Mac Office gets service pack update

Microsoft is releasing the second service pack update to Office 2008 for Mac, the company said Monday.

The free update, which is expected to be available later on Monday from Microsoft's Web site, is designed to improve speed and stability as well as add new features for connecting to SharePoint servers and to Microsoft's Office Live Workspaces.

"With SP2 we are not only delivering on top customer requests midcycle, but also taking a first step in bringing Microsoft software plus services to Mac users," senior product manager Mike Tedesco said in a statement. "This connection unlocks the door for Mac users to Microsoft services for easier collaboration and file sharing with colleagues, customers and classmates."

With the update, Mac Office users will be able to save documents to Office Live Workspace. The site also is expanding its Mac browser support to include Safari 4, in addition to Firefox.

Microsoft declined to offer any details on the next major release of Office for the Mac, but a representative said that the company is "on track with the next release and that is based on the standard 2-3 year release cycle."

Office 2008 was released in January of last year.

[cs2cdfan]

Maybe they activated hyperlinks in Entourage, I still can't belive you can't place hyperlinking in an e-mail.

Microsoft makes sure they keep the Mac Office crippled in some way.

Also notice when you install Mac Office, the icons on the doc spells out "WXPE" which are the programs "Word" "Excel" "Powerpoint" and " Entourage" but if you spell it out it says "Windows XP".

I love the humor in redmond.

[Mr. Dee]

Where is the 'E' in Windows XP? Have you ever thought that maybe it was coincidental?

[lennie22]

I guess he thinks the P and the E goes together so it still gives a "pee" sound....windowsXPee.

[Zoobie]

I didn't install Entourage on my Mac, so it's just WXP.

Maybe a coincidence, but it's still funny. Maybe the E stands for "Eternal" as in it won't die because so many people refuse to upgrade.

[sciontcya]

I love the fact that you're obviously a test-user for the medical marijuana campaign...

[Zanny_Blowzsteve]

"Microsoft makes sure they keep the Mac Office crippled in some way." .... Uh, isn't it being on a Mac being crippled enough already?

[monkeyfun14]

Oh I know cause all Apple makes wonderfully working software for PC?

Everything they make for PC uses half the CPU and eats a chunk of your ram

[thabassman]

finally firefox support.

[Pishkado]

The biggest crippling factor in Office for Mac has always been the complete absence of Access. That alone keeps Macs out of many business environments - as Microsoft knows. If anyone developed a really good Access engine (not just database content, but screens, forms, queries, the whole bit) for Mac, even if it was limited to running existing databases developed in a Windows environment, it would expand the potential Mac user base significantly. (I know, there's Windows emulation on Intel Macs, but if you're going to run Windows for a big chunk of what you do, it often doesn't make sense to get involved with another OS.)

[hpew]

According to Microsoft marketing, MS does not put out a Mac version of Access, because they expect most Mac users to use FileMaker.

[ITcomposer]

Indeed, might i ask how good is FILEMAKER and how compatible it is with access databases, that could be a way to solve the dilemma.

[hpew]

From what I've heard, FileMaker is a LOT easier to use than ACCESS

[Mr. Dee]

Ina, I think the next version of Office for Mac might be coming out in 2011, but that will probably depend on how ready they are, remember, they are reimplementing VB scripting in the next release, but it has to be development for the Intel platform since it was originally developed in Code Warrior.

[kaWOWski]

well it's taken 18 months to finally get Office 2008 going OK, don't rush out a new version just yet !!!