Help With New Computer

The paperclip and dog aren't there to help you J. They are there to help Mac users.

Turn those damn things off.

Windows search dog == bloody annoying

But I like the dog replacement for the paperclip in Office. They call him Rocky, but I call him Rufus, which I think is a great name for a dog. Rufus! Here Rufus! Sit, Rufus, sit! Well, it's better than calling your dog Dufus anyway.

You do know that you can turn the helpers off altogether right?

I don't think I've ever used them.

Yeah. I don't use them for help anyway, I just like watching the Office dog as I work. Sometimes it lays down and I find a comfy corner for it amongst my toolbars. No life, I know.

I have a brand new in the plastic Office 2003. I know I can upgrade this version for less that a full version of Office, but can I load it on more than one computer?

The Open Office looks cool, but it doesn't look like it has Outlook...

Perhaps I could use Windows Mail, which comes free and pre-installed, and is supposed to be Outlook's successor, but I don't see a place for Contacts.

Looks like there are also a number of discount dealers online. Has anyone had any experience with these?

windows mail is not an outlook replacement. It's the next version of outlook express.

Steve, MS tracks by computer and license. You will still need to buy two licenses for two machines, but you might be able to buy both as upgrade licenses and not one as upgrade and one as new. I used to hate the paperclip with a burning passion until a developer friend showed me how to permanently remove it (it wasn't optional back in the day). I remember how the little b@stard would show up when you're in the middle of something. "Dear styleforum, " Clippy: It looks like you're writing a letter! Me:No #$*@!!! GO AWAY We always had a fascination with an alternate universe clippy who really, you know, understood. "Dear Everyone, " Clippy (very happy): It looks like you're writing a suicide note! Would you like to: A. Blame your parents B. Blame your girlfriend for breaking up with you C. Wish this cruel world goodbye And we had numerous other politically incorrect things for clippy to help with. Don't know why I went off, I just totally hate that thing. Being a power user does suck with new excel (assuming theirs not hidden tricks I haven't seen), but it seems like it's moving my most common stuff to the front tab as I use it. It's all been home use so far as my work is on prior versions. I do need to uninstall the business contact manager for outlook which just keeps slowing me down.

Originally Posted by Steve B.

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The Open Office looks cool, but it doesn't look like it has Outlook...
Try OpenOffice and then Mozilla Thunderbird for mail with the Lightning plugin for calendars. Works for me.

Supposedly Open Office 3 will ship with a Thunderbird based client standard, but that is not til q3 of this year.

Count me as another big fan of Office 2007. I very much like the new versions of outlook, word and powerpoint. excel's "improvements" are o.k.

the only issue i've had with vista to date is that it will, from time-to-time experience an "unexpected error" and will proceed to shut down. that makes me a bit nervous.

I didn't like MS Office 07, had the trial. Just a bunch of new stuff that I probably won't even use. I just stuck to 03 since I had it on disk. As stated before Open Office is a good free alternative. Just get Mozilla Thunderbird instead of outlook. Of course its not as good as MS office though. If you're a student you can get Office 07 Ultimate for $60. http://www.theultimatesteal.com/home.asp

yeah just a thought Steve, you should definitely try out Open and Tunderbird before forking out the MS$. If it works for you, then great, you have got what you needed and spent nothing, and if it doesnt, uninstall it, bite the bullet and pay.

Originally Posted by m@T

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yeah just a thought Steve, you should definitely try out Open and Tunderbird before forking out the MS$. If it works for you, then great, you have got what you needed and spent nothing, and if it doesnt, uninstall it, bite the bullet and pay.

+1. I use OO at work and home, and do have MS Office installed as well. It's kind of a wash between the two for me, but I'm not a power Office user.

Thunderbird however is the ant's pants. It's a very good mail and RSS reader.

--Andre

Does T-bird do the scheduling stuff that Outlook (full) does?

Originally Posted by j

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Does T-bird do the scheduling stuff that Outlook (full) does?

It's just a mail and RSS reader, so no scheduling or any of the other PIM-like functions in Outlook.

--Andre

Originally Posted by GreyFlannelMan

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Count me as another big fan of Office 2007. I very much like the new versions of outlook, word and powerpoint. excel's "improvements" are o.k.

the only issue i've had with vista to date is that it will, from time-to-time experience an "unexpected error" and will proceed to shut down. that makes me a bit nervous.

The new access is fantastic as well. I've designed and written back-end code for SQL servers so i know a fair bit about databases, but I had never much used Access before a few months ago when was asked to make a quick and dirty database for a big reconciliation of contracts and payouts.

I'd used 2003 in the past and really hated it. The wizards in 2007 work really well and I can imagine them being very useful for a beginner. It's also much easier to create nice forms for data entry and such. Lastly, the layout of the ribbon is very logical and very easy to use. It's probably by far the easiest access ever for beginners. I am a also big fan of the new office interface in general.