Office Shortcut Bar is ESSENTIAL -- BRING IT BACK!!!

[Brian Roden]

OK, what was the development team smoking when they decided to remove the
Office Shortcut Bar from Office 2003? Even though all the versions of
Windows (2000, XP, 2003 Server) on which Office 2003 can run support the
Quick Launch bar (which I've never liked anyway), not all PCs in large
companies are running these OSes. We still have a good number of NT 4
machines on a 5-year life cycle. Many of these will be replaced over the
next year, but some of them won't hit their retirement point until January
2005. We may be limited to running Office 97 or Office XP on those desktops,
but we want the desktop experience to be as consistent as possible across
machines, which means EVERYONE should have a nice little toolbar running
down the right-hand side of the screen. Even when people get a new PC that
supports the Quick Launch bar, we should be able to maintain the look and
feel for them (that's why we set even our XP boxes to use classic folders
and the classic desktop).

Microsoft really dropped the ball on this one.

 

[Art Farmer]

You said it, wait till I meet the guy who suggested I upgrade to Off 11 2003

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Art

 

[Bob Buckland ?:-\)]

Hi Brian,

As workarounds you can use a custom install to
add the Office Shortcut Bar from an older version of Office
or add a 3rd party toolbar such as
http://jetaudio.com/products/jettoolbar

The Office Shortcut Bar has been somewhat broken since
Office 97 (didn't play well with other apps that
also wanted to be 'always on top', for example).

========
OK, what was the development team smoking when they decided to remove the
Office Shortcut Bar from Office 2003? Even though all the versions of
Windows (2000, XP, 2003 Server) on which Office 2003 can run support the
Quick Launch bar (which I've never liked anyway), not all PCs in large
companies are running these OSes. We still have a good number of NT 4
machines on a 5-year life cycle. Many of these will be replaced over the
next year, but some of them won't hit their retirement point until January
2005. We may be limited to running Office 97 or Office XP on those desktops,
but we want the desktop experience to be as consistent as possible across
machines, which means EVERYONE should have a nice little toolbar running
down the right-hand side of the screen. Even when people get a new PC that
supports the Quick Launch bar, we should be able to maintain the look and
feel for them (that's why we set even our XP boxes to use classic folders
and the classic desktop).

Microsoft really dropped the ball on this one. >>
--
I hope this helps you,

Bob Buckland ?
MS Office System Products MVP

*Courtesy is not expensive and can pay big dividends*

The Office 2003 System parts explained
http://microsoft.com/uk/office/preview/system.asp

MS on 'Why Office System 2003'
http://microsoft.com/mscorp/execmail/2003/10-13productivity.asp