What's New in Office 95?

Gail Garfield Neuman
CSS Consulting

Office 95, Standard Edition, is Microsoft's new release of its 
integrated software suite. It includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and 
Schedule+ (all Version 7.0). Office 95 takes advantage of the 32-bit 
features in Windows 95, and can also run under Windows NT. Office 95 
applications won't work with earlier versions of Windows.

Microsoft recommends a minimum of 8MB of RAM to run Office 95. However, 
you need 16MB to open more than two Office applications at once.

Integration
Office 95 applications work together seamlessly. With a single click in 
the Office Shortcut bar, you can launch any Office application or 
document. The applications have similar menus and toolbars, and call 
upon each other when needed. For example, you don't have to open 
Schedule+ to get an address when writing a letter in Word; just click on 
the address-book icon and Word knows what to do.

The Open command in any Office application, except Schedule+, offers 
improved file management. You can preview a document in a window within 
the Open dialog box, get file information, or change the way the 
document list is viewed. The Open dialog box also offers a powerful 
search capability.

The Office Binder lets you keep all the work for a project in one place, 
and provides instant access to the applications used to create the files 
in that binder.

Intellisense Technology
Microsoft has added Intellisense to Office 95. This is a group of 
smaller features for each application that help in document creation. In 
Word, for example, the Highlighter lets you emphasize words or phrases - 
useful for collaborative editing online. And spell checking is on by 
default.

Automatic Formatting in Word makes typing documents easier. Keyboard 
shortcuts let you quickly apply style formatting for headings, lists, 
borders, or rules.

All Office 95 applications have an Answer Wizard, available under the 
Help menu. You ask it a question in plain English - for example, "How do 
I number pages?" The Answer Wizard lists the answers that may match your 
request. Double-clicking on one opens a dialog box with instructions.

Each Office 95 application comes with a selection of Wizards and 
templates. Word offers a Resume Wizard. The Template Wizard in Excel 
helps you turn an existing document into a template. In PowerPoint, the 
Pack and Go Wizard makes sure you have all the pieces of your 
presentation on the diskette you're taking with you. These are just a 
few examples - there are many more Wizards and templates.

Support
Word and Excel are fully supported by IS. PowerPoint is partially 
supported. Schedule+ isn't supported, but is nonetheless a nice calendar 
package. It's also a good place to keep addresses, since the address 
book is accessed easily by the other Office applications.

You can buy Office 95 at the MIT Computer Connection. For details, see 
Bits and Bytes on page 5.