2007 Microsoft Office System > Suites > Microsoft Office Professional 2007

Microsoft Office Professional 2007 Frequently Asked Questions

Find answers to frequently asked questions (FAQ) about Office Professional 2007.

Overview

What is Office Professional 2007?

Office Professional 2007 is a complete, easy-to-use suite of productivity and information management software designed for individuals and small businesses that need their technology to help them work more effectively and serve their customers better. The new Office Professional 2007 offers many significant benefits:

•	Save time and stay organized. Office Professional 2007 has a new look and feel that makes it easier and faster to find and use the software features you need to complete tasks. It also provides you with tools for task management and project tracking in Microsoft Office Outlook 2007, so you can stay organized and spend more time working with customers and managing your business.
•	Manage all of your prospect and customer information in one place. Office Professional 2007 simplifies lead and customer management with easy-to-use capabilities within the familiar Outlook environment. It provides powerful tools that help you more easily and effectively track, prioritize, and manage leads, and help keep your sales processes organized and productive. And it provides the tools you need to better manage customer information and communications history.
•	Produce professional-quality marketing communications and campaigns in-house. Office Professional 2007 helps you create, publish, and manage designer-quality marketing communications for print, e-mail, and the Web, and create and manage effective marketing campaigns in-house. You also can create professional-quality presentations by using a library of flexible templates that can be customized to reflect your unique business identity.
•	Easily create and use databases, and generate reports to help analyze your business. Office Professional 2007 provides powerful data tools that make it easy to create and use databases and reports. With no coding expertise and little database knowledge, you can easily manage databases, track information, and create reports by using a library of professionally designed formats.

What is included in Office Professional 2007?

Office Professional 2007 includes:

•	Microsoft Office Access 2007
•	Microsoft Office Excel 2007
•	Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager
•	Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007
•	Microsoft Office Publisher 2007
•	Microsoft Office Word 2007

What’s new in Office Professional 2007?

There are many new capabilities in Office Professional 2007, including:

•	The 2007 Microsoft Office system provides an improved user interface that helps you find and use the features you need fast.
•	Office Access 2007 includes predefined database tracking applications and a simplified user interface that help you easily create and manage databases to track your business information.
•	Office Excel 2007 offers new tools for filtering, sorting, and visualizing information to make it easier to analyze your business.
•	Office Outlook 2007 includes a new To-Do Bar and Outlook 2007 task integration on the calendar, to help you manage time and tasks more effectively. It also includes instant search capabilities and color categories to help you locate, prioritize, and act upon your growing volume of e-mail.
•	Office Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager also helps you organize and manage prospect and customer information, follow up on sales leads and opportunities, create marketing campaigns, track projects, and monitor response to marketing activities.
•	Office PowerPoint 2007 helps you easily get started with a more extensive library of professional slide layouts, along with new tools to create powerful charts, diagrams, and tables, and to quickly preview changes.
•	Office Publisher 2007 provides a wide collection of professionally designed, customizable templates for print, e-mail, and the Web, and new guides to lead you through the processes for creating marketing materials and campaigns.
•	Office Word 2007 offers new Quick Formats, Live Preview, and Building Blocks that help you to quickly, easily, and confidently create professional-quality documents.

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Features

Why has the look and feel of the Microsoft Office system been redesigned?

With the addition of more features and functionality to Microsoft Office system applications, it has become more challenging for people to find the commands and options they want to use. For example, Word 1.0 had only about 100 commands; you could easily browse through the menus and find everything you could do. In comparison, Word 2003 has over 1,500 commands, many of which are admittedly difficult to find. Helping people quickly find the menus, commands, and options they need is the key benefit of the new user interface.

What were the main goals for the new product design?

We wanted to deliver new capabilities that empower people to get the results they want faster. We had four major design goals:

•	Make it easier for people to find and use product features.
•	Reduce design clutter and interruptions.
•	Make it easier for people to discover the capabilities they need.
•	Support the creation of great-looking documents.

Which applications have received the new product design?

The 2007 versions of Microsoft Office programs Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, and the authoring part of Outlook—your calendar, your mail notes, and your contacts—will have the new user interface.

Why have the default file formats changed?

Microsoft developed Microsoft Office Open XML File Formats to respond to customer requests for faster document creation from different data sources and to extend our commitment to industry-standard XML. By creating a robust yet compact structure based on industry standards such as XML and ZIP, the new default file formats make document creation faster; reduce the size of Office Word 2007, Office Excel 2007, and Office PowerPoint 2007 files; and improve data recovery in corrupted files.

Can the old file formats still be used?

Yes. Office Professional 2007 programs can be configured to save in the earlier Microsoft Office file formats. When configured this way, the Microsoft Office system programs operate in a Compatibility Mode that enforces compatibility between versions of Microsoft Office by disabling functionality that is incompatible with prior Microsoft Office releases.

Are Office Professional 2007 files backward compatible?

Office Professional 2007 introduces the new Office XML Formats, which are compact, robust file formats that facilitate improved integration with external data sources and systems. These formats are compatible with Microsoft Office 2003, Office XP, and Office 2000 with the addition of a file format converter patch, available from Microsoft Office Online and Microsoft Update. Users of Office 2003, Office XP, and Office 2000 can open, edit, and save files using the new Office XML Formats.

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Pricing and Ordering

Q.	How much does Office Professional 2007 cost?
A.	Find pricing and licensing information on the 2007 Microsoft Office System Pricing page.
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Integration and Compatibility

Q.	What are the system requirements for Office Professional 2007?
A.	See the system requirements for Office Professional 2007.
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For More Information

The information contained on this Web site relates to pre-release software products, and may be substantially modified before the commercial release. This information is provided for informational purposes only, and Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, with respect to this Web site or the information contained in it.