Why is Word for Mac clunky?

Normally, Microsoft makes the clunkier products, but Microsoft Word clearly is easier to work with than the new Mac version. I find the search and replace function in Mac especially awkward. Admittedly, as a professor, I am probably a more sophisticated user than most, and for many Mac Word will be just fine. But I would have thought they would have simply used the same system as Microsoft, not created a unique (and lesser) Mac version. Any reason for this? Microsoft trying to hold Apple back?

 

Word for Mac is also made my MS. By the way, are you using MS Office for Mac 2011? I am going to get started with my PhD soon, and was thinking of getting MS Office for Mac 2011, since iWORK will invariably have compatibility issues... But if it's too clanky, then I'll have to re-consider, I guess...

 

2011 is fine

 

Microsoft Office for Mac 2011
Developer(s): Microsoft

 

Here's a hint: it's exactly the same reason why iTunes for Windows is clunky

In all fairness, though, the most recent version of Word is clunky on all platforms. I actually think that Word 2010 is a significant step backward from Word 2003, which my workplace still uses.

 

Well, if you are a Mac person anyway, I would get it. It is not like it is a disaster. But it definitely is less user friendly than Word running in Windows. It also so happens that I used the search and replace function a lot, and that is one of the things the Mac version does not do as well. Indeed, it is often quite unreliable. On the other hand, there has been no significant problems going back and forth between Windows and Mac machines. I have Windows loaded on my MBP, but the touchpad is so unreliable in Windows, I did not want to work in Windows. I could have used an external mouse, but that sort of defeats the purpose of having a notebook....

 

Are you absolutely sure you're running Office 2011? Doesn't sound like it. Both Office 2010 (Windows) and Office 2011 (Mac) are virtually identical in UI and functionality. I have and use both versions and I don't experience anything of the like that you do.

 

I have office 2011. it seems to be working fine for me.

 

Really? I had heard similar stuff about MS Office for Mac 2008, but most people were of the opinion that MS 2011 fixes the problems, or at least a vast majority of them. have you tried Pages? How is the compatibility issue between Pages documents saved in the Word format, and then viewing them on a Windows system running MS Word? I have been told that the formatting gets screwed up a lot, especially if it involves complex diagrams or figures...

True! Touchpad gets totally messed up if you are running Windows on Macs, and that is sort of a tragedy because that multi-touch glass trackpad is one of the best features on a Mac.

 

I may be using, in Windows, a generation older version of Word, but can't imagine they downgraded the find and replace function.

 

Could you please expand on what you mean by they downgraded the find and replace function? Also you didn't quite answer my question. I was asking what version of the Mac version of Office are you using? Is it Office 2008 or Office 2011?

 

I sort of agree with this. Though, I've learned to like Word 2007(PC). But I find Onenote 2010 better than Onenote 2007 in many respects. I just miss being able to put a toolbar along the bottom or sides. That's especially helpful when using a tabletPC.

I wish they would make Onenote for Mac.

 

Now to be fair, I do LOVE Evernote and I am perfectly content with it so I'm not missing One Note on my Mac, but I agree with you, Microsoft needs to stop this nonsense of fearing to lose their customer base if they port certain apps to the Mac. I have no problem with Microsoft making specific Windows-only software, Apple does the same thing for the Mac, but to dumb down Office for the Mac by leaving out select apps that are only found on Windows is very rude to say the least and IMO they make themselves look bad doing so. Funny how they put One Note on iOS but not Mac OS.

 

Total agreement with this dumbing down nonsense. I shouldn't have to run a VM with Windows or Bootcamp to get those certain features in Office I need.

I've never tried Evernote. Considering your adoration of it, I think I'll give it a shot. Looked on their website and the cloud feature is definitely attractive. Especially nice for when I get an iPad next year.

And yes, it is peculiar that they would make Onenote for iOS. Though it's nice know that MSFT can read the writing on the wall.

 

Evernote is AWESOME, especially for platforms that don't have OneNote available to them. I use it on android because there's no OneNote.

 

You're entitled to your opinion. I personally find Office 2010 apps to be very not-clunky. Word 2010 feels very light and the UI is out of the way. I just minimize the ribbon and go go go. Every time I see LibreOffice with the overhanging bunch of toolbars and menus I'm reminded of Office 2003.

Office for Mac has always been sort of red-headed stepchild to Office for Windows. That said, Office 2011 has been generally regarded as "above average." It's still swiss cheese on features, I'm especially raging at Outlook 2011's totally lobotomized functionality. It's pathetic that mail.app is a better choice for most environments, including Exchange, than Outlook 2011 is.

 

I think the Office 2011 UI is a mess. It does a pretty poor job of copying the Office 2010 UI. Sure, it has the ribbon (it seems to be a dumbed down version of the ribbon with fewer commands/options), but it also has menus and toolbars. There is just too much clutter and confusion, and it can often be hard to find what you are looking for.

I'm forced to use Office 2010 in a VM because of the frustrating experience that is Office 2011.

 

I find it works great.

 

The Mac is 2011, the Windows is likely older. To answer another thread, there is a search and replace function. One might search for a given word that might appear a number of times. Might want to, say, capitalize it. When I tried this in the Mac version, the function was unreliable, not finding words I knew were there. Not so in the Windows version. For me, this is a big deal, for a lot of other people, not so much.

 

Exactly! Certain functional quirks will be a real bummer to some people, while some will not even notice it exists. Depends on how one uses the suite...

 

The other thing that I just learned Mac Word apparently cannot do reliably is open a Wordperfect document, something that has not usually been a problem for me in the Windows version. But as most people don't use Wordperfect, for them this is not an issue. In certain cases I am more or less forced to use Wordperfect because of all of the formatting imbedded in Word (Windows or Mac).

 

It's funny how, with all the technological advancement of computers in AI, networking, information processing, math, finance, graphics, physics, simulation (the list goes on and on)...

we haven't really nailed writing portable formatted documents.

 

So true. Actually, Wordperfect is far superior to Word, but the market power of Microsoft kept if from being competitive. You would think Word might catch up, but Microsoft--unlike Apple--is not that concerned with creating user friendly products (though Apple fell short with Mac Word).

 

To reiterate: Word for Mac is not developed by Apple. Microsoft has a separate division in their HQ that develops Mac products. The team of developers behind Windows products are far greater in number but Microsoft software (such as Office, Word, PowerPoint, etc.) is still developed by Microsoft (and contracting parties) whether it is on Unix, Linux, Mac OS, Android, iOS, or Windows.

All-in-all, Office 2011 is a big improvement over Office 2008 which, at times, was completely unusable due to bugs and crashes. I would have it crash on me when opening an *.docx file made in Office 2010. Features such as citations from EndNote in Word would hardly ever work for me. I could also create a document in Word 2010 that would automatically update the table of contents (along with creating clickable links so that I could be in the table of content, click on a certain section, and I would jump right to it) and none of that would really work in Word 2008. The formatting would be off, the clickable links would be hit or miss, and the TOC would not always update.

That has been fixed in Word 2011 and I actually find it to be more enjoyable to use than Word 2010 mainly because the ribbons in 2011 are far more manageable. MS tried to go all flashy with Office 2010 instead of trying to make things more user friendly. Yeah, it is nice that I can click on the Office button and get an animated menu but it doesn't do me any good if I have to constantly search for the option that I want. Office 2011 seems to have carried over a lot of the placement but it loses the animations and more complex ribbon navigation. Sometimes less is more and I think that is what Office 2011 is compared to 2010.

 

Kornchild already corrected on who makes what. But I'd like to comment on the user friendly idea - some things can't and shouldn't be made user friendly but should rather be made intuitive. The professional will take the time to learn something if it is vital to their business. The professional also needs more targeted features rather than dumbed down features for the sake of user friendliness.

Look at what happened with Final cut Pro. The latest version is essentially an upgrade to iMovie.

 

Which is where MS has found themselves. There was a time when office productivity programs were used only by professionals. Even then the lead "professional" would normally write their documents by hand and have them transcribed into a computer by an administrative assistant. That slowly changed over time and more professionals found themselves using document, presentation, and spreadsheet programs. They would take the time to learn the ins and outs so they could make pro documents. They also were too concerned with how pretty a GUI looks or if menus have animation.

Now everyone and their mother are familiar with Office in some way, shape, or form due to it being so widely used in the business/government areas along with coming pre-installed on so many systems. MS is between a rock and a hard place as they need to make a product for both professionals and home users. Professionals could care less about certain aspects (mainly looks) and want added functionality while home users wouldn't use the increased functions and would rather have something that looked nice and was easy to run.

I think MS has done an alright job walking the straight line but I believe they would be better off segregating their Office products. For example, they could make a dumbed down version of Excel with all of the flashy menus for John Q public and a "Pro" release of Excel that has an added statistical bar so I don't have to go through 345987349857 different animated ribbon options just to find them. That is why I was extremely disappointed with Office 2007 Professional. I thought that the added Professional tag would have made it more in line with Office 2003 in terms of GUI while also having the added functionality. It didn't.

MS better be careful before they paint themselves into a corner like Apple has done with Final Cut Pro. I actually took the time to learn the older version and have no plans on upgrading simply because I value functionality over usability. MS is starting to do this with Office and they would be wise to create two separate distinct line: one for home users with decreased functionality and one for pro users with all the bells and whistles without the fluffy GUI.