by , 3:10 AM EDT, May 13th, 2008

Microsoft introduced Service Pack 1 for Office 2008 for the Mac on Tuesday. The update addresses several user requests, improves overall application stability and security, and performance issues.

The service pack improves compatibility when exchanging files between Excel 2008 for the Mac and Excel 2007 for Windows, and improved printing reliability for elements in Excel 2008 workbooks. It also improved the Entourage calendar view and all-day reminders with reoccurrence, added the ability to send and view images in Entourage from third-party tools, and improved overall Exchange Server support.

Microsoft Word 2008 now sports updated formatting and recording status in Notebook layout, improved reliability and responsiveness in the Document map, and improved accuracy when orienting tables with cell shading. PowerPoint now supports viewing Mac-based .PPTX files on Windows Mobile phones, corrected crashing problems when printing to high resolution printers, improved printing speeds, and supports using AppleScript to implement custom scripts that operate on the current selection.

Microsoft Office 2008 SP1 is a free update for Office 2008 users and will be available by noon Pacific time at the Microsoft Web site.