Going from Office 97 to Office 2013...

...in the immortal words of Jeremy Clarkson, "how hard could it be"?

Uninstall 97 first, then install 2013. Trust me.

Actually new computer at work is forcing me. Windows XP to Win 7 as well. (They paid for it so...)

I hope your AOL free trial discs aren't running out soon as well.

My office computer just got upgraded a couple weeks ago. It's pretty much the same, except they added some 'improvements' that only seem to require more steps. I'm used to it now.

Good upgrade... took me some time to get used to the ribbon... google will be your friend fir a while... but it doesent take long to get used to it

Ribbon sucks. Sorry to hear

Having lots of lovely fun with incompatibility of some access databases and the way word is reformatting old templates. Spreadsheets are fine.

Weird layout of things, involving extra clicks. Like printing, I do miss right click, print.

I hope your AOL free trial discs aren't running out soon as well.

lol.

Maybe he'll have to go from ball mouse -> optical also. The horror!

We just went to Windows 7 from XP and finally went away from Office 97. I've noticed lots of extra clicks. Not fun for someone with wrist problems like myself.

Also many programs which used to remember what folder you are working out of now kick me back to the root every time I click file>open. So I'm stuck making a shortcut to my working folder in the root so I can easily jump back where I was. Lame.

ProDarwin wrote:

I hope your AOL free trial discs aren't running out soon as well.

lol. Maybe he'll have to go from ball mouse -> optical also. The horror!

I have an optical trackball. Best of both worlds.

If at all possible try to get office 2010 rather than 2013, I have tried 2013 and it is horrible.

She downloaded 2013 for me yesterday, had to splurge to get the version with Access apparently, so I got a few others like Publisher as a bonus. Still using Publisher 98 for blank labels so hopefully 2013's version will continue.

So far opened a spreadsheet and Word doc with no issues, but the database gave me an error. Google says I have to open my 97 database in ANY version before 2013 and resave as a special format. Then open that in 2013 and save again in it's native format. So now I'm hunting for someone with another version I can borrow for 60 seconds.

I run office 2013 at work and HATE the bland look to it. the "dark grey" option is still glaring bright. But, it is quick and handles everything I will ever use it for.

Did they finally fix the thing in excel where (in 2010) every workbook was opened in the same window, making it nigh impossible to easily work with two spreadsheets at the same time? No other office application worked that way...

Nope.

I love it

And nope. Still using a generic trackball mouse. #oldskewl

Travis_K wrote: If at all possible try to get office 2010 rather than 2013, I have tried 2013 and it is horrible.

LOL... as if he has control over it...

I'm in the same boat- we get upgrades at work when we are told, and how they will be done.

Including some very confusing directives- most people are not allowed to install other porgrams of any type, so we get stuck with whatever IE that is part of the install.

But we just got a security note telling us to use anything else. Even though that's totally against company policy.

Or when someone develops a scheduling program for a facility that requires a specific browser that we are not allowed to have. huh?

We live in a Dilbert world.

We are the same way with IE unfortunately. Several work-related things are unaccessable to me because I am stuck with a E36 M3ty browser. I'll install Chrome again one of these days, and file an IT ticket so they don't remove it.

I can't deal with using super-outdated hardware/software. I'd probably quit if I had to use Windows XP or Office 97.

wae wrote: Did they finally fix the thing in excel where (in 2010) every workbook was opened in the same window, making it nigh impossible to easily work with two spreadsheets at the same time? No other office application worked that way...

You can fix that yourself, but there are some downsides to the option.

I just use a different workflow. Open files in excel, close one of them, MMB on excel, then use open recent to pick it again.

Nothing new, good or useful has been added to windows or office since the 90's so really, it will just be a user exercise to try and find all the menu options as new ribbon/jelly beans that Microsoft likes to move around to make it look like they did something to justify the upgrade. Have fun with that.

Giant Purple Snorklewacker wrote: Nothing new, good or useful has been added to windows or office since the 90's so really, it will just be a user exercise to try and find all the menu options as new ribbon/jelly beans that Microsoft likes to move around to make it look like they did something to justify the upgrade. Have fun with that.

That is so true that it hurts. They just move stuff around and make you learn where stuff is all over again.

ProDarwin wrote: I can't deal with using super-outdated hardware/software. I'd probably quit if I had to use Windows XP or Office 97.

Great principles you have. Not sure if they are REALLY worth turning one's back on a good salary or not. It's just a tool, afterall.

alfadriver wrote:

ProDarwin wrote: I can't deal with using super-outdated hardware/software. I'd probably quit if I had to use Windows XP or Office 97.

Great principles you have. Not sure if they are REALLY worth turning one's back on a good salary or not. It's just a tool, afterall.

Yes, its a slight exaggeration. However, I and many others I've met do value modern technology at my job.

Rusted_Busted_Spit wrote:

Giant Purple Snorklewacker wrote: Nothing new, good or useful has been added to windows or office since the 90's so really, it will just be a user exercise to try and find all the menu options as new ribbon/jelly beans that Microsoft likes to move around to make it look like they did something to justify the upgrade. Have fun with that.

That is so true that it hurts. They just move stuff around and make you learn where stuff is all over again.

You guys are kidding, right? Just the ability to use more than 4GB of RAM alone is a massive change.

The key to the updates is to remember the shortcut keystrokes. The menus may not even have the options listed anymore, but the shortcuts still seems to get you what you need. At one point (office 2007 conversion I think) the software warned me that the menus did not have the item I tried to shortcut to, but the function still operated...