Office 2007 blows
At work, the IT overlords forced us to upgrade to Microsoft Office 2007, which would seem to make sense because the version we had been using was at least 6 or 7 years old.  Not that you should always upgrade old software when it gets past a certain age, but newer versions of software often have improvements that can help you do your job.  Such is not the case with Office 2007.  Here's why: 
  1. It's slow.  This isn't solely a Microsoft problem.  It's an everybody problem.  All new software is slower, less useful, and more bloated than old software.  They say it works best when used on some Pentium octo-core 12GHz processor.  Guess what, idiots:  I still simply use Word for word processing and Excel for calculations.  If my uses haven't changed, the hardware requirements shouldn't change either.
  2. It's ugly.  Many people disagree with me on this, and that's fine.  But the fact of the matter is that the entire user interface is changed, and as a creature of habit, I don't like change.  Hence it's ugly.  Also, I don't like ClearType.  It hurts my eyes for some reason.  Thankfully, Microsoft didn't give me the option to disable it.  Awesome.
  3. It's different.  This is the most important thing to me.  Microsoft Office has essentially been the same product since I started using it circa 1998.  The new versions that came out (2000, XP, 2003) never changed the core functionality to an extent that I would even notice.  There were a few slight UI changes, but other than that, the product went through a long cycle of constant improvements.  But with 2007, everything is different.  There's a ribbon bar instead of toolbars.  The menu system is completely different.  When starting a Word document, I have no idea how to change styles.  When using Excel, I feel like I have to relearn the program I've been using half my life.  And that's the kicker:  Software should help you get stuff done; it should never get in the way.  Office 2007 gets completely in the way of me getting my stuff done.
I'm seriously considering downgrading. 

Update:  I downgraded to 2003, and Microsoft Office is usable again. #technology

Peekaru (1)
This makes me quite happy. 
[Image: peekaru.jpg]
Mostly because it looks like an alien clawing its way out of the mother's torso. #products