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View Full Version : What happened to Office Assistant


sbrbot
08-20-2008, 10:15 AM
Ten years ago, in era of Office 97 (I still like this Office version, although today I use Office 2003) I was creating VBA macros using lovely Rocky dog assistant. Maybe new generation even do not remember these assistants but I and many other people loved them. My macro program users also loved assistants.

After that Office 97 period I spent few years with J2EE and still work with it and almost forgot about Office assistants.

There was a lot of criticism about these assistants (I don't know exactly the nature of them) and finally MS removed them from newer Office version (I think they were removed from Office 2000 already). One rumor was that implementation of these assistants into Office suite was led by Bil Gate's wife herself. However, some people liked them (I mean assistants, not Gates), some not, on the other side, some people adored them so much that they even created Office Assistants Fun clubs.

Whatever, I see that Application.Assistant object still exists in new Office 2003 VBA (probably for the sake of backward compatibility) but it does nothing. Is there any use of this object in new Office VBA?

If you feel nostalgy look at this (http://www.vbaexpress.com/kb/getarticle.php?kb_id=173) on this VBAX forum.

Quiz; what were the names of cat and scientist (Einstein) assistants?

:hi:
sbrbot
08-20-2008, 11:08 AM
Oh, yes, I see it now. Rocky is still here but has to be installed additionally because it's not installed by default (Help|Show Office Assistant). Unfortunately one cannot rely on installed assistant on others computers, so I think it's better not to use it in macro codes that should be redistributed.
TrippyTom
08-20-2008, 01:25 PM
Personally, if you enabled the Office Assistant to appear in ANYTHING I was working on, I would hunt you down like a dog! I (and many others) hate that thing! People complained so much Microsoft took it off their default installs.
Domski
08-21-2008, 02:39 AM
Personally, if you enabled the Office Assistant to appear in ANYTHING I was working on, I would hunt you down like a dog! I (and many others) hate that thing! People complained so much Microsoft took it off their default installs.

LOL My thoughts exactly. I used to hate having my PC upgraded or changing computers and the smegging thing re-appearing. Never have I wanted to put my keyboard through the screen so much!!!

Dom