Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac

There are a lot of similarities between 2010 and 2011; most of the gains for Mac users will be in Outlook with new calendar views and the ability to now use the scheduling assistant. A few more application‑specific features include, respectively:

• Word – full screen view, ability to dynamically reorganize a document by dragging and dropping section headings, new rich text effects
• Excel – ability to remove duplicates, create pivot tables, and filter data that are based on specific characteristics such as including font and cell color
• PowerPoint – ability to embed movies into a file, enhanced graphics and effects, plus facility to compare and merge multiple presentations
• Outlook – replaces Entourage allowing many features not available before, including: rich text formatting, viewing email as a conversation thread instead of separate emails, overlaying multiple calendars in a single view, quick preview of meeting invitations in the calendar

Don’t just take the Tech Byte Wizard’s word though; check out the following two websites and conduct your own investigation. The first site is a direct comparison between Office 2008 and 2011, and the second addresses performance enhancements (Microsoft had a “performance” commitment in mind when building Office 2011 for Mac).

Comparison: http://mac2.microsoft.com/help/office/14/en-us/admin/item/0b2bd490-71ea-49ea-a128-596760c55703?category=1e1e1541-8fd6-48d1-abf0-72fcfa403e81

Performance: http://blog.officeformac.com/office-for-mac-2011-a-step-up-in-performance/

PS. While you look around check out “co-authoring” in Office 2011? You and your team are gonna luv it!

*This Issue’s Techno Term

• Term: biometrics
• Definition: the science and technology of measuring and analyzing biological data
• Example in a sentence: In information technology, biometrics refers to tools that measure and analyze human body characteristics, such as DNA, fingerprints, eye retinas and irises, voice patterns, facial patterns, and hand measurements, for authentication purposes.
• Source: http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/definition/biometrics 

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