Microsoft Office 2000 Product Review

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Microsoft Office 2000
Product Review

Introduction

On June 10th, 1999, Microsoft Corporation released one of the most significant and impressive software upgrades in recent history: Microsoft Office 2000. This brief report is provided to offer you a quick overview of some features and how they might improve your productivity and the quality of your life.

Index

Overview of Significant Features

	Access 2000
	Excel 2000
	FrontPage 2000
	Map Point 2000
	Outlook 2000
	PhotoDraw 2000 (Design and image editing)
	PowerPoint 2000 (Presentation Software
	Publisher 2000
	Small Business Tools 2000 (Business Management and Planning)
	Word 2000

Time Saving Features

Philosophical Analysis

	How Organizational, Administrative, and Management Paradigms Have Shaped the Computer Industry
	The Democratization of Technology
	The Information Age
	Fashion Statement
	Benefit to Leadership
	Conclusion

Thank You

QuickLinks©

Summary

We believe that the enhancements found in Microsoft Office 2000 will save you time and money while at the same time increasing collaborative effectiveness and creativity. Here is a summary of just a few of the Microsoft Office enhancements applied to real-life examples:

	Collaboration. Office 2000 will allow two or more people to work together on projects more effectively, such as editing a book. Documents can be privately placed on the Internet for group editing.
	Education. Students can collaborate in teams on projects and collectively add to Internet information. Student papers can be placed on the Internet for other students and teachers to comment.
	Internet. Web site publishing is much easier; making it possible to do more work, with more flare, in less time.
	Mapping. Click on an address in any program and street level mapping is displayed including routing information. Demographic analysis can be viewed based on included data or using your own list of customers.
	Information Organization. Create your own customizable desktop "web page" in Outlook that displays schedules, data, maps, documents, images, and other information from the Internet, local hard drive, or networked computers.
	International. As you begin typing in a language, Microsoft Word will automatically identify what language you are typing in and begin spell checking in that language. A database or project created in the United States will be fully functional on a computer running a foreign version of Office 2000.

What's Included

The premier version of Office 2000 will include the following collection of integrated programs:

	Access 2000
	Excel 2000
	Outlook 2000
	Map Point 2000
	PhotoDraw 2000 (Design and Image Editing)
	PowerPoint 2000 (Presentation Software)
	Publisher 2000
	Small Business Tools (Business Management and Planning)
	Word 2000

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To purchase Microsoft Office, visit our online computer store [click here]
or contact us today [click here] and we'll assist you via e-mail or phone.

In The News

On Monday, June 7th, 1999, the Mayor of San Francisco, William L. Brown Jr., declared the week to be Microsoft Office 2000 week in his introduction of Microsoft's president, Steve Ballmer. In Ballmer's keynote address, he said that Office 2000 is designed for "knowledge workers" who work "organically" from the bottom up rather than from the top down.

Currently, over 80% of all computer information in the world is in Microsoft Office documents, yet many companies are not able to easily access information. Over 100 million computers were sold last year, more than the number of bicycles sold in the same year. Top educators are saying that "Office 2000 will change the way students learn and faculty teach." By this time next year, the Microsoft Campus will be entirely wireless with 5 megabit per second networking anywhere you go on campus. The exact same programming code will be used for the various International versions of Office 2000, so the program will work the same everywhere in the world.

Overview of Significant Features

A complete listing of details about Office 2000 can be found at the Microsoft site [click here]. We're highlighting a few features that we feel will be most significant for our readers (educators, ministers, activists, pastors, Rabbis, students, and entrepreneurs).

ACCESS 2000

DATABASE information can easily be placed on the Internet for visitors to lookup information.

EXCEL 2000

SPREADSHEET information can easily be placed on the Internet for visitors to lookup information. The interactive capabilities make it possible to create an online interactive order form where the visitor can select items and quantities having the total automatically calculated for them.

FRONT PAGE 2000

We use FrontPage 98 to maintain the entire Resources for Life web site.

THEMES control the way your web site appears: fonts, colors, bullets, dividing lines, background, etc. Now you can customize a theme and apply that across all of your other Office documents.

MAP POINT 2000

	EXTENSIVE DEMOGRAPHIC information is included with MapPoint 2000 allowing detailed market information to be displayed using maps.
	EXISTING DATA can be displayed on a map. For example, a map of the United States could show states color coded based on the number of people in your mailing list who live in each state.
	MAPPING TO HTML content is easily done. Click here for a sample of HTML generated by Map Point 2000.

OUTLOOK 2000

Outlook 2000 is the central hub of Office 2000. It contains schedules, project lists, e-mail messages, contacts, and other information.

	OUTLOOK TODAY is a one page view of your daily schedule, things to do, and other information of your choice. You can even display Internet information such as weather maps or traffic cam images (cameras that view and show traffic congestion over the Internet).
	INTERNET BROWSING from within Outlook 2000 is now possible, so you can search and view Internet information without running a separate program like Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator.
	CALENDAR. Group scheduling is made much easier. Personal or group calendars can be published to the Internet in very professional and easy to read format.
	SHARING FILES. If you receive a file attachment from a program you don’t have, Windows can automatically install a translator to read that document.

PHOTO DRAW 2000 (Design and Image Editing)

INTERNET graphics are frequently so large that they require extra time to download. PhotoDraw 2000 optimizes graphics for the Internet. Extensive editing and 3D tools are also available. It is even possible to remove scratches and other defects from photos.

POWER POINT 2000 (Presentation Software)

INTERNET support has been expanded in PowerPoint to create very colorful and interactive Internet presentations. A slide show can be accompanied by a synchronized video presentation and / or audio. Live video broadcasting over the Internet is also available.

PUBLISHER 2000

WEB DEVELOPMENT & BUSINESS PRINTING has been enhanced.

SMALL BUSINESS TOOLS 2000 (Business Management and Planning)

EXTENSIVE CUSTOMER AND FINANCIAL analysis can be performed using these special tools answering questions such as: Who are our best customers? What financial trends should we be monitoring? With these tools, you could create a letter to everyone who has purchased a specific book. Or, if you find that 80% of your financial support comes from 20% of your supporters, you can make slight adjustments to be more responsive and communicative to that 20% group.

BUSINESS PLANS and other legal documents for setting up and running a successful business are included as well as links to Internet resources.

WORD 2000

	COPY AND PASTE can retain multiple items (text, spreadsheets, images) for later retrieval.
	TABLES are floating and text can wrap around them.
	GROUP EDITING is enhanced with "discussion threads." Various editors can comment on a document which is shared over the Internet.
	"ROUND TRIP" editing allows the user to open an Internet document in Microsoft Word (for example) and edit it as though it were the original Word document and then publish it back to the Internet.
	FOREIGN LANGUAGE support is available. When you start typing in Spanish, German, or various other languages, Microsoft Word automatically recognizes and switches into that language including active spell checking.
	CLIP ART is managed much better. Once you find a clip art image that you like, you can search for others of the same style to maintain continuity in your document.

Time Saving Features

If any part of Office 2000 stops working because a files has been corrupted or accidentally deleted, it automatically "heals" itself by installing the necessary program files.

Philosophical Analysis

How Organizational, Administrative, and Management Paradigms Have Shaped the Computer Industry

In the recent history of politics and power in the world of computing there has been a trend away from the top down management pyramid structures characterized by the mainframe computers of the 1970s and 1980s. This top-down pyramid structure reflected the dominant organizational structure of corporate America at the time. However, this structure is rapidly changing to reflect more efficient and creative horizontal teamwork models.

The personal computer was a very powerful tool when it was first introduced, but it didn't bring large groups of people together. It was not a democratic technology. Different systems couldn't talk to one another and the high cost prohibited many people from owning a computer. The ability to access and control information remained in the hands of the power elite.

The Democratization of Technology

The television is very much a product of and for the benefit of wealthy capitalists. Traditional television technology permits a small number of people in power to tell the masses what to think, do, and buy. It doesn't allow the masses to voice an opinion. It permits a great deal of control over information dissemination by those who are in control. In this way, traditional television broadcasting has the ability to create hoards of drone "worker bees" and pacify large populations into a sleepy existence. Televisions do not have keyboards, microphones, scanners, voice recognition, mouse, and other tools for input, user control, or user feedback. The television doesn't give the user much control over the content or programming which is force fed. Televisions are not designed to foster creativity or individual expression. Many people can afford a television, yet only the wealthy have the finances to purchase a television station or to advertise. Equal Access and Public Access concepts attempt to deal with this unequal balance of powers, yet they operate under limited budgets.

Today it is possible for just about anyone to purchase a personal computer for the price of a VCR and television set. For about $20 per month, anyone can have full access to the Internet and create their own Internet web page. This breakthrough makes powerful technology available to just about anyone.

While the personal computer is technically capable of empowering individual creativity and small group collaborative work, for many years software was incapable of serving these needs. Microsoft Office 2000 does much to enhance and advance the "democratization of technology" making it possible for the masses to access and present a wide variety of ideas and information. It allows groups of people to easily work together.

The Information Age

In the industrial age, a small minority of people controlled a huge amount of capital and wealth. This gave them great political power as well. Workers had no ownership or influence.

As the information age continues to unfold, there are many forces at work which would like to gain control and power. There are people in power who would like to commercialize the Internet. They would like to purchase it and control it. They would like to control who uses it and what is on it. Like the television, they would like computers and the Internet to be their tools to control what people think, what they do, and what they buy. They envision computers without keyboards saying, "Why should the end user need a keyboard? What might they have to say? Would we even listen or respond?"

Yet, greater forces are at work, Microsoft being one of them, which have a different vision of the future. Microsoft and others see an information age which is "of the people, by the people, and for the people." Many companies are making an effort to keep Internet access free. Some companies are even offering free computers. In a world where information is a commodity, socialism seems to be the prevailing socio-economic paradigm.

The computer is basically a television with a keyboard to accommodate user input, feedback, and control. The television has evolved because our world has evolved. It is the answer to those who have wanted to know "How to Talk Back to Your Television Set." [Elephant Books] The answer is, you transform it into a personal computer. There are still those who don't want to talk back to their television sets and yet others who don't see why people aren't content to just sit and watch television.

Fashion Statement

At product launches and other events, Microsoft employees (men and women) can be seen wearing khaki pants and blue oxford button-down shirts. This was the "uniform" of the working class in China and for many people the style still symbolizes a recognition of the working class. In the 1970s there was a resurgence of khaki and blue in the United States among many who were making a social statement about classism and the need for socio-economic democratization and equality. It is a quasi-Amish mode of dress which accentuates the equality and importance of all people. It fosters unity.

In our society, and the computer industry in specific, people want to wear suits and ties to show that they are not just one of the working class, but they are somebody important and wealthy. Microsoft's dress code confronts this theology head on and makes a bold statement about corporate administrative dynamics and what it means to be successful. In Microsoft's paradigm, the image of success is equated with the working class person in China who is content to be part of a horizontal team. Their choice of clothing accents the philosophy behind their software.

Benefit to Leadership

People in positions of leadership will greatly appreciate the tools available in Microsoft Office 2000 which allow for better monitoring and coaching of teams. In addition, teams and individuals are able to be more accountable to those they are serving. Communications channels are opened up between all levels of an organization. Teams and individuals are given the tools that encourage personal growth and creativity.

Conclusion

The computing concepts of information retrieval and dissemination in Office 2000 are so revolutionary, it's quite possible that some of the features will require a paradigm shift for long-term computer users or people over the age of 24. While accessible to baby boomers, this new product is written with the flare, creativity, and dynamic interoperability that caters to the lifestyle and thought process of the "Generation X."

We feel that the most significant aspects of Microsoft Office 2000 will go unreported in technical journals. That is, the democratization of technology and how Microsoft Corporation will change the way companies work, the way people interact, and the way the world works together for a better tomorrow.

Thank You

Thanks for taking time to read our review. Feel free to contact us if you have any questions about Microsoft Office 2000. [Feedback] Also, please let us know if you find any errors in this report or if you have any suggestions or comments.

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