It’s not really unexpected, but we thought we would pass on the good news anyway. Microsoft is currently working on an update for Office for Mac 2011 that will bring versions, auto-save and full-screen applications to the Mac.
But, don’t expect the update to happen any time in the near future. Pat Fox, a member of the Office for Mac team has already begun tempering expectations, stating that the update will likely be released in months not days.
Another major point of interest from Fox’s blog post is that Office for Mac 2004 will never work with Lion. Microsoft relied heavily on Rosetta to get the 2004 edition of their application running on Intel based Macs, but Apple has discontinued the technology with Lion. As such, Office for Mac 2004 will never-ever run on Lion.
So, if you’re planning on running Lion, and rely heavily on Office for Mac 2004, you’re going to want to take a moment and evaluate your options: you could upgrade to the 2011 edition of Office for Mac, you could switch to iWork, you could look into other 3rd party office bundles, or you could simply avoid upgrading to Lion altogether.
Source: Office:Mac Blog
