Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac Intros at Macworld

Excel Changes

Microsoft's spreadsheet application, Excel 2008, has been expanded to handle 10,000 times more data than its previous Mac release. Stuart deSpain, lead program manager of Excel in Microsoft Mac business unit, said the new release features 16,384 columns, over one million rows and supports up to 17.18 billion cells.

Another key new feature is Formula Builder, which helps users build and calculate formulas.

"Formulas are the language of Excel," deSpain said. "With Formula Builder, it does the math for you. All you need to do is make sure the numbers are in the right place.

Lastly, PowerPoint 2008, like Word 2008, also has an extensive collection of available themes. Marcus Aiu, lead program manager of PowerPoint in Microsoft's Mac business unit, said PowerPoint 2008 has 49 new, fully customizable themes.

Arnaud Gabaudan, retail marketing manager at Microsoft Canada, said Office 2008 for Mac is a great tool for all Mac users that wish to work in an Office environment.

"The suite targets different types of customers," Gabaudan said. "We have features in the software that address the needs and capabilities of new users and we also have features that address Mac-users and experts. The user interface and features are very Mac-like so users won't be lost, whether they're experts or beginners."