Paul Thurott (WinSuperSite) has put some screenshots on his web site of the installation procedure for Office 12 and of Word 12 as well.

The installation pictures are probably a hint as to what will happen with MSI v4, and the subtle visuals in the installation shots are really nice - very similar to the Aero visuals but in XP.

The Word shots are also really enlightening. Apart from the new style toolbars (which look great) the menu's are really great - having tooltip style help showing under large menu items is a fantastic idea and really improves usability. Integration of the page zoom into the status bar and the use of a slider is also a great improvement in usability.

Overall - Word is looking really good and it's great to see Microsoft willing to leave the old style design of office behind and take a fresh new approach.

The only problem is now I'll have to rethink how the applications I develop look and feel as well. I guess you can't have it all...