Microsoft Office Professional 2010 with Word 2010, Excel 2010, PowerPoint 2010, Publisher 2010, Outlook 2010, Access 2010 and OneNote 2010
By Howard Berenbon
Microsoft Office 2010 is the newest edition of one of the most widely used business suites for the PC. It’s just about all the applications you’ll need to make your office “sing” including Word 2010, for almost any type of document, simple or graphical, Excel spreadsheet to record, manipulate and analyze data, PowerPoint for that perfect graphical presentation and Outlook, for Internet e-mail communication with calendar, contacts, time management, Access for business data management and more. Over the years, various incarnations of Microsoft office applications have become a mainstay for any business, small or corporate, in this age of personal computers. It’s hard to imagine using a mechanical typewriter to create documents and presentations, but before Microsoft and other early word processors, that was it. Now, you wouldn’t think of running a business without a personal computer.
I originally reviewed Microsoft Office Professional 2007 in July of 2009 (we reviewed Office 2000 in April 2001), with their controversial and bold new re-design using The Ribbon interface with Tabs to access commands, which I found very easy to use, but different from what I was used to in their earlier office products. Now, the new Office 2010 looks and feels a lot like Office 2007, but with lots of improvements and a correction or two.
Office History Timeline
Microsoft office has been the main productivity program used by most businesses since 1992, which always included the Microsoft Word, will was and has been the best word processing program available since the introduction of the personal computer.
Office 3.0 was first released for Windows and Macintosh in August 1992 which included Word 2.0, PowerPoint 4.0 and Microsoft Mail. Office 4 to 4.3 was released in 1994 which included Word 6.0, Excel 5.0, PowerPoint 4.0, Mail 3.2 and in the Pro version, Access 2.0. Office 95 with Word 7 in 1995; Office 96 in December 1996, Office 2000 in January 1999; Office XP in May 2001; Office 2003 in November 2003; Office 2007 in January 2007 and Office 2010 in June 2010.
What’s New and Improved
Microsoft Office has improved from 2007 to 2010. You’ll find a built-in screen capture tool, a background removal tool, a protected document mode and some new SmartArt templates. Also, new is a replacement for the “Office Button” in 2007 to a menu button that takes you to a full-window file menu called Backstage View allow easy access to some important functions like printing and sharing. Also, the Ribbon interface has also been modified, and appears in Outlook, OneNote, Project and Publisher. If you’re using Windows 7, Office 2010 has functional Jumplists for access to recent items. And more: Live collaboration functions and some new animations for PowerPoint. Also, the new File menu tab is more like the older style menu from earlier versions of Office and other Microsoft products.
Installation and Use
This installation was from a download at Microsoft.com with a single license key, which went well, though I did opt to purchase a backup CD just in case I ran into problems later (hard drive or system problems).
If you haven’t used any of the newer versions of Office then the new Ribbon menu may not feel right, but you’ll get used to it. More features and functions are available on screen, and that helps save time, and the screen is easier to read. And Help is so much easier to access for all of the products in the suite.
Microsoft Word 2010
Word 2010 has everything you need to create most documents for your business, personal and creative projects (maybe you’re writing that great American novel, a personal letter, or documentation for a business product). Word allows you to add and remove text, graphics, change fonts and character size, right at the spot you’re editing. You can add graphics and save your files in various formats including PDF, the default Word format, as a template, for use in older Word versions and more. Other features allow you to check and correct spelling errors (even as you're typing), get some advice on grammar and look up the best word in the thesaurus. If you use other languages to communicate, like German, French, Italian or Spanish, Word supports you with language specific proofing tools for checking and correcting spelling and grammar. It supports more than 80 languages including Arabic, Hebrew, Japanese, Korean and Chinese, and over 200 if you count the different language dialects. Now with the new and improved tab menu system, it’s quick and easy to get to the spelling, grammar and translate features. At the top of the page you’ll see the new Ribbon Interface with File, Home, Insert, Page Layout, References, Mailings, Review, View, Add-Ins. To get to the Thesaurus, just click on the Review tab, highlight the word you want to replace, and then click on Thesaurus at the top left. A vertical Research box will open on the right and you’ll see the related word.
Word 2010 also makes it easy to add and create tables, add photos, shapes, clip art, WordArt, add Internet hyperlinks and much more. All these enhancements are easy to access just by clicking on the Insert tab menu. When you’re done creating your document, it’s simple to save and print. To save, just click on File Tab at the top of the screen and you have access to several menu options including printing and saving. One nice and needed new feature allows you to open more than one document at a time so you can cut and paste data from one to another easily. Word 2010 is a powerful word processor that lets you design complicated pages with text and graphics that you can use for publishing.
Word 2010 now offers some new photo-editing features, text effects you can use for online content and allows for collaboration with other users. Also new is the ability to capture and add screenshots into you documents and add SmartArt graphics to your bullet-point lists.
Microsoft Excel 2010
Excel 2010 is the latest spreadsheet application from Microsoft used to help with repetitive calculations for all kinds of applications from home use (maybe budgeting) or business applications (to track receipts and expenses). A single spreadsheet, or worksheet, can hold thousands of cells of data in the form of numbers, text and mathematical formulas, each located by its column and row. Simple and complex applications can be designed for your home or business needs including data lists, reports and complex accounting systems with charts and graphs. The chart feature, accessed from the Insert tab, offers more chart options than ever including Column, Line, Pie, Bar, Area, Scatter and more. You can design your own spreadsheet with included templates, or purchase spreadsheets already designed spreadsheets you can modify for your application. One of many useful applications is a spreadsheet to predict future sales from past data using a bar chart so you can visualize those projections. All functions are available from the top tabular menus, with File, Home, Insert, Page Layout, Formulas, Data, References, Review, View, Add-Ins and Acrobat. Excel 2010 has new and improved Conditional Formatting options and new filter enhancement in PivotTable views for faster results.
Microsoft PowerPoint 2010
PowerPoint 2010 lets you design professional looking presentations for business or education. You’ll build your slides, one by one, adding text, graphics, tables, charts, animation, music and sounds (voice and sound effects) until you've created that perfect presentation. And, with PowerPoint 2010, you can add video to get your point across, a very nice addition. Also new is the ability to broadcast your presentation online using the Broadcast Slide Show function. After you run the program you see the new Ribbon menu interface system at the top of the page with Home, Insert, Design, Transitions, Animations, Slide Show, Review and View tabs. You also find new and improved transitions and animations to help you make those slides just right. PowerPoint 2010 is easier to use than earlier PowerPoint programs, but if you need Help fast, click on the “?” in the upper right hand corner of the screen.
Microsoft Publisher 2010
Microsoft Publisher 2010 will let you typeset your documents for print or online publishing (brochures, newsletters, emails, catalogs and more). It includes a great library of pre-formatted design templates so you can just drop in your text and graphics, and customize the look you want. Publisher now includes and enhanced Print Preview, and some new OpenType fonts.
Microsoft Outlook 2010
Outlook 2010 is Microsoft's business e-mail client offering e-mail and more, plus some new improvements from Outlook 2007. The best new feature is the Conversation View, which places all the replies to a message into a single list, eliminating the inbox full of "Re:" Outlook has everything you need to work online and off including a calendar, contact list, tasks and appointments. After you run Outlook and set up your e-mail account, you’ll see their new Ribbon interface with tabs for File, Home Send/Receive, Folder and View plus more function buttons below each of the tabs. This is a great improvement over Outlook 2007. Also, your Help button, the “?”, is available at the top right corner, just in case you’ve got some questions.
Microsoft Access 2010
Access is Microsoft’s premier business database manager. It’s a powerful program that can be used as is, out of the box, for many database management needs, or it’s versatile enough to allow a database design specialized for a particular business. Use it to track inventory, customer information, data trends and all types of business information. Here’s what’s new to Access: more pre-build database templates and easier to use, ability to access reports using multiple data connections and linked information, and more.
OneNote 2010
This application is used to share, organize and edit business information online with other group project members, and has been improved in Office 2010. After you run the program the Ribbon Interface at the top displays: File, Home, Insert, Share, Draw, Review and View and displays a General tab with what you can do and how to do it. To the far right you can click on buttons for OneNote Basics, Top Uses and What’s New.
Microsoft Office 2010 offers a great set productivity programs for any home or business application. It sells for $408.99 and will run on any multimedia PC, 500 MHz processor or higher, Windows 7, Windows XP with Service Pack 3, Vista, 256 MB RAM , 1.5 GB hard disk space, supported browsers for Web apps: Internet Explorer, Safari and Firefox, with a 1024x768 resolution monitor and a CD-ROM or DVD drive. For more information, or to order, visit Amazon.com.
Howard Berenbon
Software Companies Mentioned
Microsoft Corporation
One Microsoft Way
Redmond, WA 98052
Phone: 1-206-882-8080
URL office.microsoft.com
