Office 2003 appearance

[Uooosh]

Hi, my friends!

I've just installed Office 2003 and I'm shocked. Is this Office or
is it a videogame? What is this bubbly look? Isn't Office meant to
produce serious things like professional documents, presentations and
so on? This is not serious... Indeed!

Well, before going back to the elegant and serious Office 2000, I
have a last hope that Office 2003 becomes something usable (yes, I
can't concentrate when I'm expecting an enemy soldier or monster
coming from the print button, so I can't use it efficiently). That
last hope is you.

Yes, my friends! I wonder if do you know a way to get Office 2003 look
like a Windows native application and not resemble a cubist picture. I
know (because I've conducted some searches on Goggle) that one can
configure Office 2003 look through Windows' appearance settings. That
operation, sadly, only changes the colors of Office apps, but they
keep getting "decorated" in such a Picasso style. I'm on Windows 2000
and, of course, using the Windows Standard color scheme, which makes
the thing even more sad.

Bill Gates should fire inmediately the Einstein who designed this
crime against usability.

Help, please, help!

 

[Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]]

Sorry, I like it just the way it is. I would suggest going back to Office
2000, or even XP if the appearance is so offensive. You would have done
better to watch a few web demos of Office 2003 to observe the interface
prior to buying to avoid the cost.

You can, however, return Office 2003 to Microsoft within 30 days for a full
refund.


--
Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]

Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact. All
unsolicited mail sent to my personal account will be deleted without
reading.

After furious head scratching, Uooosh asked:

| Hi, my friends!
|
| I've just installed Office 2003 and I'm shocked. Is this Office or
| is it a videogame? What is this bubbly look? Isn't Office meant to
| produce serious things like professional documents, presentations and
| so on? This is not serious... Indeed!
|
| Well, before going back to the elegant and serious Office 2000, I
| have a last hope that Office 2003 becomes something usable (yes, I
| can't concentrate when I'm expecting an enemy soldier or monster
| coming from the print button, so I can't use it efficiently). That
| last hope is you.
|
| Yes, my friends! I wonder if do you know a way to get Office 2003 look
| like a Windows native application and not resemble a cubist picture. I
| know (because I've conducted some searches on Goggle) that one can
| configure Office 2003 look through Windows' appearance settings. That
| operation, sadly, only changes the colors of Office apps, but they
| keep getting "decorated" in such a Picasso style. I'm on Windows 2000
| and, of course, using the Windows Standard color scheme, which makes
| the thing even more sad.
|
| Bill Gates should fire inmediately the Einstein who designed this
| crime against usability.
|
| Help, please, help!

 

[Peter Foldes]

I do not find it so. I have Off2000 on another system and Off2003 on the other ones. 2003 to me is a much better and gives a lot more that Office 2000. Change = Evolution and that has always been so in life

 

[Carey Frisch [MVP]]

Change Office's appearance
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HP010439961033.aspx

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User
Microsoft Newsgroups

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

:

| Hi, my friends!
|
| I've just installed Office 2003 and I'm shocked. Is this Office or
| is it a videogame? What is this bubbly look? Isn't Office meant to
| produce serious things like professional documents, presentations and
| so on? This is not serious... Indeed!
|
| Well, before going back to the elegant and serious Office 2000, I
| have a last hope that Office 2003 becomes something usable (yes, I
| can't concentrate when I'm expecting an enemy soldier or monster
| coming from the print button, so I can't use it efficiently). That
| last hope is you.
|
| Yes, my friends! I wonder if do you know a way to get Office 2003 look
| like a Windows native application and not resemble a cubist picture. I
| know (because I've conducted some searches on Goggle) that one can
| configure Office 2003 look through Windows' appearance settings. That
| operation, sadly, only changes the colors of Office apps, but they
| keep getting "decorated" in such a Picasso style. I'm on Windows 2000
| and, of course, using the Windows Standard color scheme, which makes
| the thing even more sad.
|
| Bill Gates should fire inmediately the Einstein who designed this
| crime against usability.
|
| Help, please, help!

 

[Uooosh]

On Sat, 27 Aug 2005 08:15:52 -0700, "Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]"

Hi Milly! Thank you for your interest!

I would suggest going back to Office 2000, or even XP

Yes. I'm going back to Office 2000. XP is even worse than 2003!

Be happy! If I can only be happy with Office 2003. Oh how I envy
you!

 

[Uooosh]

Change Office's appearance
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HP010439961033.aspx

Hi, Carey! this is what Office 2003 says about changing Office 2003
appearance. It is also what I said I did in my previous post. Maybe
you're reading the Usenet with Outlook 2003. That will explain the
confussion! LOL!

Anyway, thank you for your interest!

 

[Mike Hall \(MS-MVP\)]

If you were to use the classic XP interface, Office 2003 follows suit.. I
prefer the classic interface anyway..

Going back to earlier versions is a silly thing to do.. but your call..

--
Mike Hall
MVP - Windows Shell/User

On Sat, 27 Aug 2005 08:15:52 -0700, "Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]"

Hi Milly! Thank you for your interest!

I would suggest going back to Office 2000, or even XP

Yes. I'm going back to Office 2000. XP is even worse than 2003!

Be happy! If I can only be happy with Office 2003. Oh how I envy
you!

 

[Uooosh]

If you were to use the classic XP interface, Office 2003 follows suit.. I
prefer the classic interface anyway..

Hum this is very interesting. That is what I was asking for. The
fact is that I'm using the classic interface, but I'm on Windows 2000
instead of Windows XP. I guess that we are facing a subtle strategy to
force us to install Windows XP. I'm going to do it. I'll post my
feelings in a few hours!

Going back to earlier versions is a silly thing to do.. but your call.

This is not always true. The Microsoft world has eminent examples of
it. For example, Windows 2000 is zillions of times better than Windows
XP, which, using a Formula One analogy, is basically a Windows 2000
with a new colorful livery and, most importantly, a rev limiter.
Mutatis mutandis, the same happened with Windows 98 and Windows ME.

Well. I'm going to install Office 2003 on Windows XP. Pray for me!

Regards!

 

[Uooosh]

Change = Evolution and that has always been so in life

Not really. At least, not in some respects. An sculpture from Rodin
is and always will be a superior piece of art when compared to a
ready-made "sculpture" from Marcel Duchamp. Note that we were talking
about usability and aesthetical issues, not about capabilities nor
features of Office 2003.

Best wishes!

 

[Herb Tyson [MVP]]

For my part, I find the Office 2003 applications so much more robust (not to
say that they never crash, but I've found crashes to be much more
infrequent) that's it's been well worth the aesthetic transistion. I also
find that I'm using a lot of the new functionality in Office 2003, so that
it's made me more productive in what I do. The only thing I really missed
was Photo Editor, so I reinstalled just it from an earlier CD. I find that I
also use the new Picture Manager, only for different things, since it
doesn't provide the same kinds of functionality as PhotoEd, nor vice versa.

For a while, I reverted to the classic look for Office 2003 applications.
Because I need to produce screen shots for the current version, however, I
found myself switching back and forth, and eventually growing more
accustomed to the new look, so that I've left the old look behind.

--
Herb Tyson MS MVP
Please respond in the newsgroups so everyone can follow along.
http://www.herbtyson.com

If you were to use the classic XP interface, Office 2003 follows suit.. I
prefer the classic interface anyway..

Going back to earlier versions is a silly thing to do.. but your call..

--
Mike Hall
MVP - Windows Shell/User

On Sat, 27 Aug 2005 08:15:52 -0700, "Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]"

Hi Milly! Thank you for your interest!

I would suggest going back to Office 2000, or even XP

Yes. I'm going back to Office 2000. XP is even worse than 2003!

Be happy! If I can only be happy with Office 2003. Oh how I envy
you!

 

[Carey Frisch [MVP]]

For your edification:

Kernel Enhancements for Windows XP
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/driver/kernel/XP_kernel.mspx

Lab Report: Windows XP Outperforms Earlier Versions
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/evaluation/whyupgrade/performance.mspx

Lab Report: Windows XP More Reliable
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/evaluation/whyupgrade/reliability.mspx

Windows XP Professional Comparison Guide
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/evaluation/whyupgrade/featurecomp.mspx

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User
Microsoft Newsgroups

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Uooosh"wrote:

| This is not always true. The Microsoft world has eminent examples of
| it. For example, Windows 2000 is zillions of times better than Windows
| XP, which, using a Formula One analogy, is basically a Windows 2000
| with a new colorful livery and, most importantly, a rev limiter.
| Mutatis mutandis, the same happened with Windows 98 and Windows ME.
|
| Well. I'm going to install Office 2003 on Windows XP. Pray for me!
|
| Regards!

 

[Uooosh]

For your edification:

Thanks, Carey

Lab Report: Windows XP Outperforms Earlier Versions
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/evaluation/whyupgrade/performance.mspx

In that article, Windows XP is compared to Windows 98, which is a
whole different product, based on DOS, and not on NT kernel. Of
course, it outperforms it, the same way that Windows NT (which I used
for years and found always wonderful) and Windows 2000 do. The article
also states that it equals Windows 2000 performance. My experience
says that this is false: Windows XP runs significantly slower than
Windows 2000 on the same hardware (which is not a supercomputer, but
at least a reasonably fast Pentium IV @ 2.66 Ghz and 1 Gb RAM).

Lab Report: Windows XP More Reliable
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/evaluation/whyupgrade/reliability.mspx

Again, Windows XP is compared to Windows 98, which was not the same
product and was not adressed to the same market as the NT product
line, which is where XP belong to. Is ridiculously true that Windows
XP is more reliable than Windows XP, but these articles are written
for people making the transition from DOS based Windows 9x/ME to NT
based Windows XP. Nothing on these articles applies to Windows 2000,
which is what I'm using and what I claimed (and still claim) that was
superior to Windows XP.

Windows XP Professional Comparison Guide
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/evaluation/whyupgrade/featurecomp.mspx

Based on the feature chart, I'll still keep Windows 2000 on my
system (and if it was the case, I'll also keep Windows NT).. Take the
firewall as an example: there are plenty of freeware and shareware
firewalls out there. Why is the XP firewall a reason to migrate? I
can't see it...

Anyway, thank you very much for edification.

 

[Uooosh]

Is ridiculously true that Windows XP is more reliable than Windows XP

I meant "It is ridiculously true that Windows XP is more reliable
than Windows 98".

Sorry.

 

[Mike Hall \(MS-MVP\)]

Uooosh

Concepts about Win 2000 being better than XP are unfounded..

 

[Uooosh]

Well. I'm going to install Office 2003 on Windows XP. Pray for me!

Regards!

I'm back on Windows 2000 and Office 2000. I installed Office 2003 on
Windows XP. It integrates nicely with XP styles, but ignores Windows
Classica theme settings. What a pity. I'll return it to the shop and
pick WordPerfect Office 12. Maybe Office 2005 (or whatever will be the
next version) is able to respect the user's preferences in GUI
matters.

Till then, be happy!

 

[Gary Smith]

I've never seen anyting that makes me want to change from Windows 2000 and
Office 2000. I was "upgraded" to Office 2003 at work, and while there are
a few improvements over 2000, there are many pointless and annoying
differences. Maybe the next version will have something more compelling.

 

[Mike Hall \(MS-MVP\)]

Running XP in 'classic' mode makes a huge difference to the speed at which
XP responds, particularly on less well specified machines..