Office 2003: Who still uses it?

to each his own

 

Yes, that is exactly right! I was once reluctant to upgrade to 2007 from 2003 because I was really acustomed to the menus and when the ribbon came along, I didn't know what to do! So I quickly uninstalled it... But when the school upgraded to 2007 I didn't really have a choice to which one I could use... After using it at school, I really came to like it and felt the need to upgrade, and once 2010 came along, I figured they are both similar in terms of the ribbon that the upgrade was worth it.

 

Word 2003 has something like 28,000 menu commands and options hidden in cascading menus and pop up dialog boxes, Click on the Tools Menu, Click on the Advanced Tab...then the advanced button. The XP era interfaces felt like you were boxing with the interface, bob and weave...bob and weave...

The Ribbon gives me easy access to the tools I need most, and with 2010 Backstage puts most of my advance tools with one click...

 

I agree. I think the Ribbon is very convenient. It has certainly improved how I work. Also nice is the fact that one can reduce the ribbon to maximize on screenspace as and when required.

 

they changed it because they had to, as the ui has outgrown usability by far.

here you find all info on why they changed it, every detail of it.

The Office 2007 UI Bible - Jensen Harris: An Office User Interface Blog - Site Home - MSDN Blogs

should get rid of your annoyances.

 

i use note pad. it suffices.

 

not that great for presentations, though.. and email..

but yeah, i use it often, too

 

They changed it to provide convenience to a handful of professional users and a fraction of the market that make use of certain niche functions.

Probably a good move for them business-wise, it still affects me negatively.

 

The change to ribbon is quite drastic and it affects lots of people(just think about those books, classes teaching office).

However, I have to agree with others that once you get use to the new interface, they are much better than the old one. That would take a few years to have this 'ribbon' to settle into the majority office users mind.

 

it's been four years
still not used to it

 

you can't get used to it as long as you moan about it. first thing you have to do is to get rid of the hate. only then, you can actually start seeing how much you benefit from it. till then, have fun hating it and talking about "it was all better in the past".

 

Yeah the ribbon can be a big change for some. If youve been using 03 interface for so long, then you might find yourself resistant to change.

Personally the ribbon interface doesnt really bother me because im used to using hotkeys and macros.

and I do like the new Outlook

 

Does the ribbon still has to be at top or can be put at sides? 16:9 screens don't work well with top ribbons.

 

You can use Ctrl + F1 to hide the ribbon until you need to use one of the commands. Works well on my notebook with 16:9. Especially when working in Excel.

 

or doubleclick on the ribbon tabs, or in office 2010 use the little arrow on the top right..

yeah, very handy for 16:9 screens.

 

I would not want to hide it. I have screen size to have it open on sides. Guess it is not flexible, same crap with Autodesk 3Dsmax ribbon.

 

I am a bit puzzled here. On my Office 2010, the ribbon is not there until I select one of the top menu which I find it to be pretty handy.

Sure having an option to place it on the side may be more flexible(especially we have wider and wider screen nowadays) but would that be even more drastic as most windows applications would still place the key feature lists on the top ?

 

they tested it on the side, but the results where that users find it very confusing. so they made the hide-solution instead. users preferred it in many tests over the sidebar-solution.

 

Thanks for the info. I'll continue in Open Office.