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Coming Soon! Microsoft's Latest Release: Office XP
Microsoft has just released the latest version of their most popular suite of productivity software, Office XP.
Office XP comes as the first step in Microsoft's biggest new product rollout in recent years, followed in late 2001 by Windows XP and Internet Explorer 6.0.
Office XP is available in several different "suites," ranging from Standard (which includes the basics: Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint) to Professional Special Edition (which also includes FrontPage, SharePoint, and Publisher). New features of Office XP include smart tags, task panes, integrated e-mail, document recovery, and "send for review."
The next step in the XP rollout will come in late October, with Microsoft's new Windows XP, touted by chairman Bill Gates as "the most advanced Windows ever." Built on the enhanced Windows 2000 engine, Windows XP promises a "fresh new look and extends the personal computing experience by uniting PCs, devices and services like never before." Windows XP will be available in two editions, Home and Professional.
Rounding out Microsoft's new releases will be Internet Explorer 6.0, the latest version of the popular web-browsing software. IE6 will come as a standard component of Windows XP.
Microsoft Project 2000
 "Project Managers" can breathe a sigh of relief, now that there is software that can actually help support you in creating your projects. The latest software is the companion tool for Microsoft ® Project 2000; its name is "Project Central". Project Central is the web-based collaboration tool, which allows multiple users to communicate on projects. Even those who do not have Microsoft ® Project 2000 on their desktops may share or view information.
There are approximately five million users worldwide utilizing Microsoft ® Project Management software; including a wide variety of user types, from ancillary staff to expert project managers. With Microsoft Project 2000 and the enhancement tool of Project Central, project management will become a more accessible activity within organizations. What does this mean? Now project managers can share information with a broader audience in much less time. Maximizing the usefulness of the project-related software leads to the benefits listed below.
Benefits of Project Central:
- Shared collaboration of Projects.
- Quicker response times for any questions or concerns.
- Greater independence for employees
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- Improved time reporting features.
- Overall improvement of productivity within an organization
Software Features
How does the software work? Project Central stores sharable data in a database that is separate from the actual project managers design. Assigned team members can work with/view this information with Project Central. When a team member logs on to the organization’s home page, Project Central displays. From this page they can access the following areas of Project Central.
Timesheet: The Timesheet contains task information. From the Timesheet, team members can enter and send updates on actual hours worked on tasks; create new tasks; delegate tasks to others; transfer calendar entries from Outlook; delete tasks they are no longer working on; and sort, filter, and group tasks for easier viewing.
Status Reports: Team members can respond to status reports sent to them by their managers. In addition to information about the hours worked on a task, managers are often interested in getting reports from their resources describing what they have been working on, the goals and objectives they have set, obstacles they are facing, and other issues.
Views: Team members can look at views their manager has set up. Views allow team members to view information in other projects or view assignments made through Project Central.
Project Central provides managers with the flexibility to collaboratively plan and track projects, then deliver the results that their specific business demands. Overall project management will now be a more effective tool with the increased sharing power of this software. Project Central is the missing component for enhanced productivity, which is the key ingredient in this evolving business climate.
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