Writer – Editor – Blogger
Posts tagged MS Office 2007
E-mail: Webmail or Outlook?
Mar 25th
Do you prefer webmail or an e-mail client like Outlook? Do you use an e-mail address associated with your Web site? I use both webmail and Outlook, but I am no longer using the e-mail addresses that come with my Web site. I’ll share the reason for that in a minute, but, first, I want to cover the pros and cons for webmail and Outlook.
Webmail: I’ve tried Yahoo, Hotmail (Windows Live), Gmail, Mail.com, Lycos, and AOL webmails. They all work pretty much the same except for Gmail, which has a totally different operational model. All are free services, so you can sign up for an account and try them out. Gmail is the only one that allows you to send and receive from Outlook or other e-mail clients without paying for the privilege. Just sign up for the free Gmail account and go the Help section to see how easy it is. The others can be set up in Outlook only if you pay a fee of anywhere from $9.99 a year to $19.99 a year. More >
Office 2007 – Bamboo Fun Evaluation
Feb 17th
In my last post, I mentioned some new software and gadgets that I’ve been working with. MS Office 2007 is a bit frustrating because I had been using Office 2000 for such a long time. My biggest problem is, when I’m in a hurry, I often can’t find the command I need. I am especially bothered by Word’s table formatting in the new version. However, the Help file usually does—well, help, although you get better quality help if you’re online when you access it. More later on Office 2007.
I used a Christmas gift card to buy the Bamboo Fun because a friend told me he got one as a Christmas gift. The cheaper Bamboo does everything the Bamboo Fun does except that it does not have an accompanying mouse. I chose the more expensive model because I needed a new mouse anyway.
This is one of those situations where what works for most people does not work for everyone. I use my mouse with my left hand, but I write with my right hand. I intended to use the mouse with left hand and pen tablet with right hand. Picture it. I’m sitting at my desk with both hands going…vroom, vroom! Well, you can’t do that with the Bamboo mouse because the mouse has to rest on the pen tablet. You can’t use the pen and the mouse at the same time. The good news is that the mouse does not require batteries. The bad news is that it isn’t as agile as my regular mouse, so I should have gotten the regular Bamboo. I can use my other mouse with left hand and the Bamboo pen with right hand, but that means two mouse pad spaces on my work area.
The pen tablet feature works with Corel Painter which comes with the package. I insert here my signature done with Corel Painter and saved as jpg.
I can insert this image in any document I want, which is a neat feature. I thought that I would be able to use the pen feature on all Word 2007 documents as in a tablet notebook computer. I think it works automatically with Windows Vista. However, to use the pen feature in Office 2007 while running Windows XP Professional, you have to purchase additional software called JustWrite. The free download is good for 30 days. Then it’s $29.95 for the license.
I have not figured out how to use the pen feature with Outlook 2007. I’m not even sure it’s possible if you run Vista. I can, however, insert my signature jpg above in my e-mail messages.
Included in the Bamboo Fun package is photo editing software which I have not experimented with at all. Maybe I can find time to tinker with that and let you know what I think.
So—-is the Bamboo Fun worth the $80 or $100 (depending on which model you choose)? I’m not sure yet. Since I haven’t even tried the photo editing features, perhaps I shouldn’t make a final judgment on whether this was a wise purchase. However, right now, I have to decide whether to pay the extra $30 for JustWrite in order to use it with MS Office. I have two days to decide.
I hope my observations are helpful to someone else who’s considering purchasing Bamboo. I welcome comments from others who’ve used this product.
New Year, New Computer Stuff
Jan 6th
Online groups and some blogs have alerted me to potential security problems with Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 (which I really liked), so I have switched to Mozilla Firefox Web browser. Some of my friends were already using Firefox, having been told that it was more secure than IE.
I switched a couple of weeks ago, and, so far, Firefox is fine. I do think it’s a little faster than IE. The bookmark process is different, so I had a bit of a learning curve there. On IE7, I used the Favorites menu feeds feature to track my RSS feeds. I didn’t immediately find a similar feature on Mozilla, so I just transferred all my feeds to Google Reader. If you have Gmail, you don’t need a new password to use Reader.
I spent my Christmas cash on MS Office 2007 Small Business, so I now have the latest versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, and Outlook. Another learning curve! I still haven’t found all my favorite commands on Word. I tried importing my RSS feeds into Outlook, but I didn’t like it as much as I like Google Reader. The updating process seemed to slow down my e-mail delivery. With Google Reader, I can stay logged in as long as I’m online and check periodically for updates.
Also, I got a Bamboo Fun input device for Christmas. I’ve installed it and fiddled around with it some, but I’m still really in the dark as to what this gadget will do for me. More on that later, I guess.
