Office 12: Where's 3DXML?

Ina Fried of CNET interviews someone from Microsoft about "what's new" in the next release of its Office collection of software. Few details, vague stuff about collaboration, less emphasis on server-based software. Also:

- no mention of Visio
- no mention of 3DXML

Here is the Microsoft spokeser [that would be the CBC's attempt to neuter spokesman] creating demand for new email software: "Some things, like e-mail, have improved, but nonetheless raised new challenges. Raikes noted studies that show that the average worker gets about 10 times as much e-mail now as in 1997. That's projected to increase another fivefold in the next four years, Raikes said. To handle that increase, as well as the rise of instant messaging and other forms of electronic communication, Microsoft is trying to develop software that can do a better job of sorting out the really important messages."

They needed to do a study to show that email has increased since 1997? Combing through my email archives (which go back to 1994 for the Internet, and 1991 for CompuServe), I see I was receiving approx. 10 emails a day in 1997.Yesterday, I received approx. 90 emails. A 9x increase. That didn't take much study.

Yet the email software I use today (Eudora v4.x) is the same brand I used when I first got onto the Internet in late 1994. To sort out the "really important messages" from the 90% spam I receive, I use Eudora's filters, which either redirect msgs to specific mailboxes, or colorize them. There's no need to wait until the second half of 2006, and then pay for a Microsoft solution that it is still "trying to develop."

Comments

[Robin Capper]

I hope, suspect, they are "trying to develop." something a leap ahead of the folder, rule, highlight features that have also been in Outlook for years.
I use them all but think they are a poor solution to the single problem of "dealing with and finding stuff".
I suspect the real future is along the lines of tagging documents and some nice interface to display views based on content or tags. Perhaps the desktop search tools are a hint of that future.

[Roger Rogerson]

"Microsoft is trying to develop software that can do a better job of sorting out the really important messages."

Let's see now...

My Documents
My Pictures
My Music

OK... Longhorn will feature a new compulsory folder in your root directory:

My Important Emails

The folder will be populated using second generation AI designed by Clippy.