Office 2010 Click to Run Feedback

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Bugs

Hi, I work on the Click-to-Run product team and would to hear a lot more, besides to printing option, as to what you are experiencing and is broken. This is just Beta 1 and like any Beta 1 product can be a little rough around the edges, so we want to hear what is broken and what you believe works.

Thanks,

Bob {MSFT]

Sure. Thank you for contacting me.

  • Virtual (as in not a physical printer, not C2R) OneNote 2010 printer not visible on Win 7 x64 or

Vista x32; what you posted below; Daniel Escapa says fixed in current internal builds

  • Inking on tablet devices (confirmed by ~5 other people onenote newsgroup “How do you ink”;

check it out) in both Onenote and composing in Outlook; what’s weird is that inking works on my non-tablet desktop with a mouse; this is a major show stopper

  • Starting Outlook when offline on a Win 7 x64 desktop (product has been installed and open for

hours on a fast connection) fails occasionally. My Win 7 RC x64 occasionally does not connect to the network on boot. I must go to network settings and turn the adaptor off and on. This has happened on two RC 7 x64 desktops one a Dell and the other an HP; never on any other machine or OS in the house/network. When this happens Outlook does not seem to start and gives some message about being offline and referencing virtualization. I tried to reproduce this by pulling my network cable, but Outlook started offline no problems. Very weird for both the Win 7 and Outlook flaws.

  • In OneNote 2010, when you have Onenote 2007 installed and use the clipping feature FROM

2010, it will actually open 2007 and paste the clipping in there (reported in the OneNote newsgroup “Regressions and Suggestions”)

  • OneNote 2010 fails to register with search service after prompting for admin credentials on my

Vista x32 tablet. I don’t think I have this issue on my Win 7 x64 desktop.

  • Outlook breaks the Windows 7 taskbar by opening a separate taskbar item, instead of using

the pinned shortcut. I think someone said this was fixed later.

  • Startup seems to be slow
  • I have heard of various problems with add-ins on Outlook. Don’t have a problem though since

I just use 2 exchange accounts.

  • BTW something you guys do right: In Win 7 x64 RC when you start menu search “Mail” for the

Mail (ie Outlook) control panel – the 2007 Mail control panel DOES NOT show up. You must go into the control panel and search for it. Only the 2010 virtual Mail panel shows up in start menu search. I have Office 2007 and Office 2010 C2R installed. I hope your Win 7 team fixed this. Both show up on Vista x86 start menu search with 2007 Ultimate and 2010 C2R installed.

My main concern is that C2R does not seem to be for me. I don’t think that installing Office is much of a problem. Who is this product for? Companies who don’t want to run updates on each computer? Consumers?

It is because I don’t see how this product is for me combined with the frustration that these bugs which I discover are only in the C2R. I see why you want to get people to test C2R; however testing both 2010 and click to run is frustrating because I don’t know if it is a bug in Office or its click to run application. Perhaps running both normal MSI and C2R Office side by side could help us better beta test. This way we would know where to address issues.

These are all the issues I could find, if I find anything more in the future, I will post it in that app’s newsgroup.

Finally, In that statement you reference, I was perhaps too harsh from the frustration I described above of every issue I was sending to Daniel Escapa was C2R only and I apologize. Let me know if there is anything else you want me to test.

-Michael Plasmeier



Use Case

Am I missing something???

Let's take the case of a netbook user without a CD drive. You can't easily use your Office CD. It seems that some are suggesting C2R for this case. However, why can a netbook user not be able to download the standard MSI file and install Office like that?

Others have recommended selling USB sticks preloaded with Office. I think that Microsoft should stick to selling 1 package of Office. In it should be a CD and a product key. If you don't have a CD drive you can go to a free Microsoft website, enter your product key, and get a .MSI download. Actually can't you do this with a trial version???

In sum, netbooks sans CD drives not a clear C2R usecase, and Microsoft should make sure to put download instructions (special website or trial version) in the retail box.

-Michael Plasmeier http://theplaz.com

Feedback on the below questions:

> Current Questions/Concerns: > > 1) Will users be allowed to migrate to the full MSI for the cost of the > disc or > be allowed to download an ISO to make their own disc for a small fee?

[PBARR] Although the final distribution story for Click-to-Run is not yet locked, all customers who get Click-to-Run (either by opting in to it, or being provisioned automatically), will have rights to download the MSI version of the product free of charge. This is similar to how we are thinking of distributing 64-bit versions. A user buys "Office" and they get access to x86, x64, Click-to-Run, etc. Media fulfillment (CD/DVD in the mail) will be available for a nominal charge similar to how they are today.

> 2) How does a user reinstall? Do they have to keep a link around? If > their > system crashes without a backup how do they get back to it? With a disc > they > simply pop it in and install.

[PBARR] This will depend on how the user was provisioned. In all Click-to-Run cases, the user obtained the software through ESD (Electronic Software Distribution == an online store). So the user can either:

- (preferred) Repair their product from the Control Panel: Add/Remove Programs entry. This will re-install their product from the original location and (optionally) reset their user state as well in case that is the cause of their problem. - Refer to the email received from the online store and re-install the product using the link(s) within. - Return to the store itself, log-in, select their purchased/trial'd software, and re-install.

This series of (free of charge) options is a much better experience than the ESD story today.

> 3) Apps that call things like winword.exe/excel.exe don't work. Many > medical > office applications have setup options to tell it where winword.exe and > excel.exe are so they can integrate with them and they no longer work. We > serve > several medical offices who have users who work from home and may be the > "target" audience for C2R because they're "home users". How do you plan > to > solve this?

[PBARR] This is a valid concern, although the implications are not as drastic as described above. The vast majority of extensibility for Office applications will work with Click-to-Run at RTM, but there will be some cases (particularly for COM enabled 3rd-party applications) where Click-to-Run may not be the right solution for the customer. There are things we are doing to mitigate this issue for users:

- Make sure the right users are getting Click-to-Run products. This is achievable by profiling users (trial vs purchase, market, locale, etc.). We have a ton of data that shows that unmanaged home users do very little of the automation you describe above, and certainly for trial scenarios (of which we expect to serve about 24 million a year), the benefits of Click-to-Run (co-existence, low-impact, fast delivery, up to date out of the box, etc.) out weigh some of the downsides of limited automation support. - We will always make the MSI version of the product available to users. - We can resolve these issues by making changes to Click-to-Run, or the Office products both prior to RTM, and as the product evolve.

> 4) How do you mitigate "man-in-the-middle" attacks if a local system is > compromised and one launches a C2R app and it thinks there are updates > because > of a hack on the local system? At least with Microsoft Update you have a > choice > to install updates. I can see that hackers will go after C2R quickly and > figure > out how to redirect a client PC to some eastern Europe virus/spyware site > to > hack C2R.

[PBARR] Well, if the client is actually compromised as you describe, all bets are off. No one would bother spoofing Click-to-Run updates when they could silently elevate and do anything they wanted ala Conficker.

If you're talking about a true "Man in the Middle" attack spoofing the "server-side" of Click-to-Run updates, we have multi-layer security mitigation in place, both in the hashed content of the update, and (more importantly) all of the update content is signed with a private key, then verified locally by a service before any changes are applied to the client.

> Also, with ISPs all over the world starting to limit or otherwise charge > for > bandwidth. In fact, someone at MS should call over to Paul Allen, the > largest > holder of Charter Communications stock and remind him his company's new > limits > may encourage users not to use C2R, though of course that's not a huge > amount of > data, but it adds to the total.

[PBARR] Interestingly, Click-to-Run actually uses significantly less bandwidth than the traditional ESD it replaces because the bits are compressed over the wire, and the user doesn't have to download the RTM version of the product and *then* download the updates (currently almost as big as the RTM product itself for Office 2007). The Click-to-Run bits are already updated and therefore the client only downloads one set of binaries to get up and running.

> Other than the immediate gratification effect of C2R I see very little > benefit > of C2R. In fact, the added QA overhead and costs at MS will likely cause > both > products to suffer in the end. You now have 4 fully different base builds > of > Office where before you had one (x86, x64, C2R, "Live" vs. x86). Unless > you > have significantly increased your staff I see no way 4 builds can ship > with the > same reliability as one or two builds. IMHO, C2R should be a proof of > concept > and then dropped as unnecessary. The eventual "Live" build of Office out > there > to compete with Google Apps should be targeted to home users not the C2R. > > Also, with ISPs all over the world starting to limit or otherwise charge > for > bandwidth. In fact, someone at MS should call over to Paul Allen, the > largest > holder of Charter Communications stock and remind him his company's new > limits > may encourage users not to use C2R, though of course that's not a huge > amount of > data, but it adds to the total. > > Current Questions/Concerns: > > 1) Will users be allowed to migrate to the full MSI for the cost of the > disc or > be allowed to download an ISO to make their own disc for a small fee? > > 2) How does a user reinstall? Do they have to keep a link around? If > their > system crashes without a backup how do they get back to it? With a disc > they > simply pop it in and install. > > 3) Apps that call things like winword.exe/excel.exe don't work. Many > medical > office applications have setup options to tell it where winword.exe and > excel.exe are so they can integrate with them and they no longer work. We > serve > several medical offices who have users who work from home and may be the > "target" audience for C2R because they're "home users". How do you plan > to > solve this? > > 4) How do you mitigate "man-in-the-middle" attacks if a local system is > compromised and one launches a C2R app and it thinks there are updates > because > of a hack on the local system? At least with Microsoft Update you have a > choice > to install updates. I can see that hackers will go after C2R quickly and > figure > out how to redirect a client PC to some eastern Europe virus/spyware site > to > hack C2R. > > I'm sure I'll think of other reasons why C2R isn't a good idea, but I can > tell > you if B2 does't run at 99% of the speed of the MSI files once installed > editors > will pan it and users will not use it. > > Brian Bergin > 133451 > > > > > > On Fri, 24 Jul 2009 16:54:15 -0700, "Paul Barr [MSFT]" <ConnectUser> > wrote: > > |Hello Brian- > | > |I posted the following in the general Newsgroup, and hopefully it > |answers some of your questions. > | > |In addition, I would say that Click-to-Run is an offering which is > |definitely geared towards our "unmanaged" customers, which is > |Microsoft-speak for "Home Users". The locally installed MSI client > |is still the correct option for system builders and corporate > |customers. > | > |And I know you've heard it before, but we really have made major > |performance improvements to the Click-to-Run products in recent > |builds (yes, 2x plus in many cases). I'm sorry we aren't able to > |share these changes with external customers until Beta2, but do > |please continue to provide feedback on the Technical Preview build. > | > |Thanks, > | > |-Paul Barr [MSFT] > | > |<begin paste from General Forum> > | > |Click-to-Run utilizes core Microsoft streaming and > |application-virtualization technology whereby the applications run in > |a virtual bubble on your individual operating system. Basically the > |applications have private views of their own registry and file > |system, and they also have their own namespace, so they always get > |the exact data they are requesting (versus possibly a shared version > |from the system). They do not run in a Virtual Machine, and they are > |running locally on your client (they are not "cloud based"). > | > |The Office binaries are the identical binaries installed by the MSI > |version of the product. > | > |The apps are not slower "by design". :-) But users will notice a > |performance difference between the MSI applications and Click-to-Run > |applications during the Technical Preview build due to a variety of > |causes (virtual environment setup, additional licensing validation, > |etc.). The Click-to-Run team is hard at work on these issues, and we > |have seen great gains in recent builds. Performance for > |Click-to-Run, like all of Office, is an extremely high priority. > | > |The benefits of Click-to-Run versions of the Microsoft Office 2010 > |products are: > | > |- The applications stream from the internet and are ready to use in a > |radically shorter time than the MSI product. We only have to > |download the virtualization infrastructure (~10MB), and the first > |boot bits for the application being started (~25MB). This will allow > |users to provision Office products from the internet in as little as > |90 seconds at RTM (on a broadband connection). The remainder of the > |applications download in the background. Once fully cached, the > |applications function just as if they were locally installed(*). > |- There is no install required for the Click-to-Run products. The > |applications are ready to execute once they are downloaded. > |- Users get the latest bits out of the box when downloading > |Click-to-Run products. No need to immediately install patches to get > |up to date. The bits that are streamed are the latest available at > |any given time. > |- Users are automatically kept up to date when using Click-to-Run > |products, with no need to "install" future updates. The client > |downloads only what has changed from the internet, and applies those > |changes during the next application boot. (Yes, users can opt out of > |this mechanism if they desire) > |- The Click-to-Run Office products are very low impact. They do not > |update any shared code on the Operating System, and they co-exist > |seamlessly with other software installed on the machine (including > |prior Office versions!). Uninstall is fast and clean. > | > |*The current not-so-great side-effects of Click-to-Run are: > | > |- The above noted performance degradation, particularly for boot, > |versus the MSI product. Again, we are hard at work on this. > |- Click-to-Run products may not interface with other installed > |software on the machine in the same way that the MSI or locally > |installed products do (things like Add-ins, or other extensibility > |mechanisms). This is something we're still gathering data on, and > |would love to see any bugs or issues reported from our Technical > |Preview customers. > | > |And finally, the Click-to-Run Technical Preview Program is separate > |from the other Office 2010 Technical Preview programs, although > |(obviously) users from the Click-to-Run program can post in the > |shared forums. > | > |I hope this answers some of your questions, and I hope you're having a > |good experience with Office 2010 and Click-to-Run so far. > | > |Thanks, > | > |-Paul Barr [MSFT] > |Lead Program Manager, Click-to-Run > | > | > |Brian S. Bergin 133451 wrote: > |> Bob, > |> > |> I posted this and you replied in the general group, but I'm still > looking for > |> more information on how MS envisions C2R and why exactly users should > use C2R > |> over real installers. Based on hundreds of betas with many companies, > including > |> MS, that speed increases in betas never amount to double and as it > stands now if > |> C2R isn't 2x faster by RTM than it is now every user will either > complain or > |> upgrade back to Office 2003 (2007 is much slower than 2003 as well > which is why > |> so many of our customers still use 2003). > |> > |> > |> Brian Bergin > |> Terabyte Computers, Inc. > |> Vista Pro Ultimate RTM or XP Pro SP3 or Windows 7 - depending on my > mood... > |> Dell Precision 390 Workstation, 2.4 GHz Core2Duo, 4GB RAM, 1TB SATA > RAID-5 volume, nVidia Quadra video > |> > |> connect_dot_ms at terabyte_dot_net > > > > Brian Bergin > Terabyte Computers, Inc. > Vista Pro Ultimate RTM or XP Pro SP3 or Windows 7 - depending on my > mood... > Dell Precision 390 Workstation, 2.4 GHz Core2Duo, 4GB RAM, 1TB SATA RAID-5 > volume, nVidia Quadra video > > connect_dot_ms at terabyte_dot_net

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