Microsoft Makes Date For Mac OS X Office

The Mac OS X-native version of Microsofts Office suite took another step closer to store shelves on Wednesday, Oct. 24, when the company set a shipping date of Nov. 19 for the productivity package.

Microsoft said it has begun offering preorder sales of the Office X suite, which has been tailored to conform with the Carbon Application Programming Interfaces in Mac OS X, Apple Computers Unix-based operating system. The suite will cost $500, and upgrades will be $300 each.

Microsoft also reported that more than 90,000 Mac users have downloaded a free public beta of the suites Word component since the company unveiled it during Apple CEO Steve Jobs keynote speech at Septembers Seybold Seminars in San Francisco.

Erik Ryan, product manager of Microsofts Mac business unit, told Ziff Davis News Service that there are 900,000 registered Mac users of Office 2001. He said that Microsoft did not have information about how many of the new versions test pilots already used the word processing program, which dominates the Mac market.

In addition to Carbon compliance, Microsoft Office X for Mac will include tweaks for Mac OS Xs Aqua interface and new features for the component applications in the Mac suite: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and the Entourage X e-mail client and personal information manager.

The software will require Mac OS X 10.1.

Daniel Drew Turner contributed to this report.