14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft takes a variety of measures to ensure that customers have an as smooth as possible ride when it comes to migration scenarios involving the company’s latest technology products. It is the case of Office 2010. While the next iteration of the Office System is months away from general availability, the software giant is offering corporate customers a tool designed to assess whether their IT environment is ready for the deployment of Office 2010. The Office Environment Assessment Tool is currently available for free from the Microsoft Download Center.
“This is a comprehensive environment scanning tool. This tool (along with documentation) assists a customer in the assessment phase of deployment. It identifies: currently installed applications and installation environment; add-ins currently in use by Office clients; programs that are not registered as add-ins but still interact with Office programs; Report: environmental assessment (potential upgrade issues); Report: add-ins assessment--list of third party programs and information about the compatibility of those programs with Microsoft Office 2010,” Microsoft explained.
Office 2010 Beta Build 14.0.4536.1000 along with the activation product keys for the product continue to be available for download at this point in time from Microsoft. Users can easily grab the bits and start testing the release. At the same time, corporate customers have the option to start planning migration to Office 2010 once the productivity suite becomes available approximately in mid-2010. A specific release deadline for the successor of Office 2007 has yet to be announced.
“This tool collects information for the following Office applications: Microsoft Office 97, Microsoft Office 2000, Microsoft Office XP, Microsoft Office 2003, 2007 Microsoft Office system, Microsoft Office 2010,” the company stated. “In addition, you must have the following applications installed: Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0, Microsoft Office Excel 2007 or Microsoft Excel 2010.”
Office Environment Assessment Tool is available for download here.
Office 2010 Beta 14.0.4536.1000 is available for download here.