Microsoft Launches Web Site For Mac Office 2008 UsersMicrosoft Launches Web Site For Mac Office 2008 Users

Microsoft on Tuesday unveiled a redesigned version of its Mactopia Web site for users of its new Macintosh-compatible software.

Mac users can purchase Office 2008 for Mac on the updated site, participate in community forums, and access a range of product help and information.

The site also will house Microsoft's Mac Business Unit blog -- a popular resource for Apple fans looking for hints about Microsoft's Macintosh product road map.

Microsoft launched Office 2008 for Mac on Tuesday at Macworld in San Francisco. The suite includes the latest versions of Mac-compatible editions of Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and Entourage.

As of Tuesday afternoon, the new Mactopia site was already fielding support questions from users unable to get the software to work properly. The top support issues related to e-mail integration, the appearance of type characters, and wonky Visual Basic macros, according to the site.

Microsoft's new Mac Office software isn't without controversy.

Like its Windows counterpart, Office 2007, Office 2008 for Mac uses Microsoft's new Office Open XML format as the default format for document creation. Microsoft has been criticized by a number of industry groups for releasing a standard that isn't fully compatible with the Open Document Format -- which is recognized by the International Organization for Standardization as a global standard.

Last week, the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency advised schools in the United Kingdom not to upgrade their PCs to Windows Vista and Office 2007.

Among other things, the agency cited concerns about Microsoft's failure to employ the Open Document Format in its Office software.