Posts Tagged ‘Office System 2009’

(Follow me on Twitter: msftkitchen)

Back in October, Microsoft gave a presentation in regards to “the translation tools and technologies used for Microsoft Office localization.” At the end of the presentation, Office 14 was discussed in addition to future thoughts on localization beyond Office 14. Perhaps the right person out there will be interested in the following information. For those of you who don’t understand what this is, it’s essentially Microsoft’s plans for making Office as language-neutral as possible via methods of accurate and efficient translation. Discussed below are some of their tools and ideas for the constant evolution of this process. As written in the presentation:

Office 14 Translation Plans:

Translation Automation Internally:
- Automated word-count forecasting for accurate handoff volumes.
- Scalable process automation around word-counting, recycling analysis and machine translation.
- Integration of Helium, Trados and MSR-MT for post-editing. (UXEvangelist Note: All are internal localization tools but can be read a bit about here)

‘Tools Independence’ Externally:
- Translation vendors have flexibility to choose which recycling, MT and translation tools they want to use.
- Enabled by: standardized word-counts, standard quality expectations, XML-based file format.

O14 Language Technology Initiatives:

Raw-MT Piloting for Office Developer Documentation:
- Translation wiki for SDKs

Translatability Checking:
- Style checker tool integrated with authoring environment
- Reduces effort in editing, catches no-brainer issues
- Improves consistency and quality for translators
- Implements MSTP style-guide: Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publications

The Version After Next – Thoughts for the Future:

Tools Independence:
- Move toward standards-based localization, giving translation vendor freedom to choose/innovate tools that works best to deliver on the quality defined by Microsoft.

Extend and Improve the Use of Language Technology:
- Investigate broader use of Machine translation, when appropriate and when the quality is there.
- Adopt advanced recycling solutions.
- Tools support for translation quality assurance.

Customer & Community Engagement

External Academic and Industry Engagement

Again, most of my readers won’t find this information particularly interesting but if you happen to be one who would like to further engage the aforementioned information, feel free to download the document I’m referencing. Likewise, feel free to leave comments and discuss this topic with others who may share your interest!

Reference: TM Europe 2008 Presentation

-Stephen

(Follow me on Twitter: msftkitchen)

Well, they say perseverence pays off. While “they” seem to be right, I still have yet to figure out exactly who the heck “they” happen to be… *crickets*

Anywho, I managed to get a hold of a very recent presentation regarding Software + Services and amongst the plethora of information is a small-yet-informative section regarding Office 14. In one slide, there are 3 pillars listed as an Office 14 value proposition by “dealing with the paradox of empowerment at the top and control at the bottom.” The 3 pillars with their generic descriptions as they appear in the presentation are as follows:

Ubiquity and Specialization (Role-Based Productivity): Anywhere availability for information and applications. Avoid information overload through personalized workspaces and reporting for each end user.

Consumerization and Governance: The new “thumb generation” comes to work with an expectation to use devices and services uncommon in today’s enterprise class systems. At the same time, the enterprise must also be able to maintain governance by enforcing policies to those new systems and services (today: instant messenging, VoIP and web conferencing; tomorrow: live workspaces, content sharing, peer to peer, web 2.0,…).

Flexibility and Consolidation: Seamless integration with third party back end systems (CRM, ERP, etc.). Need for a cost-efficient platform that doesn’t require allocation of additional resources, consolidation of specialized technologies.

After reading that, bear in mind that Office is primarily an enterprise product. Sure, the usage of Office extends to the realm of home users, students, etc., but the functionality and productivity for those realms has been well-established since Office 2003, though the ribbon bar in Office 2007 has received mixed reviews. Because of this, the breadth of Office 14 is absolutely business-centric. I haven’t seen Office 14 yet, nor have I found any information regarding a UI facelift or what they have planned in terms of user experience but everything I’ve personally run across thus far has pertained specifically to making Office much more productive for enterprises. Not that increased productivity hasn’t always been a goal with Office but my point is that you probably won’t feel much change at all in terms of productivity and performance as a home user, student, or general enthusiast. All of the aforementioned is merely personal opinion, though. Feel free to comment and let me know what YOU think!

Now, without any further adieu, here is a screenshot of the roadmap slide which shows Office 14 in alignment with a 2010 release (click for full-sized image):

Well, I guess that sums it up; Office 14 RTM appears to have officially spilled over into 2010. Personally, I’m in no rush for a new office product, so the fact that they’re a year behind schedule doesn’t affect me at all. As history has shown, I would rather them spend the time on a product to get it right than simply to get it out in the marketplace. Where this jives with my recent post of Office 14 having a final name of Office System 2009, who knows. I guess we’ll see what the cat drags in as we approach Beta 1, which is sure to come in the first half of this year.

-Stephen

(Follow me on Twitter: msftkitchen)

I touched on this in a previous post of mine but I wanted to make it more front and center. Along with it, I wanted to post a picture of the document from which I obtained this little tidbit. There are some other things to try to discern from it but I’m sure the answers will all come in due time. I know it really doesn’t matter to some people if it’s Office System 2009 or Office System 2090 and if you happen to be one of those people, no one cares that you don’t care, so nix the “I don’t care” remarks, mmmkay? lol.

Anyway, here is a screenshot from a July 2008 Microsoft software product roadmap I obtained (click for full-sized image):

I have no idea what those other 4 are that are ambiguously labeled but what intrigued me was the 12/31/2009 “Primary Milestone Date”. More than likely, they’re just placeholders but 2009 being listed as the “Primary Milestone Date” for the row with “Microsoft Office System 2009″ on it leads me to believe that Office 14 RTM could indeed see the light of day in 2009 instead of 2010. We already know Microsoft is a year behind their initial schedule with Office System but maybe it’s all supposed to fit together with the release of Windows 7 and VS 2010; who knows? Anyway, I just wanted to pass this little tidbit along. What are your thoughts?

-Stephen

(Follow me on Twitter: msftkitchen)

I’ve received a few emails from people who recall the previous version of Office carrying a code name of “Office 12.” Their inquiries ring through a resounding, “what the heck happened to “Office 13?” Though this issue has been addressed within a few of the Microsoft communities ever since we first found out there would be no “Office 13,” I’ll go ahead and echo the core fact of the matter: Superstition, Watson! Ho ho!

Yes, it seems the folks who coin the code names on the Office team at Microsoft decided that 13 was indeed an unlucky number, but this comes as no surprise seeing it as Friday the 13th is supposed to be unlucky and many 13+ story buildings either have a 12a designation or they do as Microsoft has done with Office and skip to 14. It’s all just cutsy little semantics and doesn’t amount to a hill of beans in terms of what the product will actually be, so don’t freak out simply because someone at Microsoft has a sense of numerologically impending doom. lol.

Psst! Hey, Microsoft: “…the number 13 isn’t any more unlucky than any other number. There exist negative and positive, and balanced, over-balanced, and under-balanced qualities for every number.” That’s straight from a numerology “expert.” Personally, I don’t subscribe to any superstitious dogmas but if you want to see just what they’re buying into, go here.

And if you happen to wonder if this is all indeed why they skipped “Office 13″ for a code name, nothing’s better than a document straight from Microsoft’s servers showing as such. Here, Eric Vigesaa, the 2006-? Program Manager for Office System client applications, is having a discussion with TechNet and says the following on 12/27/2006:

“Eric: I actually am taking a vacation for two weeks and then, it may sound strange but the next version of Office is already in the planning stages, we want to make sure that our IT perspective and apps are represented in the new product focus and offerings so we’re going to be very involved with that.

Michael: So that’s Office 13 in development huh?

Eric: Well, 13 is unlucky so we’re calling it Office 14.“

Source: TechNet Radio 12/27/2006 Transcript

Oddly enough, even folks within Microsoft prior to then were assuming the natural progression from “Office 12″ to “Office 13.” Again, residing on Microsoft’s servers, are a couple of documents containing the same information from 2005 referencing the development of “”Office 13″ prototypes”:

Source 1: Dik_Bigl.pdf

Source 2: ServiceorientatieEnICT.pdf

Both of those documents are in Dutch, but with a quick Babel Fish translation comes a loose interpretation of what we can easily gather to be the information we’re interested in in regards to “Office 13:”

“With which (version of) product Microsoft comes also on the market, there is always a remake in frequently make and is thus still worked to the prototypes of a still remake. To give an example: Office 2003 are in 2005, the current version of Office and have the internal version number 11. For Office 12 for the `Longhorn wave’ and is now already researchers there it is at present worked busy with considering and developing prototypes for Office 13. Thus continues invest Microsoft in the future.”

All in all, this is a pretty frivolous effort in research but hopefully this will provide the be all and end all of this topic. Personally, I think Microsoft should’ve just replaced the 1 with a <, thus ending up with Office <3 annnnnd that's why I'm a freelance journalist and not on Microsoft's marketing team. lol.

-Stephen