Office 2007 Service Pack 2 Out Now

Office 2007 SP2 can be downloaded from here.

SP2 includes two types of fixes:

• Previously unreleased fixes that were made specifically for the service pack, and in addition to general product fixes, improvements in stability, performance, and security. Product-specific changes are are set out in MS KB Article 953195.
  
  
• All hotfixes released through to February 2009.

Office 2007 Service Pack 2 due April 28

The Microsoft Update Product Team Blog has announced that Office 2007 SP2 will be available for download on April 28. Details are available here.

Access updates include:

• The ability to export reports to Excel
• Fixes for issues with the import data wizards, report printing and previewing, macros, Excel integration, and date filters.
• Updates to Access Developer Extensions now included in SP2

Office 2007 SP2 Out This Month

According to Bink.nu, Office 2007 Service Pack 2 will be made available to Windows Server Update Services in April.

SP2 includes: built-in saving of documents in ODF & PDF formats, improvements to Outlook’s performance and calendar reliability, significant bug fixes for charts in core Office applications, the ability for client service packs to be removed using an uninstall tool, user-requested enhancements, and a roll-up of all fixes that have previously been released for Office 2007 products.

Office 2007 SP2 Slated for Early 2009

An MS TechNet blog has announced that Service Pack 2 for Office 2o07 will be released on a date between February and April 2009.

Some details of changes in Office desktop applications in SP2 have been included in the announcement:

• Improved Outlook Calendaring Reliability
• Improved Outlook Performance
• Enabling Object Model support for Charts in PowerPoint and Word
• Improved cryptographic functionality by supporting all cryptographic algorithms offered by the operating system
• Improved functionality in Excel’s charting mechanism
• Ability to un-group SmartArt graphics and add animations in PowerPoint
• Ability for Visio to export UML models to an XML file compliant with the XMI standard
• Tool that enables the un-install of Office client Service Packs

Expanded List of Formats to be Supported in Office 2007 SP2

Microsoft has announced that the release of Microsoft Office 2007 Service Pack 2 (SP2) scheduled for the first half of 2009, will include support for XML Paper Specification (XPS), Portable Document Format (PDF) 1.5, PDF/A, and Open Document Format (ODF) v1.1.

When using SP2, Office users will be able to open, edit and save documents using ODF and save documents into the XPS and PDF fixed formats from directly within the application without having to install an add-in. Users will also be able to set ODF as the default file format for Office 2007. To also provide ODF support for users of Office XP and Office 2003, Microsoft says it will continue to collaborate with the open source community in the ongoing development of the Open XML-ODF translator project on SourceForge.net.