Word 2007

by Steven Marzuola

Why I don't use Word 2007.

Short answer:

I started using Word 2007 in February 2008 while working at a client's office. I gave it a good try, for about four and a half months. Given enough time, I could accomplish everything I needed to do in a document, but I felt that the program tied my hands.

Here's an analogy: Imagine that you're a plumber and you have made an investment in a good set of tools. For example, you have six wrenches, to handle different sizes and types of pipe. But one day you go to a certain customer's house. He stops you at the door and say, you can't bring your toolbox. Instead, he says, use this one. It only has one tiny wrench.

Longer answer:

1. If you prefer to use keystroke sequences and you remember the Word 2003 versions, Word 2007 will recognize *some* of them, but not all. Others will not work. And if you remember only part of the old sequence, 2007 will not prompt you for the rest. You will have to learn the new way.
2. In many, many cases, it takes more keystrokes to accomplish the same thing in 2007 than in 2003. This includes modifying tables, changing styles, views, languages, etc. Anything. And in many case you cannot accomplish everything with keystrokes, but have to reach for the mouse.
3. I have written dozens of macros that I use every week, and hundreds of others that I can call on. Most of then work in Word 2007, but not all. Example:

I normally keep Word set to use three dictionaries at all times: (a) "Custom.dic", that includes terms that are always correct in any language, (b) a client dictionary, for terms (mostly names and places, some specialized terms) used only on the current project, and (c) a language-specific dictionary, either "English.dic" or "Spanish.dic". These include terms that are always correct in one language but not the other. I have been using a set of macros, originally written in 2002-3, to switch between English and Spanish.

In Word 2007, this macro consistently fails to add one of these dictionaries, and it takes about 6 mouse clicks to add the missing dictionary.

4. Previous versions of Word allow you to add an indefinite number of toolbars. Each toolbar can be controlled individually. It can be docked at the top, sides, or bottom or the window, or floating, (including in the other window if you have two monitors), or turned off. You can create a new toolbar with custom buttons when you're working with a particular type of document, then turn it off when not needed.

In Word 2007 you are limited to ONE toolbar. Your only option is to display it above or below the ribbon. If you have more macros than fit on the toolbar, then that's too bad, they "spill off" the right edge and are not immediately visible.

5. In older versions of Word you can create new toolbar buttons, which can include a built-in graphic icon, or an icon that you create yourself. Or, you can add a text title.

For instance, the Word Shift-F3 command (in all versions of Word) is not smart enough to apply true "title case" (lower case for unimportant words such as articles and prepositions). I have a macro that corrects the case of a string of text to "Title case". To use it, I select the text and click a toolbar button labeled "TitleCor".

6. Word 2007 does not allow a toolbar button to have a text label. Instead, one is limited to a set of about 100 built-in icons. That sounds like a lot, but not a single one of those icons conveyed the essence of my "TitleCor" macro. The letter "T" would be a good choice, but there's no letter icons except a few different versions of "A".