Microsoft Office Word 2000 Free Download

Anyone who uses Microsoft Part will hold on ii things: It's a powerful collection of applications, and it needs improvements.

Hither are six programs that bring Function a lot closer to what information technology should be. The first three piece of work across multiple Office applications, improving the much-loved–and much-hated–ribbon-based interface. The other three are application-specific, giving Outlook, Word, and Excel additional capabilities that Microsoft either didn't call up of or didn't bother with.

For links to these downloads all in one convenient identify, meet our "Six Downloads to Improve Microsoft Office" drove.

User Interface Improvements

Office Tab

If you've ever had multiple Excel worksheets open at a time, you know the frustrations of switching among them and keeping track of which is which. The aforementioned goes for Discussion documents and PowerPoint presentations.

Extendoffice.com'south Office Tab adds tabbed document management to those three applications, making the chore much easier. As with the tabbed Spider web pages in your browser, you can easily switch betwixt tabs, rearrange them, or right-click for a carte du jour of options.

Extendoffice also sells separate tab programs for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, merely if y'all utilise whatsoever two of those applications, the total Office Tab plan costs less.

Download Office Tab | Cost: $25; 30-twenty-four hours free trial | Supports Function 2003, 2007, and 2010 (does not yet support PowerPoint 2010)

Search Commands

Do you know, off-hand, which ribbon you need to alter Discussion's AutoCorrect options? Or which Excel ribbon you need for sorting a worksheet? There'due south always a characteristic that you just know is around somewhere, but Help is a far as well boring and painful manner to observe it.

This freebie from Microsoft Office Labs won't eliminate your need to ask such questions, but it will probably provide answers. Simply go to the Search Control ribbon and enter a keyword to bring upward a row of appropriate icons. 1 is jump to be the particular you want.

Search Commands works in the 2007 versions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.

Download Search Commands | Price: Costless | Supports Office 2007

Classic Carte for Office 2007

If you miss the quondam Microsoft Office user interface–the 1 with menus instead of ribbons–Classic Menu is a dream come true. Install it, and you're dorsum to the Give-and-take, Excel, and PowerPoint you beloved.

And Addintools, the creator of this download, brings back the menu the right manner: It augments the ribbon interface rather than replacing it. Classic Carte du jour merely adds another ribbon–one with the old, familiar menus and, as a bonus, the former, familiar toolbars. It's there when yous want it, but you can always click on another ribbon and use the more modern interface when the mood strikes you.

As the name implies, this program is for Office 2007. Addintools sells like add-ons for the various Role 2010 packages.

Download Archetype Menu for Office 2007 | Price: $thirty; 30-day free trial | Supports Office 2007

Specific Awarding Improvements

Lookeen

You have a lot of data stored in Outlook–your entire contact listing, appointments, countless e-mail messages. And the but thing you have to search it with is…Outlook.

Unless you're willing to driblet $40 for Lookeen, that is. Then you'll have all sorts of fast, indexed searches at your fingertips. For instance, yous can select an electronic mail message and click the Conversations icon to bring up all of the messages that Lookeen thinks are part of the same conversation, likewise every bit possibly relevant appointments and contacts. Other searches will find elements added today or this week, or items that are "more similar this."

It tin even search outside of Outlook, making it a desktop search tool.

Download Lookeen | Price: $forty; 14-mean solar day gratis trial | Supports Outlook 2003, 2007, and 2010

CrossEyes

Word documents aren't sausages–there's nothing gross about seeing how they're fabricated.

With Levit & James's CrossEyes, you tin come across exactly what'due south going on inside a Word document. Is that word assuming and red because someone assigned a particular manner to information technology, or simply because someone made it assuming and carmine? That sort of difference means a lot when you're altering a document's look, specially if you're not the only person who has worked on that file.

Not every Discussion user needs CrossEyes; but if y'all have to reformat other people'south piece of work, it's a approval.

CrossEyes is currently on version 4. Version v, which is in public beta as I write this, supports Word 2010.

Download CrossEyes | Price: $30; fifteen-solar day trial | Supports Word 2003 and 2007

ASAP Utilities

This Excel add-in puts all sorts of tools onto the application's ribbon. With information technology, you lot can format the on-screen view (hiding grids, zero values, and other peradventure distracting $.25), select the cell with the smallest or largest number, select all the cells with errors, freeze panes on multiple sheets at once, and simultaneously save the current file and create a backup.

That'southward just a pocket-sized sample of all the means this tool allows y'all to manipulate numbers, text, links, and information. And if its vast offerings go also confusing (it'southward really for Excel power users), you can put your most-used options in the customizable 'My favorite tools' menu.

And if things become too frustrating, you can salve some tension past pulling down the ribbon'south Start carte and selecting Funny (error) letters. I got 'Fault saving file! format drive now?'

Download ASAP Utilities | Cost: $49 for commercial use, after 90-solar day trial period; gratuitous for noncommercial use, unless "you don't want to exist forced to update to the new version twice a yr…or if you lot like this plan and think information technology is worth the money." | Supports Excel 2000, 2002/XP, 2003, 2007, and 2010 (32-scrap)

Contributing Editor Lincoln Spector writes PCWorld's Answer Line column and weblog.