[Raiker]

Recently WZor.Net has published details about upcoming Windows 7 release as well as first screenshots of Microsoft Office System 2009 (previously known as Office 14).

So Microsoft plans to devide the Windows 7 release into 8 waves concerned with localizations. Here is the table that contains the details about the waves.



So first wave0 will consist in english, spanish, japanese, german and french versions.

According to WZor.Net Microsoft plans to release Windows 7 Release Candidate in april, then they will withouth delay prepare RTM. Windows 7 OEM will be available by this autumn (preinstalled on new PCs) and retail will be available by Christmas season.

There is also some information about Office 14 availability. It really will be called as Microsoft Office System 2009, the beta starts in may and the final release is planned for the end of the year.

Here are some screenshots of the recent alpha of Office 14.

 mso2009v14_alfa0.png (153.83K)
Number of downloads: 179

 mso2009v14_alfa1.png (60.56K)
Number of downloads: 157

 mso2009v14_alfa2.png (77.98K)
Number of downloads: 102

 mso2009v14_alfa3.png (72.86K)
Number of downloads: 97

[DanielKornev]

Raiker, on Jan 12 2009, 06:31 PM, said:

...
There is also some information about Office 14 availability. It really will be called as Microsoft Office System 2009, the beta starts in may and the final release is planned for the end of the year.

Here are some screenshots of the recent alpha of Office 14.

Without any comment on whether these images are representing office 2009 or not - call to community:

Do these images represent the steps into direction shown by Microsoft Visionary videos (produced by Office Labs)?

http://www.windowsvi...th-concept.html <-- link to one of Visonary videos I'm reffering to.

[Raiker]

DanielKornev, is it a question or such a rhetorical statement?

I can only see some semi-updated UI, which is undoubtedly under construction and a very bloated and cumbrous Word menu, which, for some reason, reminds of Whistler days for me.

[Chris1244]

Raiker, on Jan 13 2009, 02:53 AM, said:

DanielKornev, is it a question or such a rhetorical statement?

I can only see some semi-updated UI, which is undoubtedly under construction and a very bloated and cumbrous Word menu, which, for some reason, reminds of Whistler days for me.

You hit the nail on the head... Man it really does feel like Whistler

[palakisbest]

looks like a very crude alpha, but I guess thats progress. But I must say they would have received much better response if they used a better color scheme than gray such as the really nice blue gradient color used in office 2007

[TheWahbinator]

Why are they calling it "mondo" again

Anyways looks like they're moving more towards the "scenic" UI, which I think should be finalized first (from what I've seen in Paint and Wordpad in 7 there's rough edges to be smoothed out)

[Rhys]

I can't believe they put Japanese above Russian. I am not amused.

[Raiker]

TheWahbinator, on Jan 13 2009, 07:12 AM, said:

Why are they calling it "mondo" again

Probably the Office team has an ancient cult of "Mondo" and they have its idol in the heart of their lab, worship and asking it for blessing to develop the next version of Microsoft Office?




If somebody forgot the story, pre-release versions of Office 12 had the "Mondo" name as well as it was shown at PDC 2005:


It actually was

Quote

Microsoft® Office Word 12 [pre-release](12.0.3224.20000) MSO (12.0.3224.2006) BETA
Part of Microsoft Office Mondo 12
Unpublished work. Copyright © 1983-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

[nexus]

you can bet money that sh*t is hitting the fan over the leak of these shots. if you thought things got crazy up in Redmond you haven't seen anything. The lower key things are kept the more they dont want you seeing it (obviously) and thus the hush factor is on the same scale.

[Edootjuh]

Why aren't they just releasing it all at once?
Does it take that much time to translate it?

[Tierro]

Office 2009 looks like something from the Blackomb and Whistler days - that's not bad or anything. Quite like it. But yeah, it needs some work to make it match up with what we've got today.

And why do Dutch people have to wait 14 days for their translation?! That's not cool!

[Chris Gonzales]

Could it be because the classic skin is being used and office 2009 may just as well go by what ever skin your using (if your using a bright pink skin, the office UI will be pink )

[HeinanXP]

I cant belive I have to wait 73 days after Windows 7 RTM to get the Hebrew Version!

[Tierro]

HeinanXP, on Jan 13 2009, 12:02 PM, said:

I cant belive I have to wait 73 days after Windows 7 RTM to get the Hebrew Version!

I can believe. I think Microsoft splits it up into a few waves to prevent the activation servers from getting overloaded.

[Cuppa]

Well, the early versions of Office 12 looked pretty terrible (going by the PDC05 screenshots in Paul Thurrott's site), but I think the final version ended up looking great. No doubt Office 14 will look much better by RTM (I'd be interested to see what the alpha looks like with Aero enabled, though).