New Version of Office for Mac is Due

For quite some time, the biggest complaint that consumers had about Mac computers was that they were not compatible with Microsoft Office. This was not necessarily because Microsoft Office was the most superior word processing software to ever grace the industry, but perhaps because Office was so widely used. Office continues to be the word processing program used by most consumers today. Many schools and professions, in fact, require their students and employees to submit projects in Word documents. Of course, Apple responded to this issue by collaborating with Microsoft to create Office for Mac.

Office for Mac altogether eliminated any shortcoming that Apple computers may have had. By providing a way for consumers to install Office on their Mac computers, an avenue opened up for consumers to channel all of the benefits of a Mac while still having the option to utilize Office. Office for Mac provided consumers with the best of both worlds, so to speak. And now, Office for Mac 2011 is in the development stage to bring consumers an even better version of this product.

Presently, one of the key differences between Office for Mac and Office for PCs is that Office for Mac doesn’t offer Outlook. To many consumers this matters not, but there are those that would stand to benefit quite a bit from having Outlook offered as part of Office for Mac. Outlook is the program that manages calendar events and emails. Office for Mac offers a similar program, called Entourage, but the two programs are not entirely compatible. So this presents problems for consumers who use Outlook on a work computer and Entourage on a home computer because there is no way for them to sync their home and work calendars. Apple and Microsoft intend to remedy this situation with Office for Mac 2011.

Windows for Mac is also intended to have improvements that will ideally make this version of Windows similar to the version that is presently used on PCs. For instance, Windows for Mac will have a new user interface that has been received warmly by PC users. Additionally, Windows for Mac will support Web Apps that have only been compatible with Windows for Office. These changes will likely bring much improvement to Office for Mac.

The question that many consumers are asking is whether Microsoft will make an Office Suite that is compatible with other Apple products, such as the iPhone or iPod Touch. There are many who would be thrilled at the prospect of syncing their iPhone with their Office Suite. When asked whether Microsoft is considering such an idea, a top employee at Microsoft responded that the idea has not been ruled out. It may be that in the years to come, Office finds its way into all of Apple’s products.