Customer Reviews

Microsoft® Office Document Designer: Your Easy-to-Use Toolkit and Complete How-To Source for Professional-Quality Documents (Bpg-Other)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I am a business consultant that works with Microsoft, HP, Oracle, HP, Xerox etc. and teaches how to conduct sales presentations to CXOs for a living. I can say that this book has taken the look, feel and ease of creating a first class executive level business case to a level I could have not imagined. At first it is quite daunting and overwhelming. But I had to get some business cases together for 50 marketing professionals in Sydney on a special workshop and I crashed into it. The MODD system once you "get it" is easy, fast and addictive. I ripped through Excel, PowerPoint and Word integrated data and information in no time flat with the MODD tools. It scared me it worked so well. This stuff is like awesome and it is refreshing to actually see a program work without a hitch. ( I wonder how they did that?)Krieger has made me look really, really good. Go for it!

This book is like having an assistant to help with my documents. I create a lot of my own documents at work, and they have to look good. The book is a true help with that, not to mention the tools that come with the book. And, I can't believe how many how-to articles and tip sheets come along with the tools on the CD. Those articles are so great for quick and practical answers to the whatever I need to get done - I use them all the time.

This is the first book on Office that's not a theoretical reference or a laundry list of all the stuff you can do but will probably never use. The book and the tools actually help me get my work done. The tools save a lot of time, and they help me do things I didn't think I could do (like complex page layouts in Word or formatting Excel charts). I think Office 2003 is great, but I can do a lot more with it since I started using this book.

I have trained over 3,000 people in Microsoft Word. None of them had ever heard of or used styles. Styles are necessary if you're going to use Word correctly. So, I bought this book for two reasons. First, I find that a woman writes a better book about learning software. I think women authors seem to explain software in better detail, especially for beginners. Second, the back cover describes a CD that has "Dozens of professional designs and layouts." I like examples for learning.

So, I opened the book. It looked very good. Good topics, easy reading, nice coverage of Word, Excel,and PowerPoint. But, not a single reference to Word styles. Did I waste my time? No. I then looked at the CD and guess what? There is more information for Word users on the CD than in the book. Don't get me wrong - the book is good. But the CD has articles that explain more about how Word works than most people know. And as for styles, I found them when I loaded the samples, they were filled with styles. And, the CD tells much about their use.

How about Excel and PowerPoint? They are also covered very well on the CD, along with great examples in the book.

So, this book is about integration of three programs, yet each is covered very well. In today's world of business, if you know how, you can always find a job. You will learn the "how" with "Document Designer." You'll also learn the "why", and, if you know why, you can always be the boss.

I've recently become interested in finding training material for my staff on using Microsoft Office to create professional quality documents and document templates, with a particular emphasis on Word Styles. After some web and Amazon searches and a perusal of reviewer comments I decided to order Stephanie Krieger's Microsoft Office Document Designer (MODD).

Unfortunately, the text itself is little more than a tutorial on how to use the MODD tools available on the companion CD. The tools may be very nice, but they will only install for Office 2003. As an Office 2007 user, I was of course disappointed. The book by itself has little stand-alone value (i.e. no design principle guidance and very little guidance on how to work with MS Office products without the MODD toolkit).

You may find some value in the text if you are a just learning MS Office, have Office 2003 only, and are interested in what you can do with styles and formatting. However, before buying this textbook my recommendation would be to review the many free online tutorials at the Microsoft Website.

The book is well-written and describes the installation and use of the toolkit enclosed on the accompanying CD/ROM. The toolkit is good and fills a needed niche for those who want to produce complex and polished documents without understanding how Word works "under the covers". If this is what I wanted, I would give it either four or five stars.

What this book does not do is talk in depth about how Word actually works and how to either take advantage of that or work around it (like the fact that you can't really "lock" styles). My impression from reading web reviews prior to purchase, was that the book did this. My bad; it really doesn't.

After purchasing this book over a month ago, I have attained the necessary tools and techniques to be able to create complex looking documents that weren't hard to create at all. The book was easy to read and the CD that was supplied had really great layouts that helped me put together some of the documents I needed for my job. Also the various toolbars were really helpful, so I didn't need to go searching; it was right there! After using Office 2003 / XP for quite some time I felt that something was missing...and this was it.