Microsoft (again) demonstrating how, despite their best efforts (and pots of money), they still can't get it right when it comes to usability. This time, Entourage for Mac is the culprit. Look at the picture and see if you can spot the problem:

The main 'windows' for entourage are: Mail, Address book, Calendar, Notes, Tasks and Project center.
If you close any of these windows (which is the main window), you might think going to the window menu would be the appropriate place to re-open it?
But no!
Under the window menu you can bring up the progress information and the my day panel (which incidentally doesn't behave like a window). None of the main windows are accessible via the window menu.Instead, to access these windows, you have to access the calendar menu! In other words, if I want to view my mail, I have to select calendar > mail. Mail view is found under calendar!!? Umm? Same goes for address book, notes and tasks.
Next time I go shopping perhaps I'll look for fruit in the personal hygiene section.
If I had the option of not using Entourage then I wouldn't mind. But, since Microsoft's use of proprietary standards has locked me into exchange, Entourage is mandatory.
Basic rule of happy customers: if you force your customers to use your product, make sure it's a good one. Or your customers will end up writing blog posts like this.
OK update: this goes from bad to worse.
The menu changes depending on what you were last doing, even after you shut all the windows. If you've been using calendar, then the menu is called calendar (under which you find mail, address book etc...). But, if you go into mail, then the menu changes its name to view. So either this is a bad bug, or some highly warped interaction design.


The problem here with changing menu names based on your task, is once your task is over and you close the window (going back to the 'neutral state'), the menu names retain their previous state. That and bad menu naming to start with (all windows should be accessible under the menu 'window') .








