This is a GREAT manual--it aggravates me to have to buy a manual for a program that I just spent $200+ for but that is the way of the world today. However, the $20+ I spent on this one was well worth it--great job Nancy & Matthew!
It was the only Office 2010 manual I found that actually covers all of the programs in some reasonable depth without being overwhelming. Also, the conversational tone of the book is a big plus when dealing with the dry topic of computer software.
It has been very helpful in bringing me into the new developments of Outlook and made One Note less daunting for me.
Thanks again for a useful tome... Office 2010: The Missing Manual
'Office 2010: The Missing Manual' by Nancy Conner & Matthew MacDonald is an absolute gem of a book. With 900+ pages of material covering Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and so much more, this is the definitive reference item for all heavy Office users that want to ramp up as quickly and efficiently as possible. Broken up over 31 chapters, this book logically separates the different applications and uses of the Office program suite. Focusing heavily on not just the use of the apps but the differences with previous versions, this is another grand slam by the 'Missing Manual' line of books.
The only person that I really couldn't recommend this for is if you are a user of a particular application in the Office suite. For you I would recommend on picking up one of the particular books that delve more into detail than this book does. Only gripe is the lack of color but that isn't enough to not recommend this highly.
Awesome books, incredible job by one of the best book lines out there today.
***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
Like many software manuals, it covers the basics but doesn't give you anything special. As large as it is, I expected a really strong index (and there are a lot of things listed) but it just didn't get there for me. I'm not a beginner, but Office 2010 was obviously new for me. I'm finding it easier to struggle through the new software and find the solution than struggling through the book to find it.
I usually get one of these mega-books on each upgrade of software, and this was a very good choice. It does what it says it is going to do, and I am using it repeatedly as I explore Office 2010. The information has been correct every time I look, and leads to aspects I didn't know I wanted to know about until informed in this manual. Sort of like Windows 7, that anticipates problems and solutions without your having to ask.
The only complaints I have are the lack of color, which has turned out to be a very minimal lose, and the lack of depth in some not so unusual areas, like style in Word, which has a very complex set of functions. It is covered, but I left it hungry.
I will most likely get a dedicated book on Word, or just keep following up with searches on the MS Office 2010 Site. The video tutorials there are, by the way, quite good introductions to various parts of every Office program.
bmkmd
Super price for what you get! This book is well written and covers the BASICS of using this Microsoft (M/S) product. But there is so much to know about the Office Suite products that this book, even at 900+ pages, cannot possibly cover the detailed information that I would like to have. I dislike having to go online for help information from M/S and become lost in the process. I cannot understand why M/S cannot include the equivalent of an electronic manual with their products. Most laptop PCs have memory & hard-drives in the megabytes and memory-sticks (& cards) in the gigabytes. So if your looking for information on how to use this M/S Office product you'll have to keep looking. Please let me know if you do. For the neophyte user of M/S Office this book definitely gets you off the ground and is well worth the cost.
Unlike previous versions, the launch of Windows XP wasn't immediately followed by one of Brian Livingston's classic "Windows Secrets" books, so I looked for an alternative. I found and bought the "Windows XP Missing Manual", which proved to be a complete waste of time and money. I wrote a scathing review on Amazon, and swore to never buy another "Missing Manual". Fooled me once -- shame on you.
Years went by and I kept that pledge, until recently when Microsoft Office 10 and a Kindle 3 arrived on my desk almost simultaneously. It seemed logical that one of my first Kindle books should be an Office 2010 manual. Searching Amazon's lists I found that most of my favorite authors and series were not yet available and, keen to try out my Kindle, I plunged one of the best reviewed of the available few -- Office 2010: The Missing Manual. Fooled me twice -- shame on me.
If you find anything in this disorganized mess of a book, you're lucky. If you find more in this book than is already quickly available from the program's Help, or from the most cursory web search, you're a talented bookworm. As a book, this is just a pack rat's nest of superficial, incomplete, and poorly edited information that can be found in a more complete, and better organized form on any number of Microsoft and third-party web pages. As a Kindle book this is a disgrace. Because there is no quick reference, searching requires leafing through pages and pages of detailed Table of Contents heads and sub-heads (most of the information in the book is so incomplete and superficial that there are many, many sub-heads, with little text between them). Near the end of this TOC search, one finally finds a link to the Index, but clicking on that just leads to yet another search through pages and pages of what is nothing more than the same table of contents re-organized in alphabetical order. That is when you find that what you are looking for -- being neither simple nor obvious -- is not covered in this book.
Really? That bad? Here's one simple example: when I sit at my desk in the morning the first thing I look at is my agenda for the day, in the form of "Outlook Today". Regularly, through the day, I check my progress through "Outlook Today". In the evening, before leaving my desk, I check "Outlook Today" for tomorrow. Now, go look in the Missing Manual's Table of Contents, Index, or use the Kindle Search for "Outlook Today" -- not once, not one mention,.. Missing. - Missing Manual - Microsoft'
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