The Macintosh Business Unit (Mac BU) at Microsoft Corp. today announced the availability of Service Pack 1 (SP1) for Office 2004 for Mac via Microsoft AutoUpdate. Customers are encouraged to download SP1; it addresses potential security issues and bugs that their feedback played an important role in identifying. New to Office 2004, Microsoft Error Reporting Protocol (MERP) allows customers to communicate bug data anonymously to Microsoft, enabling efficient fixes and helping increase the overall stability of Office 2004.
“Our customers who use Office for Mac every day are a valuable resource because they put the product to the test in real-life scenarios that expand on our experiences in the lab,” said Scott Erickson, group product manager for the Mac BU at Microsoft in the press release. “We strive to deliver the best possible product experience through extensive testing and by gathering customer feedback. This helps us determine issues to address within a service pack and prioritize which improvements will make the most difference.”
When an issue occurs, MERP gives customers the choice to anonymously communicate data to Microsoft so developers can pinpoint and solve issues that affect users. While Microsoft proactively worked to improve Office 2004 through thousands of its own tests, new tools such as MERP played a large part after the product shipped in determining fixes included in SP1.
A service pack is a tested, cumulative set of security and critical updates following an initial product release, along with fixes for problems found by Microsoft or through MERP data provided by customers and through customer support calls. Customers will be notified and can download Office
2004 for Mac SP1 via Microsoft AutoUpdate. In addition, customers can download SP1 for Office 2004 from http://www.microsoft.com/mac ; Office X and 2001 users may also visit the Web site to receive new security updates and bug fixes specific to their product versions.
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