[X4U] Consumer Reports-Word use

[Richard Gilmore]

We have over a dozen Macs with Office 2004 and hundreds of PCs switching
files back and forth all the time and we¹ve never had a virus or problem. If
you don¹t have Word on the Mac it gives the PC people more ammo to say the
Macs are useless. I don¹t have a problem with Word on Mac.




On 8/9/05 5:40 PM, "A. Scott McCulloch" <mylists at ascottmcculloch.com> wrote:

> On Sep 8, 2005, at 2:14 PM, keith_w wrote:
> 
>> 
>> I run Mac OS 10.3.9, and will be installing a brand new copy of MS Office
>> 2004 in about a week.
>>  
>> 
>> Valid reason? My wife uses PC programs at work, and has decided she wants the
>> ability to do some work-work on the home Mac.
>>  
>> 
>> So, back to having MS products on my Mac!  Sighhhh.
>>  
>> 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Anyhow, first question is, must you be actually using a Word or Excel macro
>> in order for the "macro virus/worm" to activate?
>>  
>> 
>> If I use the various parts of MS Office bareback, no macros, etc., do I have
>> to concern myself about viruses or worms?
>>  
>> 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> If so, what's the least obtrusive solution that still works?
>>  
>> 
>> In your most humble opinion, of course!  <wink>
>>  
>> 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Should I install Office 2004 on a separate HD inside the CPU? Will that
>> isolate the probability of infection?
>>  
>> 
>> Awww, that raises a ton of other questions, and may not be practical in the
>> long run.
>>  
>> 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> keith whaley
>>  
> 
> Depending on the types of documents she'll be working on (complicated
> formatting, etc??) you may not have to install MS Office - you could try
> NeoOffice or AbiWord or one of the other Office compatible apps (I'm pretty
> sure there are a couple more - and I'm sure others will chime in).
> 
> I'm not sure that using one of these Office compatible apps solves the issue
> of malicious macros, etc. - but it keeps MS off your Mac, if that's one of
> your preferences.
> 
> Scott
> 
> 
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