Open Office 2

[Aaron Grewell]

On Thu, 2005-11-17 at 12:53 -0500, A. Khattri wrote:
> On Thu, 17 Nov 2005, Chong Yu Meng wrote:
> 
> > Actually, Ajay, this behaviour is NOT consistent across all Microsoft
> > applications. If you used the "X" button at the top right-hand corner of
> > the window to close files, in MSWord2000, you will close the file, but
> > NOT the application. If you used it in Excel, it closes everything.
> > Powerpoint does the same thing. If you closed Outlook, it will still
> > leave open message windows open.
> 
> Just checked in Office 2000 on XP:
> 
> When you have multiple documents open in Excel they all share the same
> real estate on the screen (unlike Excel on Win2K) - you can switch
> different documents by using the Window menu or the task bar. In this case
> there are TWO close buttons on the top-left. The larger one on the
> top-right is like a "master" close button and will close all documents and
> the application too. Under that and slightly indented is a smaller close
> button which only closes the current document.
> 

This is standard MDI (multiple document interface) behavior and has been
in Windows and its apps since at least 3.x.  The main window in Excel
versions that use MDI is considered the 'parent' so if you close it the
others close too.  Same goes for Word.  I don't think Outlook ever used
MDI, nor did PowerPoint or Access.  IIRC in PPT and Access you can have
only one file open at a time, so MDI is moot.  At some point MS began to
shift from MDI because users don't understand it.  In newer office revs
everything is its own window, and there is supposed to be a distinction
between Close and Quit.  MDI is old tech, so MS apps that still use it
will be converted within a version or two.  It doesn't really work well
in a multi-monitor environment, and since users have always been
confused by the multiplicity of close buttons and  strange nesting
behaviors (minimize and maximize within MDI is funky and irritating) I'm
not going to miss it one bit.