Filed under: Software
VBA to return in next version of Microsoft Office; SP1 released
Macworld UK is reporting that Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac saw record sales since its release, becoming the best selling version ever. Of particular interest, however, is that Microsoft has announced the next version of Office will return Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) to the Mac platform. You may recall that one of the big brouhahas connected with Office 2008 was the elimination of VBA, which was present in Office 2004 and earlier versions; Microsoft suggested that users rearchitect their macros and automation with AppleScript. While it's generally a good thing for third-party applications to support AppleScript thoroughly, in this case it created a lot of problems for cross-platform users since the Windows version of Office depends on VBA for macros. While it is possible to duplicate some (though not all) VBA functionality with AppleScript, cross-platform macros were completely broken, leaving some users, especially in corporate environments, unwilling to upgrade from Office 2004. In this light, it is good news that VBA will return, though no timeline is yet available.
In addition to the roadmap announcements, today Microsoft is also releasing Service Pack 1 for Office for Mac 2008 with a host of improvements, including improved compatibility with Windows versions and better printing support. It should available for download at noon PDT from Microsoft or via Auto Update in Office. Full change list in the continuation of this post.
Update: Mac BU developer Erik Schwiebert has a post up on the revitalization of VBA; he originally discussed the decision not to implement it for Office 2008 here.
via MS press release:
With the launch of SP1, the Mac BU is addressing the top issues as reported by customers via MERP and other feedback channels. Office 2008 for Mac SP1 features key suitewide updates for increased stability, increased security and overall performance improvements. Users also will find application-specific updates, including the following:
Microsoft Office Excel
* Compatibility. Improved compatibility with files exchanged between Excel 2008 for Mac and Excel 2003 and Excel 2007 for Windows
* Custom Error Bars. Restored formatting option on the Error Bars panel for data series
* Printing. More reliable printing for elements on Excel 2008 workbooks
Microsoft Entourage
* Calendar. Significant enhancements to improve calendar view and all-day reminders with reoccurrence
* Exchange Server support. Overall improvement to synchronization support, including removing attachments from Exchange Server messages and synchronizing to the server, as well as support for editing the contents of
Exchange Server messages via AppleScript and synchronizing the changes to the server
* E-mail images. Ability to send and view images in Entourage from third-party tools
Microsoft Office Word
* Printing. Improved accuracy when orienting tables with cell shading
* Document map. Improved reliability and responsiveness to select items
* Notebook layout. Updated formatting, recording status and a variety of display options
Microsoft Office PowerPoint
* Printing. Improvements to eliminate crashing when printing documents to high-dpi printers and increased overall printing speed by 10 times on some large presentations
* Mobile viewing. Ability to view Mac .PPTX files on Windows Mobile phones
* AppleScript. Ability to use the PowerPoint selection object in AppleScript to implement custom scripts that operate on the current selection in PowerPoint
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Sebastian said 7:46AM on 5-13-2008
"Office 2008 SP1 - now including performance and speed"...
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Mo said 7:55AM on 5-13-2008
So, no ability to dock the formula bar to a window in Excel still.
Still, it's good that the largest software company in the world has finally managed to hire enough monkeys to write a VBA interpreter for the next version. Maybe it won't take four years to get released this time around.
JsdWdc said 7:55AM on 5-13-2008
The elimination of VBA was probably the single worst move the Mac BU could have made. By the time the "next version" comes out, most professional business users will have found better ways to do spreadsheets. Kudos to any developers that pre-empt the "new release" with a Mac program that handles statistics and solver functions.
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bax said 7:57AM on 5-13-2008
Ironically, OpenOffice (beta version of Aqua port 3.0) _does_ understand VBA macros. Well done, Microsoft.
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Kronk said 7:58AM on 5-13-2008
I hope it can now open a large Windows .xls file in, say, less than 2 hours.
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Redhead said 8:00AM on 5-13-2008
Let's hope the service pack also fixes the increasing font sizes in Entourage. Saw an e-mail from myself lately on a Windows machine, the font was HUGE!!!
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SWY said 8:15AM on 5-13-2008
"bringing VBA-language support back to the next version of Office for Mac"
I suppose it's too much to hope that would be SP2, and not Office 2012, right?
I'll be happy with a copy of Entourage that never just randomly declares that the database is corrupted and demands being rebuilt. I have a 65 person company, and I haven't had a week go by that I've had to rebuild that evil database...
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SWY said 8:16AM on 5-13-2008
bah. make that "NOT had to rebuild that evil database".
Off for more coffee....
gear said 8:49AM on 5-13-2008
No mention of Entourage's "tasks" working with exchange server. I would really like to keep my tasks synced between computers.
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umijin said 9:08AM on 5-13-2008
Nope, not available yet. You didn't say what DAY it would be available.
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vman said 10:27AM on 5-13-2008
Gah, I just hope like hell, for the sake of my thesis, that they mean SP2. I need me my Endnote!
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Sportsmedjosh said 11:06AM on 5-13-2008
I'v been using the old version of office and EndNote, works great for me.
n8manAfter said 1:45PM on 5-13-2008
Posted: (see the bottom of the page)
Page:
http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.mspx?pid=Mactopia_Office2008&fid=395D1487-A3A6-4106-A0F8-4D6E1D6D89D2#viewer
Direct Link to English DMG:
http://download.microsoft.com/download/a/5/b/a5b1382a-3f34-4b40-b65b-4ff1fe63b02c/Office2008-1210UpdateEN.dmg
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jh said 2:04PM on 5-13-2008
Unfortunately, SP1 doesn't add the option to get rid of the Elements Gallery pseudo-toolbar... so annoying.
For more discussion of this issue - http://groups.google.com/group/microsoft.public.mac.office.word/browse_thread/thread/dfeec048e739346d
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Tams Lai said 2:42PM on 5-13-2008
I had problems after installing this crappy update. Everytime I open up an office program it quits and goes to Office Setup Assistant, any way to resolve this?
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Josh said 3:45PM on 5-13-2008
same here.. this is annoying.
They can't even do an update right
tiroger said 3:46PM on 5-13-2008
Same issue here... I had to revert back to 12.0.1 through Time Machine. What a disappointment! I was really hoping that this update would fix some of the issues, especially with excel (no custom error bars) and powerpoint (crashes every time I try to save), which render office basically unusable to me.
Thomas said 7:08PM on 5-13-2008
guidowenzl from VersionTracker:
try this:
delete ˜/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2008/Microsoft Office 2008 Settings.plist
delete /Applications/Microsoft Office 2008/Office/OfficePID.plist
buzzdat said 4:43PM on 5-13-2008
Wow. Welcome back to the wonderful world of Microsoft. After the update, Excel crashes on startup and Word crashes on exit. Thumbs up, Bill.
Anyone else seeing this after update? Know of a resolution other than rolling back to the previous release?
Other than this wonderful instability, my biggest complaint is the lack of Mac key bindings (eg. ctrl-end rather than cmd-right arrow); windows shortcuts on the Mac? And no option to change them? Gosh, I sure am glad I paid full retail for the product.
I need this PoS for one reason: change tracking when sharing documents with co-workers stuck on PCs.
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tiroger said 7:48PM on 5-13-2008
When an office app doesn't want to start:
delete ˜/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2008/Microsoft Office 2008 Settings.plist
delete /Applications/Microsoft Office 2008/Office/OfficePID.plist
Reply