of course, if you upgrade to Office 2007 ...

is it too tinfoil-hat of me to suggest that M$ left this vague bug in Excel years ago to be able pull a stunt like that to scare users into upgrading that little bit quicker ?

No problem

Seeing as SP3 has been out for months now, the "fix" has already been out for ages. So the advice is simple, upgrade to SP3. Even if you are a business and need time to test it, that should've been done by now so deploy.

Invetnt the bug. hide it. scare people off into buying new version by revelaing it. Brilliant!

Right.

SP3 for office 2k3 breakes a lot of things. Like opening file from older versions of Office. There is no fix from MS as of yet but surely.....why not to release this "hoax" to scare people into installing SP3. What a bunch of douchbags they are.

ooh, hardly anyone knows ...

... so it's not much of a problem!

(rams ice cream into forehead)

or don't use Excel..

..cos it's rubbish. Like the rest of Office. And everything else from Micro$h4ft.

MS is rubbish

MS is rubbish. Everyone knows that you need a good OS like MAC OS. Apple is super special awesome and never has any software issues ever, not even the software that (grrr) Bi££ Gate$ writes

Typical

And I thought Microsoft aimed their products at enterprises. Security bugs that people don't know about so isn't a problem, cowboys!

Oh no! Not Again....

Damn this time round they dint throw in a flight simulator like they did in Office 97???

Am so offended that i could use Office 2003!

Is there a reason why Trendmicro, Mcafee, Norton etc havent added Windows to their Signatures??

One Word...

OpenOffice

No-one knows about it?

Well they bloody do now, don't they? It's plastered all over the 'net so it's just a matter of time until the lowlife manage to locate the vulnerability. Call me a cynic, but I suspect it'll take them less time to find and exploit it, than it'll take MS to fix it.

Erm...

"Pending the availability of a fix, security clearing house US-CERT advises users of older versions of Excel to avoid opening unfamiliar or unexpected email attachments."

Because of course, once they've patched it, it's absolutely fine to open unexpected attachments from strangers.

Open mouth. Insert foot. Then if you want to look even sillier, start chewing.

Sorry...

OpenOffice? No.

I love opensource, haven't run M$ for a couple years, blah, blah blah.

I'm sorry, but OOo doesn't cut it. The Spreadsheet program isn't as useful as Excel, the Doc Writer is about as good. I haven't used the Presentation much. The suite has a lot of potential, is almost there, in fact. It just doesn't quite get it for me.

OOo spreadsheet doesn't have the more complex stat analysis that I want it to be able to do (and that Excel can do) for working in the lab.

The one thing it does well is exchanging files with Genuine Micro$hite Software.

How about an Abiword/Gnumeric combo? Thats the ticket!

A simple and invulnerable solution to this problem

Revert to Spreadsheet v0.0 !! It cannot be hacked from *any* distance and you just have to shoot the hackers if they come near your spreadsheet(s).

This product consist of large quantities of A3 sheets of paper attached to each other with vast quantities of sticky tape !! They existed at the time when the last of the dinosaurs were dying out and co-existed with manual calculators (wind-up variety) and comptometers !!

One excellent feature of this product is that they existed *BEFORE* young Billy Gates was born !!

Right, I'm off to have a chat about the good old days with my mates in the cemetery !!

Enterprises or Joe Sixpack?

Anonymous Coward: "And I thought Microsoft aimed their products at enterprises."

They may say they do, but the design of MS products is clearly aimed at the lowest common denominator -- Joe Six-pack and his family of chicken boner trailer trash.

By training, I'm neither a logician nor a philosopher, but this doesn't stop me from having a sneaking intuition that systems designed for the feckless masses are not serviceable for serious use by enterprises.

Case in point: the design philosophy that if the user makes a mistake, the software will guess what he *meant* to do. Wonder how many financial spreadsheets there are that incorporate the results of such goofiness? Lord knows it's hard enough to get a complex spreadsheet right without the software inserting guesswork into it!

Rantlet: it wouldn't be so bad if MS actually understood the uses to which their products are put, but holy moly, sometimes you get the impression that MS went and read a "For Dummies" book and now they is [sic] experts in this or that specialized field of knowledge.

Case in point: Windows machines controlling realtime medical equipment that decide to call home and install an update at an inopportune moment. (Is this fact, or is it an urban legend?)

Dear Bill: You can't have your cake and eat it too.

Love,

Me.

[torn between <heart> and <PH>, so settled on <geek>]

S#it happens

Lets be honest no piece of software is perfect, whether MS or not. Personally I think if

other office applications were used as much as MS Office, then there would be more known issues.

OpenOffice may not do everything some experts need

but OpenOffice surely does more than enough for 95%+ of homes, school and college students, and even business spreadsheet and WP users.

Anyway, Bill's retired now, who's going to decide what to buy/copy/steal/be inspired by for MS's next generation of moneyspinners? Have they updated CineMania and Music Central lately? Is there a Symbian version of Autoroute yet? I gather there's a new version of Windows ME out soon?

They have no shame

Having supported MS OS and apps for over 17 years I appreciate the annuity income. Installing services packs, anti-virus, anti-spyware and patches has paid off my house and car and thanks to Billy G and that Ballmer monkeyboy I expect the cash to keep rolling into my pocket.

I know I can rely on Microsoft to continue to screw the pooch aka customer for as long as the sky is blue and the grass is green. That's what makes America great!

OpenOffice is not a bad option but it is not suitable for the 5% or less who actually use the advanced features of Excel. But for those who want to do a quick budget analysis OO's spreadsheet is fine.

Re: Invetnt the bug. hide it. scare people off into buying new version by revelaing it. Brilliant!

Break a lot of things? Does it though? SP3 stops you from opening older-than-97 files (why would you STILL be relying on them?) which you can convert anyway and in any case Microsoft HAS published a workaround. It's simple. Get the latest service pack. It's your own fault if you don't update.

> I gather there's a new version of Windows ME out soon?

I gather that they did that last year, except that they call it "Vista".

What a bunch of hypocrites you all are.

Seriously. One moment you're complaining about how insecure Microsoft products are and how you shouldn't use them, and then the next you're all upset because you think it's all deliberate to scare you into upgrading.

If you believe the first statement, then I assume you're using Linux or some other platform. If you believe the second statement, then I assume you're using Linux or some other platform.

If you make either the first OR the second statement (or both) and yet you're still using Microsoft products, then you're a hypocrite and a liar. Get real, people, and stop Microsoft-bashing just for the sake of looking 'cool'.

@ They have no shame

You said:

"OpenOffice is not a bad option but it is not suitable for the 5% or less who actually use the advanced features of Excel. But for those who want to do a quick budget analysis OO's spreadsheet is fine."

After 35+ years as a CPA in Australia, I recomnmend that all spreadsheets be limited to a few pages which can be viewed within a screen or two.

If you intend to create a complex spreadsheet using those advanced features, you are unlikely to understand the output you get, you are unlikely to be able to audit anything beyond a few pages and therefore you cannot rely/depend/entrust your life or future to that spreadsheet.

These cautions may also apply to a spreadsheet of a few pages, depending on your level of skill with spreadsheets.

However, these cautions definitely apply, independent of skill levels, to large complex spreadsheets.

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

re: What a bunch of hypocrites you all are.

Rubbish.

I don't like Microsoft for any number of reasons and though I use Linux for my workstations and servers at work and home I still have to support the poor sods (customers and staff) who are still using Windows due to necessity (application lock-in), ignorance or orders from 'higher-up'.

For these reasons I reserve the right to bitch about Microsoft as much as I like and I suspect many of the previous posters are in the same boat.