Microsoft Office shared tools
Encyclopedia
Microsoft Office shared tools are software components that are (or were) included in all Microsoft Office
products.
's clip art
organizing software to find drawings, photographs, sounds, videos, and other media clips with presentations, publications, and other Office documents. It is also comes with a variety of stock media clips and offers more selection on the Microsoft Office Online
website as well.
application that is deployed by a number of the Microsoft Office
programs such as Excel
and Access
to create charts and graphs. The program can also be hosted as an OLE application object in Visual Basic
. Microsoft Graph supports many different types of charts, however, it is a legacy application and the charts produced are not modern-looking and polished. Office 2003 was the last version to use Microsoft Graph for hosting charts inside Office applications as OLE objects. Office 2007, specifically, Excel 2007 includes a new integrated high-quality charting engine and the charts created are native to the applications. The new engine supports advanced formatting, including 3D rendering, transparencies and shadows. Chart layouts can also be customized to highlight various trends in the data. Microsoft Graph still exists for compatibility reasons, but the entry points are removed.
by adding a companion to Microsoft Multiplan
, the company's spreadsheet in the early 1980s.
Ms/Chart shared with Multiplan the box design and the two lines menu at the bottom of the screen, and could import Multiplan data. The simple graphs (pies, bars, lines) were drawn on the screen by switching the display mode of the IBM PC
Compatibles to graphics (which was not available to entry level models), or could be printed on some dot matrix devices.
The main drawback of the Microsoft solution at this time was the necessity to quit the spreadsheet and then load Ms/Chart to compose and draw a graph, as MS/DOS was not a multitasking operating system. Thus, Lotus 1-2-3 maintained its market share until the release of Microsoft Excel
by Microsoft.
In the early 1990s, Microsoft Chart was renamed to Microsoft Graph.
developed by Design Science
that allows users to construct math and science equations in a WYSIWYG
environment. Equation Editor was developed by Design Science and is included in Microsoft Office
and several other commercial applications. It is a simplified version of Design Science MathType
. It can be used as a standalone program or it can also be used from within applications that support OLE
as an embedded object. Its feature set has not changed significantly since its introduction in Word for Windows, version 2.0.
In certain Microsoft Office 2007
applications (including Word), and in all Microsoft Office 2010 applications, Equation Editor is no longer the default method of creating equations, and is kept for compatibility with old documents only. Instead, a reengineered equation editor is included, which is built into the document-editing part of the interface rather than being operated through a separate dialog and being treated as an OLE
object in the document.
, however, it is fully customisable using the tools available on the WordArt toolbar and Drawing toolbar, or on the WordArt tools tab on Microsoft Office 2007
and Microsoft Office 2010. It is also available in Microsoft Excel
, Microsoft PowerPoint
and Microsoft Publisher
. WordArt in Microsoft Office 2010, users can apply formatting effects such as shadow, bevel, glow, gradient glow, and reflection to their text.
In Office 2007, WordArt was given a complete overhaul in Microsoft Excel and Microsoft PowerPoint, with new styles, new effects and the ability to apply WordArt to regular text boxes. The new styles have been included in Microsoft Word 2010. As well as this, Office 2010 includes the new PowerPoint & Excel styles in Microsoft Word, replacing the old versions.
, 97
and 2000
designed to allow users to include several different types of OLE 2.0
objects (e.g., Microsoft Word
documents, Microsoft Excel
spreadsheets, and Microsoft PowerPoint
presentations) integrated in one file. Originally a test host for OLE 2.0, it was not widely used, and was discontinued after Office 2000.
The filename extension
for Microsoft Binder files was .OBD, and the Office binder template format was .OBT. A Microsoft Office Binder Wizard used the extension .OBZ.
Binder files can still be opened in later versions of Microsoft Office up until version 2003, with the Microsoft Binder Support add-in, called Unbind which can be installed through the Add and Remove programs menu, by selecting Microsoft Office, click change, add it and update. According to Microsoft, Unbind is not included with Office 2007. However, Office 97 Unbind is available for download from the Microsoft website.
. Microsoft originally purchased the software as part of an acquisition of the intellectual property of Maximal Innovative Intelligence - Maximal had a product called "Max" which was rebranded as Microsoft Data Analyzer. The developers behind Microsoft Data Analyzer have been working in Office since the acquisition and are currently working on Excel Services
Even though it was a stand alone application and was not available in any Office XP bundle, it was a part of the Office XP suite. However, it was not updated beyond version 3.5.
Microsoft Data Analyzer allows analyzing and visualizing data and data trends, and is integrated with SQL Server Analysis Services. Reports and graphs generated could be saved as HTML, Microsoft Excel or Microsoft PowerPoint files.
(OCR) software application introduced first in Office XP. The OCR engine is based upon Nuance's OmniPage. Microsoft Office Document Scanning is suited for creating archival copies of documents.
Microsoft Office Document Scanning is closely tied with Microsoft Office Document Imaging
, the application that manipulates Microsoft Document Imaging Format
(MDI) files. The application can also create TIFF files.
Notably, this application can also embed OCR data into both MDI and TIFF files. This enables some sort of automated text searchability on the files, which is integrated into the Windows shell Search function.
Microsoft Office Document Scanning, like Office Document Imaging is no longer available in Office 2010.
(OLE) components (allows embedding and linking to documents) implemented as ActiveX control in Microsoft Office 2000, Office XP and Office 2003. These ActiveX Controls can be plugged into web pages, Visual Basic
and Visual Basic for Applications
(VBA) forms, Windows Forms
or programmed in-memory. The OWC can be used by any COM-compliant Component Object Model
programming language. Applications like Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Access
and Microsoft FrontPage
allowed creating interactive web pages using Office Web Components.
The following components are included:
The Office Web Components have been discontinued in Office 2007, and are not included, except as a part of Office Project Server 2007. However, they will still be available for download from Microsoft's website. Microsoft has not yet offered a complete replacement for the Office Web Components. However, programmers can use a combination of third party products, Excel Services
or Visual Studio Tools for Office
to provide similar functionality.
The Pivot Table web component does not function on Windows 7.
There are currently four books in print on programming the OWC.
WordArt
Binder
Microsoft Data Analyzer
Office Web Components
Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office is a non-free commercial office suite of inter-related desktop applications, servers and services for the Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X operating systems, introduced by Microsoft in August 1, 1989. Initially a marketing term for a bundled set of applications, the first version of...
products.
Clip Organizer
Microsoft Clip Organizer is MicrosoftMicrosoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
's clip art
Clip art
Clip art, in the graphic arts, refers to pre-made images used to illustrate any medium. Today, clip art is used extensively in both personal and commercial projects, ranging from home-printed greeting cards to commercial candles. Clip art comes in many forms, both electronic and printed. However,...
organizing software to find drawings, photographs, sounds, videos, and other media clips with presentations, publications, and other Office documents. It is also comes with a variety of stock media clips and offers more selection on the Microsoft Office Online
Microsoft Office Online
Microsoft Office web site is the official web site of Microsoft Office. The site provides Office how-to articles, tips, training courses, templates, clip art, stock photos and media, add-ins for Microsoft Office programs, productivity-enhancing tools, and web-based services.As of November 2004,...
website as well.
Graph
Microsoft Graph (also known as Microsoft Chart) is an OLEObject Linking and Embedding
Object Linking and Embedding is a technology developed by Microsoft that allows embedding and linking to documents and other objects. For developers, it brought OLE Control eXtension , a way to develop and use custom user interface elements...
application that is deployed by a number of the Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office is a non-free commercial office suite of inter-related desktop applications, servers and services for the Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X operating systems, introduced by Microsoft in August 1, 1989. Initially a marketing term for a bundled set of applications, the first version of...
programs such as Excel
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel is a proprietary commercial spreadsheet application written and distributed by Microsoft for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. It features calculation, graphing tools, pivot tables, and a macro programming language called Visual Basic for Applications...
and Access
Microsoft Access
Microsoft Office Access, previously known as Microsoft Access, is a relational database management system from Microsoft that combines the relational Microsoft Jet Database Engine with a graphical user interface and software-development tools. It is a member of the Microsoft Office suite of...
to create charts and graphs. The program can also be hosted as an OLE application object in Visual Basic
Visual Basic
Visual Basic is the third-generation event-driven programming language and integrated development environment from Microsoft for its COM programming model...
. Microsoft Graph supports many different types of charts, however, it is a legacy application and the charts produced are not modern-looking and polished. Office 2003 was the last version to use Microsoft Graph for hosting charts inside Office applications as OLE objects. Office 2007, specifically, Excel 2007 includes a new integrated high-quality charting engine and the charts created are native to the applications. The new engine supports advanced formatting, including 3D rendering, transparencies and shadows. Chart layouts can also be customized to highlight various trends in the data. Microsoft Graph still exists for compatibility reasons, but the entry points are removed.
History
The first software sold, under the name Microsoft Chart, was an attempt from Microsoft to compete with the successful Lotus 1-2-3Lotus 1-2-3
Lotus 1-2-3 is a spreadsheet program from Lotus Software . It was the IBM PC's first "killer application"; its huge popularity in the mid-1980s contributed significantly to the success of the IBM PC in the corporate environment.-Beginnings:...
by adding a companion to Microsoft Multiplan
MultiPlan
Multiplan was an early spreadsheet program developed by Microsoft. Known initially by the code name "EP" , it was introduced in 1982 as a competitor for VisiCalc....
, the company's spreadsheet in the early 1980s.
Ms/Chart shared with Multiplan the box design and the two lines menu at the bottom of the screen, and could import Multiplan data. The simple graphs (pies, bars, lines) were drawn on the screen by switching the display mode of the IBM PC
IBM PC
The IBM Personal Computer, commonly known as the IBM PC, is the original version and progenitor of the IBM PC compatible hardware platform. It is IBM model number 5150, and was introduced on August 12, 1981...
Compatibles to graphics (which was not available to entry level models), or could be printed on some dot matrix devices.
The main drawback of the Microsoft solution at this time was the necessity to quit the spreadsheet and then load Ms/Chart to compose and draw a graph, as MS/DOS was not a multitasking operating system. Thus, Lotus 1-2-3 maintained its market share until the release of Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel is a proprietary commercial spreadsheet application written and distributed by Microsoft for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. It features calculation, graphing tools, pivot tables, and a macro programming language called Visual Basic for Applications...
by Microsoft.
In the early 1990s, Microsoft Chart was renamed to Microsoft Graph.
Equation Editor
Equation Editor is a formula editorFormula editor
A formula editor is a name for a computer program that is used to typeset mathematical works or formulae.Formula editors typically serve two purposes:...
developed by Design Science
Design Science (company)
Design Science, Inc. is a US-based Software Company that develops, markets and supports software for scientific and technical communication.-Profile:...
that allows users to construct math and science equations in a WYSIWYG
WYSIWYG
WYSIWYG is an acronym for What You See Is What You Get. The term is used in computing to describe a system in which content displayed onscreen during editing appears in a form closely corresponding to its appearance when printed or displayed as a finished product...
environment. Equation Editor was developed by Design Science and is included in Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office is a non-free commercial office suite of inter-related desktop applications, servers and services for the Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X operating systems, introduced by Microsoft in August 1, 1989. Initially a marketing term for a bundled set of applications, the first version of...
and several other commercial applications. It is a simplified version of Design Science MathType
MathType
MathType is a software application created by Design Science that allows the creation of mathematical notation for inclusion in desktop and web applications.- Features :...
. It can be used as a standalone program or it can also be used from within applications that support OLE
Object Linking and Embedding
Object Linking and Embedding is a technology developed by Microsoft that allows embedding and linking to documents and other objects. For developers, it brought OLE Control eXtension , a way to develop and use custom user interface elements...
as an embedded object. Its feature set has not changed significantly since its introduction in Word for Windows, version 2.0.
In certain Microsoft Office 2007
Microsoft Office 2007
Microsoft Office 2007 is a Windows version of the Microsoft Office System, Microsoft's productivity suite. Formerly known as Office 12 in the initial stages of its beta cycle, it was released to volume license customers on November 30, 2006 and made available to retail customers on January 30, 2007...
applications (including Word), and in all Microsoft Office 2010 applications, Equation Editor is no longer the default method of creating equations, and is kept for compatibility with old documents only. Instead, a reengineered equation editor is included, which is built into the document-editing part of the interface rather than being operated through a separate dialog and being treated as an OLE
Object Linking and Embedding
Object Linking and Embedding is a technology developed by Microsoft that allows embedding and linking to documents and other objects. For developers, it brought OLE Control eXtension , a way to develop and use custom user interface elements...
object in the document.
WordArt
WordArt is a text-styling feature that is available in the Microsoft Office suite of products. It allows users to create stylized text with various "special effects" such as textures, outlines, and many other manipulations that are not available through the standard font formatting. For example, one can create shadows, rotate, "bend" and "stretch" the shape of the text. WordArt is available in 30 different preset styles on Microsoft WordMicrosoft Word
Microsoft Word is a word processor designed by Microsoft. It was first released in 1983 under the name Multi-Tool Word for Xenix systems. Subsequent versions were later written for several other platforms including IBM PCs running DOS , the Apple Macintosh , the AT&T Unix PC , Atari ST , SCO UNIX,...
, however, it is fully customisable using the tools available on the WordArt toolbar and Drawing toolbar, or on the WordArt tools tab on Microsoft Office 2007
Microsoft Office 2007
Microsoft Office 2007 is a Windows version of the Microsoft Office System, Microsoft's productivity suite. Formerly known as Office 12 in the initial stages of its beta cycle, it was released to volume license customers on November 30, 2006 and made available to retail customers on January 30, 2007...
and Microsoft Office 2010. It is also available in Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel is a proprietary commercial spreadsheet application written and distributed by Microsoft for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. It features calculation, graphing tools, pivot tables, and a macro programming language called Visual Basic for Applications...
, Microsoft PowerPoint
Microsoft PowerPoint
Microsoft PowerPoint, usually just called PowerPoint, is a non-free commercial presentation program developed by Microsoft. It is part of the Microsoft Office suite, and runs on Microsoft Windows and Apple's Mac OS X operating system...
and Microsoft Publisher
Microsoft Publisher
Microsoft Publisher is a desktop publishing application from Microsoft. It is an entry-level application, differing from Microsoft Word in that the emphasis is placed on page layout and design rather than text composition and proofing...
. WordArt in Microsoft Office 2010, users can apply formatting effects such as shadow, bevel, glow, gradient glow, and reflection to their text.
In Office 2007, WordArt was given a complete overhaul in Microsoft Excel and Microsoft PowerPoint, with new styles, new effects and the ability to apply WordArt to regular text boxes. The new styles have been included in Microsoft Word 2010. As well as this, Office 2010 includes the new PowerPoint & Excel styles in Microsoft Word, replacing the old versions.
Microsoft Binder
Microsoft Binder was an application originally included with Microsoft Office 95Microsoft Office 95
Microsoft Office for Windows 95 was the version of Microsoft Office designed specifically for Windows 95, succeeding Office 4.3. Previously, Microsoft had released Office 4.2 for Windows NT for several architectures, which included 32-bit Word 6.0 for Windows NT and Excel 5.0 for Windows NT ,...
, 97
Microsoft Office 97
Microsoft Office 97 was a major milestone release of Microsoft Office, which included hundreds of new features and improvements, introduced "Command Bars", a paradigm in which menus and toolbars were made more similar in capability and visual design featured natural language systems and...
and 2000
Microsoft Office 2000
Microsoft Office 2000 is a release of Microsoft Office that succeeded Microsoft Office 97 and was designed as a fully 32-bit and Y2K compliant version to match Windows 2000 features. All the Office 2000 applications have OLE 2 capacity, which allows moving data automatically between various...
designed to allow users to include several different types of OLE 2.0
Object Linking and Embedding
Object Linking and Embedding is a technology developed by Microsoft that allows embedding and linking to documents and other objects. For developers, it brought OLE Control eXtension , a way to develop and use custom user interface elements...
objects (e.g., Microsoft Word
Microsoft Word
Microsoft Word is a word processor designed by Microsoft. It was first released in 1983 under the name Multi-Tool Word for Xenix systems. Subsequent versions were later written for several other platforms including IBM PCs running DOS , the Apple Macintosh , the AT&T Unix PC , Atari ST , SCO UNIX,...
documents, Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel is a proprietary commercial spreadsheet application written and distributed by Microsoft for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. It features calculation, graphing tools, pivot tables, and a macro programming language called Visual Basic for Applications...
spreadsheets, and Microsoft PowerPoint
Microsoft PowerPoint
Microsoft PowerPoint, usually just called PowerPoint, is a non-free commercial presentation program developed by Microsoft. It is part of the Microsoft Office suite, and runs on Microsoft Windows and Apple's Mac OS X operating system...
presentations) integrated in one file. Originally a test host for OLE 2.0, it was not widely used, and was discontinued after Office 2000.
The filename extension
Filename extension
A filename extension is a suffix to the name of a computer file applied to indicate the encoding of its contents or usage....
for Microsoft Binder files was .OBD, and the Office binder template format was .OBT. A Microsoft Office Binder Wizard used the extension .OBZ.
Binder files can still be opened in later versions of Microsoft Office up until version 2003, with the Microsoft Binder Support add-in, called Unbind which can be installed through the Add and Remove programs menu, by selecting Microsoft Office, click change, add it and update. According to Microsoft, Unbind is not included with Office 2007. However, Office 97 Unbind is available for download from the Microsoft website.
Microsoft Data Analyzer
Microsoft Data Analyzer 2002 was a data analysis software for Microsoft Office XPMicrosoft Office XP
Microsoft Office XP is a productivity suite written and distributed by Microsoft for their Windows operating system. Released on March 5, 2001, it is the successor to Office 2000 and the predecessor to Office 2003, and was known as Office 10 in the early stages of its development cycle...
. Microsoft originally purchased the software as part of an acquisition of the intellectual property of Maximal Innovative Intelligence - Maximal had a product called "Max" which was rebranded as Microsoft Data Analyzer. The developers behind Microsoft Data Analyzer have been working in Office since the acquisition and are currently working on Excel Services
Excel Services
Excel Services is a new server technology included in Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. This shared service enables users to load, calculate, and display Excel 2007 workbooks on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007....
Even though it was a stand alone application and was not available in any Office XP bundle, it was a part of the Office XP suite. However, it was not updated beyond version 3.5.
Microsoft Data Analyzer allows analyzing and visualizing data and data trends, and is integrated with SQL Server Analysis Services. Reports and graphs generated could be saved as HTML, Microsoft Excel or Microsoft PowerPoint files.
Microsoft Office Document Scanning
Microsoft Office Document Scanning (MODS) is a scanning and Optical character recognitionOptical character recognition
Optical character recognition, usually abbreviated to OCR, is the mechanical or electronic translation of scanned images of handwritten, typewritten or printed text into machine-encoded text. It is widely used to convert books and documents into electronic files, to computerize a record-keeping...
(OCR) software application introduced first in Office XP. The OCR engine is based upon Nuance's OmniPage. Microsoft Office Document Scanning is suited for creating archival copies of documents.
Microsoft Office Document Scanning is closely tied with Microsoft Office Document Imaging
Microsoft Office Document Imaging
Microsoft Office Document Imaging is a Microsoft Office application that supports editing documents scanned by Microsoft Office Document Scanning. It was first introduced in Microsoft Office XP and is included in later Office versions including Office 2007. It is no longer available in Office 2010...
, the application that manipulates Microsoft Document Imaging Format
Microsoft Document Imaging Format
MDI is a file format created by Microsoft for storing raster images of scanned documents together with optional annotations or metadata which can include the text of the document, generated by OCR...
(MDI) files. The application can also create TIFF files.
Notably, this application can also embed OCR data into both MDI and TIFF files. This enables some sort of automated text searchability on the files, which is integrated into the Windows shell Search function.
Microsoft Office Document Scanning, like Office Document Imaging is no longer available in Office 2010.
Office Web Components
Office Web Components (OWC) are a group of Object Linking and EmbeddingObject Linking and Embedding
Object Linking and Embedding is a technology developed by Microsoft that allows embedding and linking to documents and other objects. For developers, it brought OLE Control eXtension , a way to develop and use custom user interface elements...
(OLE) components (allows embedding and linking to documents) implemented as ActiveX control in Microsoft Office 2000, Office XP and Office 2003. These ActiveX Controls can be plugged into web pages, Visual Basic
Visual Basic
Visual Basic is the third-generation event-driven programming language and integrated development environment from Microsoft for its COM programming model...
and Visual Basic for Applications
Visual Basic for Applications
Visual Basic for Applications is an implementation of Microsoft's event-driven programming language Visual Basic 6 and its associated integrated development environment , which are built into most Microsoft Office applications...
(VBA) forms, Windows Forms
Windows Forms
Windows Forms is the name given to the graphical application programming interface included as a part of Microsoft .NET Framework, providing access to native Microsoft Windows interface elements by wrapping the extant Windows API in managed code...
or programmed in-memory. The OWC can be used by any COM-compliant Component Object Model
Component Object Model
Component Object Model is a binary-interface standard for software componentry introduced by Microsoft in 1993. It is used to enable interprocess communication and dynamic object creation in a large range of programming languages...
programming language. Applications like Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Access
Microsoft Access
Microsoft Office Access, previously known as Microsoft Access, is a relational database management system from Microsoft that combines the relational Microsoft Jet Database Engine with a graphical user interface and software-development tools. It is a member of the Microsoft Office suite of...
and Microsoft FrontPage
Microsoft FrontPage
Microsoft FrontPage was a WYSIWYG HTML editor and web site administration tool from Microsoft for the Microsoft Windows line of operating systems. It was branded as part of the Microsoft Office suite from 1997 to 2003...
allowed creating interactive web pages using Office Web Components.
The following components are included:
- Spreadsheet
- Chartspace
- Pivot table
- Data source component
The Office Web Components have been discontinued in Office 2007, and are not included, except as a part of Office Project Server 2007. However, they will still be available for download from Microsoft's website. Microsoft has not yet offered a complete replacement for the Office Web Components. However, programmers can use a combination of third party products, Excel Services
Excel Services
Excel Services is a new server technology included in Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. This shared service enables users to load, calculate, and display Excel 2007 workbooks on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007....
or Visual Studio Tools for Office
Visual Studio Tools for Office
Visual Studio Tools for Office is a set of development tools available in the form of a Visual Studio add-in and a runtime that allows Microsoft Office 2003 and later versions of Office applications to host the .NET Framework Common Language Runtime to expose their functionality via the .NET...
to provide similar functionality.
The Pivot Table web component does not function on Windows 7.
There are currently four books in print on programming the OWC.
- The O.W.C Black Book 2nd Edition - Alvin Bruney 2007
- The Microsoft Office Web Components Black Book with .NET - Alvin Bruney 2005
- Professional ASP Programming Guide for Office Web Components: With Office 2000 and Office XP - Qimao Zhang 2001
- Programming Microsoft Office 2000 Web Components - Dave Stearns 2000
External links
Equation Editor- MathType Homepage
- CodeCogs Online LaTeX Equation Editor - add equations to any website
- MathType and Equation Editor
- Math in Office blog
- GrindEQ Converts from MathType OLE objects to Equation Editor 3.0 object.
- Equations in Word 2007
- DragMath an open source Java applet.
WordArt
- How to insert and modify WordArt in MS Word
- How to Use WordArt for Document Identification and marking
- How to be a tool for Document Making
- A free program to design and create WordArt
Binder
- Office 97 Unbind
- File Extension Details for .OBD
- File Extension details for .OBT
- Open an Microsoft Binder document in Office 2003
- FAQ on Microsoft Binder 97
Microsoft Data Analyzer
Office Web Components
- How to find Office Web Components (OWC) programming documentation and samples
- The Unofficial Office Web Components plugin for Firefox
- Office 2003 Web Components
- Office XP Web Components
- Office XP Web Component toolpack containing samples and walkthroughs
- Office XP Web Components Animated Walkthrough