Microsoft delays Office 2007 again

Microsoft said Thursday that it is making another slight delay to the planned arrival time for Office 2007, citing performance concerns with recent test versions.

The software maker now plans to finish the code for the revamped Office suite by the end of the year, rather than in October, the date it set in March. The company said in March that it would wait to start selling Office until January, to coincide with the launch of Windows Vista. Now, though, it says Office may not be ready for store shelves until "early 2007."

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What do you make of the latest delay to Office 2007?

Microsoft can't be trusted to keep to a release date.
Give them a break--it makes sense to wait until the code is right.
Who cares? I'd rather use alternatives.

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"Based on internal testing and the beta 2 feedback around product performance, we are revising our development schedule to deliver the 2007 system release by the end of year 2006, with broad general availability in early 2007," a Microsoft representative said in an e-mail. "Feedback on quality and performance will ultimately determine the exact dates."

It was not immediately clear how the Office delay would affect Microsoft's Vista plans or a potential joint product launch. Many outsiders have already said they expect the Windows update to also be delayed beyond January, but Microsoft has yet to acknowledge a further delay.

"We are assessing the impact this timing change will have to our specific launch plans," a Windows unit representative said, adding that Microsoft is "still targeting January for general consumer availability."

Gartner analyst Michael Silver noted that the delay in Office could hit some businesses hard, particularly those that signed volume license contracts in late 2003. Such Enterprise Agreement or Software Assurance contracts offer, among other things, the right to any new versions of the product that come out over a period of time, typically three years.

Video: Microsoft Office 2007 beta 2
Changes in Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Outlook

"Each month they miss is another group of customers that renewed EA or SA in 2003 that got no new version of Office for their payments," Silver said. "It was just March when Microsoft emphatically stated that Office 2007 would be on the October price list. Even at close range, they can't forecast this stuff."

Microsoft said that the final delivery of both Office and Vista will be dependent on the code reaching certain quality levels. It said it expects to release the first, near-final release candidate of Windows Vista in the third quarter of this year.

Microsoft said earlier Thursday that it had nearly reached its self-imposed limit for testers of the current Windows Vista beta, with plans to stop allowing new downloads after Friday. In addition to the publicly available beta 2 version of Office, Microsoft this week made available a Web-based test version of the software.

[kamwmail-cnet1]

There's no delay. OpenOffice 2.0 handles everything.

It does the same thing as MS Office. Has the general "office" interfaces of MS and Lotus. And it's encryption is tougher than MS. And it's out now and it's FREE. Best of all, it doesn't send private info from your PC to MS.

[catch23]

Really? I use a lot of Automation

and COM interfaces into Office. Can I just put OO in and have it work? (the answer is, of course, no).
I have a lot of complex documents (Word docs with embedded Excel pulling data from ODBC sources). Can it handle that? (again, no; at least not without basically recreating the doc)

OO is a great program. I use it at home. If you just need a type writer, your insane to pay for Office. But please don't make claims that are blatantly false.
Also, Office doesn't send data from my PC to MS either. Even WGA called home to read info from home, not send info to it. Just another lie to prop up your ignorant bigotry.

[ServedUp]

How Accountable are they?

Nothing new.

But does anybody really care anymore?

Truth is how accountable are they? Not only for their product
releases but for their cutsomers and for the industry in general.

Their clearly not being an industry leader at all and this article
proves it. And Steve Ballmer has the audacity to call themselves
innovative.

But...

On the upside atleast they have flip3d and gadgets.. lol

[metsrok]

Re: How accountable are they?

I don't understand you people that complain about how Microsot never delievers on time; if they don't deliever on time, you complain. If they do and there are bugs, you complain. I'd much rather wait a few more weeks for a good product than use a shoddy product just so they can ship on time.

Get over it, it's a large company with large products that have large ship cycles.

[befuddledms]

why does MS use years in their product names?

Why do they continually use a projected year for a new release of their products. They should just call it MS Office TBD.

[mystereojones]

Message has been deleted.

[Eggs Ackley]

Someone please post ...

... if you were counting on this release and explain why you're disappointed by the delay. {-O

[kamwmail-cnet1]

More Like NO ONE is counting on this release.

So no one was disappointed.

Microsoft hasn't come up with a must have Office release for half a decade now. In fact, the newer releases gets more complicated to do the same thing. And the spreadsheet/doc file sizes gets larger for no apparent reason.

[Captain_Spock]

"if you were counting on this release..."

... absolutely not; a review of both OpenOffice.org 2.0.3 and the Online Version of MS Office has indicated that their developers have of late now decided to talk with the "financial" folks and they have hurried to replace the formulas that they both might have overlooked when they were "copying" from Lotus SmartSuite. Now, what happens to the users who do not have a clue about the meaning and relevance of terminologies such as Internal Rate of Return (IRR), Net Present Value (NPV), Discounted Cash Flow Rate Of Return (DCFROR)...; and, how many users will be utilizing these newly integrated formulas. Now, also add the time (of the learning curves) and the cost of training for this product (MS Office) roll-out!!! Lastly, the big question is - when will developers from Open Office.org and Microsoft sit down with the "international financial and economic folks" regarding the integration of the functionalities for the conversion to Economic Rate of Return (ERR) not that they have (the developers from those companies in question) come to understand the values of the former (IRR, NPV, DCFROR...)! Maybe I may be in a better position to six months from now if updates by then fulfill current limitations!