Many of the investments developers make in Office 2007 are version-durable (read: they are likely to endure into the next version of Office). Some of the Office 2007 technologies that are so appealing for business productivity solutions are the new Office document format, Word content controls, and the Office Fluent UI (eg: Ribbon).

There are some great resources to help you get into these. I recommend:

• JUST ADDED (9 March 2009): http://www.microsoft.com/events/series/officedeveloperlive.aspx
• http://openxmldeveloper.org/ --- This is the main site for our XML initiative regarding the file formats in Office 2007. There are samples and explanations here that will serve you quite well as you dive in.
• Introducing the Office (2007) Open XML File Formats by Frank Rice --- This is an excellent introductory article by the prolific and precise Mr. Rice!
• Creating Custom Task Panes in the 2007 Office System by Mark O'Hara and Frank Rice
• Customizing the 2007 Office Fluent Ribbon for Developers (3 parts) by the incomparable Ken Getz
• Programming Office Business Applications by Steve Fox, Paul Stubbs, Rob Barker
• Master VBA for Microsoft Office 2007 by Richard Mansfield
• 6 Microsoft Office Business Applications for Office SharePoint Server 2007 by Rob Barker, Adam Buenz, Joanna Bichsel

It is too early to comment yet on Office 14 specifically, so I will not disclose product details at this time. Nevertheless, there are some things worth investing in now and in looking ahead. The XML file formats, Office Fluent UI, and Word content controls remain exciting technologies and excellent opportunities to extend Office to meet business needs.

Rock Thought of the Day: Here's a raw dump of the awesome Rock and Roll I have listened to in the past 24 hours! 

ROCK ON!

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