Microsoft pushes back Open XML converter, Office 2008 12.0.1 coming

[Thursday, February 21st]

Microsoft has posted a message to its Mactopia site making two announcements: the Open XML File Format Converter Update to Office 2004 for Mac will be delayed until June (the second major delay for the tool) and Office 2008 12.0.1 will be released on March 11th.

The company also noted:

• Availability of Office 2008 Volume Licensing ? English, French, and Japanese versions became available on February 1st; all other supported languages will be available on March 1st.
• Remote Desktop Connection for Mac version 2.0 ? the final release is scheduled for spring. The public beta version is available for download here.
• Messenger for Mac 7.0 (discussed in this post) ? As mentioned previously, Messenger for Mac 7.0 is currently in beta with corporate customers; we expect to roll out the next version to everyone later this year.

An interesting note: Microsoft Office 2008 does not include Visual Basic capabilities in any form. It has no execution of newly or previously compiled macros, and the macros cannot be edited in Office 2008. Company representatives have defended this tack in a series of blog postings. This state of affairs means that Office 2004 with the addition of an official converter for Open XML documents (whenever it is released) may remain the most cross-platform compatible version of Office in existence.

There is a standalone Microsoft Office Open XML Converter (version 0.2.1), but users have experienced significant problems with it.

Several users have reported better success with some of the alternatives for converting Office Open XML files, including:

• MacLink Plus
• docXConverter
• NeoOffice

Feedback? Late-breakers@macfixit.com.

Previous coverage:

• Misadventures in Microsoftery: The Oops of OOXML
• Microsoft releases OOXML Word 2007/2008-to-RTF converter for Mac OS X; no Excel, PowerPoint or macro support yet
• MacLinkPlus Deluxe 16 released: Office 2007 translators
• Keeping Visual Basic macros in Office for Mac OS X: Microsoft says macros will survive translation
• Office 2004 with Open XML converters may be the most cross-platform compatible edition -- even after Office 2008 ships
• Working with Office 2007 documents under Mac OS X: Extracting text from .docx files, more

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