SP2 promises faster MS Office
According to Microsoft the recent release of Service Pack 2 (SP2) for Microsoft’s Office 2007 suite is a step forward for interoperability, as users of Office 2007 SP2 will now be able to read, edit and save documents in a range of formats, including ODF (Open Document Format), PDF and XPS.
Office 2007’s second Service Pack has a number of feature improvements and performance tweaks, including making Outlook 36 percent quicker for users with large mailboxes says Albie Bester, head of the Information Worker unit at Microsoft South Africa.
But it’s Microsoft’s ability to work with other formats that’s the big news, says Bester. South Africa is one of many governments around the world to have a clear ODF preference, and with the addition of ODF in Office, it is now possible for public sector users to use Office and still adhere to government mandates.
Office 2007 SP2 implements ODF 1.1, the most widely adopted version of ODF in the market today. While only ODF 1.0 has been approved as an ISO standard, Microsoft decided to implement ODF 1.1 to enable the broadest interoperability with other ODF implementations.
“Customers want the ability to choose the best file format to meet their needs,” said Bester. “SP2 includes built-in support for a wider range of file formats than any other productivity suite – over 18 different file formats, including Open XML, ODF, XPS and PDF,” said Bester.
Bester says the main improvements that customers will notice with SP2 are the performance and stability of Outlook, better charting functionality in Excel, and more control over the appearance of SmartArt graphics.
On the server side, IT professionals will notice several enhancements to the security and performance of SharePoint Server 2007, including calendaring reliability, general performance for Outlook, support for read-only content databases, improvements to forms-based authentication, and an STSADM command-line utility that enables administrators to scan sites that use the variations feature for errors. SharePoint will also feature better support for newer versions of the Firefox browser.
Service Pack 2 also makes interoperating with Office easier for developers, and Microsoft is providing tools and resources to make the development process, shorter and more cost effective. This represents a growing opportunity for developers who want to interoperate with Office. By including the Open XML Format External File Converter, SP2 allows developers to make any third-party document format a “first-class citizen in Office”, says Bester.
Microsoft Office 2007 SP2 discussion
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