Office Assistant

The Office Assistant was an intelligent user interface for Microsoft Office that assisted users by way of an interactive animated character, which interfaced with the Office help content. It was included in Microsoft Office for Windows (versions 97 to 2003), in Microsoft Publisher (versions 98 to 2003), and Microsoft Office for Mac (versions 98 to 2004).

The default assistant in the English Windows version was named Clippit (though Clippy is a common nickname), after a paperclip.[1][2] The character was designed by Kevan J. Atteberry.[2] Clippy was the default and by far the most notable Assistant (partly because in many cases the setup CD was required to install the other assistants), which also led to it being called simply the Microsoft Paperclip.[3] The original Clippy in Office 97 was given a new look in Office 2000.

The feature drew a strongly negative response from many users.[4][5] Microsoft turned off the feature by default in Office XP, acknowledging its unpopularity in an ad campaign spoofing Clippy.[6] The feature was removed altogether in Office 2007 and Office 2008 for Mac, as it drew criticism from customers and even Microsoft employees.

The default assistant Clippy has been heavily mocked in popular culture, being parodied, appearing in memes, and even being made fun of by Microsoft themselves from 2001 onwards.

Overview

According to Alan Cooper, the "Father of Visual Basic," the concept of Clippy was based on a "tragic misunderstanding" of research conducted at Stanford University, showing that the same part of the brain in use while using a mouse or keyboard was also responsible for emotional reactions while interacting with other human beings and thus is the reason people yell at their computer monitors.[7] Microsoft concluded that if humans reacted to computers the same way they react to other humans, it would be beneficial to include a human-like face in their software[8] As people already related to computers directly as they do with humans, the added human-like face emerged as an annoying interloper distracting the user from the primary conversation.[9]

First introduced in Microsoft Office 97,[10] the Office Assistant was codenamed TFC during development.[11] It appeared when the program determined the user could be assisted with using Office wizards, searching help, or advising users on using Office features more effectively. It also presented tips and keyboard shortcuts. For example, typing an address followed by "Dear" would cause the Assistant to appear with the message, "It looks like you're writing a letter. Would you like help?".

Assistants

Apart from Clippy, other Office Assistants were also available:

In many cases the Office installation CD was necessary to activate a different Office assistant character, so the default character, Clippy, remains widely known.

In Office 2000, the Hoverbot, Scribble and Power Pup assistants were replaced by:

The Clippy and Office Logo assistants were also redesigned. The removed assistants later resurfaced as downloadable add-ons.

The Microsoft Office XP Multilingual Pack had two more assistants, Saeko Sensei (冴子先生), an animated secretary, and a version of the Monkey King (Chinese: 孫悟空) for Asian language users in non-Asian Office versions.[12] Native language versions provided additional representations, such as Kairu the dolphin, in Japanese.

Technology

The Office Assistant used technology initially from Microsoft Bob and later Microsoft Agent, offering advice based on Bayesian algorithms. From Office 2000 onwards, Microsoft Agent (.acs) replaced the Microsoft Bob-descended Actor (.act) format as the technology supporting the feature. Users can add other assistants to the folder where Office is installed for them to show up in the Office application, or install in the Microsoft Agent folder in System32 folder. Microsoft Agent-based characters have richer forms and colors, and are not enclosed within a boxed window.

Compatibility

The Microsoft Agent components it required were not included in Windows 7 or later, however they can be downloaded from the Microsoft website. Install of Microsoft Agent on Windows 8 and Windows 10 is possible, but it creates a solid-colored pink, blue, or green space around the Office Assistant and thus obviously is unsupported.[13]

Additional downloadable assistants

Since their introduction, more assistants have been released and have been exclusively available via download.[14][15]

The 1997 assistants can be downloaded from the Microsoft website.[17]

Criticism and parodies

Clippy creator Kevan Atteberry discussing his much-maligned character at ROFLCon II

The program was widely reviled among users as intrusive and annoying,[18][19] and was criticized even within Microsoft. Microsoft's internal codename TFC had a derogatory origin: Steven Sinofsky[11] states that "C" stood for "clown", while allowing his readers to guess what "TF" might stand for. Smithsonian Magazine called Clippit "one of the worst software design blunders in the annals of computing".[20] Time magazine included Clippit in a 2010 article listing fifty worst inventions.[21]

In July 2000, the online comic strip User Friendly ran a series of panels featuring Clippit.[22] In 2001, a Microsoft advertising campaign for Office XP included the (now defunct) website officeclippy.com, which highlighted the disabling of Clippit in the software. It featured the animated adventures of Clippit (voiced by comedian Gilbert Gottfried) as he learned to cope with unemployment ("X… XP… As in, ex-paperclip?!") and parodied behaviors of the Office assistant. Curiously, one of these ("Clippy Faces Facts") uses the same punchline as one of the User Friendly comic strips.[23] These videos can be downloaded at the Internet Archive.[24] Clippy ends up in an office as a floppy disk ejecting pin.

There is a Clippit parody in the Plus! Dancer application included in Microsoft Plus! Digital Media Edition which is later included as Windows Dancer in Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005. The dancing character Boo Who?[25] is wearing a ghost outfit, roughly having the shape of Clippit's body, with a piece of wire visible underneath. Occasionally, the white sheet slips, and reveals the thin curve of steel. The description mentions "working for a short while for a Redmond, WA based software company, where he continued to work until being retired in 2001". Clippit is also included as a player character in Microsoft Bicycle Card Games and Microsoft Bicycle Board Games. It was also used in the Word Crimes music video by "Weird Al" Yankovic.

Vigor is a Clippy-inspired parody software - a version of the vi text editor featuring a rough-sketched Clippy.

On April 1, 2014, Clippy appeared as an Office assistant in Office Online as part of an April Fools' Day joke.[26] Several days later, an easter egg was found in the then-preview version of Windows Phone 8.1. When asked if she likes Clippy, the personal assistant Cortana would answer "Definitely. He taught me how important it is to listen." or "What's not to like? That guy took a heck of a beating and he's still smiling."[27] Her avatar occasionally turned into a two-dimensional Metro-style Clippy for several seconds. This easter egg is still available in the full release version of the Windows Phone operating system and Windows 10.

On April 1, 2015, Tumblr created a parody of Clippy, Coppy, as another April Fools joke. Coppy is an incredibly annoying anthropomorphized photocopier that wouldn't stop popping up on the screen and asking the user if they want help. Coppy would engage the reader in a series of pointless questions, with a dialogue box written in Comic Sans MS, deliberately designed to be extremely annoying. However, he grew on the users, who were heartbroken to find he had left the very next day on April 2, 2015.

In the ninth episode of HBO's Silicon Valley (TV series) originally aired in June, 2016, there is a new animated character that provides help to users of the Pied Piper platform. His name is "Pipey", and it is clearly based in Microsoft's Clippy.

Appearance in Ribbon Hero 2

After featuring Clippy's tomb in a movie to promote Office 2010,[28] the character was relaunched as the main character of the game Ribbon Hero 2, which is an interactive tutorial released by Microsoft in 2011.[29] In the game, Clippy needs a new job and accidentally goes inside a time machine, travelling to different ages solving problems with Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote. Other Office Assistant names are also featured during the "Future Age" as planets of the future solar system.

In 2015 a music video was released for the song "Ghost" (by Delta Heavy) in which the abandoned Clippy is stuck between the software of the mid-nineties but then travels to the contemporary web and regains his place by hacking himself into any digital system.[30]

Clippy, hidden.

Clippy can be found in Office 2013 or newer. Go to options and change the theme to "School Supplies". Clippy then appears on your ribbon.

Clippy made a cameo appearance in the Drawn Together episode "The One Wherein There Is a Big Twist, Part II", where he offered to help Wooldoor Sockbat with his suicide note.

A bestselling short story by Leonard Delaney, "Conquered by Clippy," portrayed Clippy as a romantic interest in a parody of erotic fiction.[31]

In the HBO comedy Silicon Valley, the compression company Pied Piper introduces a character named "Pipey", a parody of Clippy.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Freeman, Jan (2007-02-25). "Finding the grammar checker's frailties". The Boston Globe. Retrieved 2007-02-25.
  2. 1 2 "Clippy". Oddisgood.com. Retrieved 2016-02-10.
  3. ↑ "The Microsoft Paperclip Is Back". Newrisingmedia.com. Retrieved 2016-02-10.
  4. ↑ Cozens, Claire (2001-04-11). "Microsoft cuts 'Mr Clippy'". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 2010-05-20.
  5. ↑ "Microsoft banks on anti-Clippy sentiment". USA Today. 2002-02-06. Retrieved 2010-05-20.
  6. ↑ Luening, Erich (2009-10-27). "Microsoft tool "Clippy" gets pink slip". News.cnet.com. Retrieved 2010-09-05.
  7. ↑ https://archive.org/details/g4tv.com-video4080
  8. ↑ https://archive.org/details/g4tv.com-video4080
  9. ↑ G4TV. com. "g4tv.com-video4080: Why People Yell at Their Computer Monitors and Hate Microsoft's Clippy". Retrieved 4 June 2016 – via Internet Archive.
  10. ↑ "Microsoft Office 97 Released to Manufacturing". Microsoft. 1996-11-19. Retrieved 2016-11-22.
  11. 1 2 Steven Sinofsky (2005-12-16). "PM at Microsoft". blogs.msdn.com. Retrieved 2011-12-22.
  12. ↑ "フミオ君のボヤキ 第14回 『ワード』のイルカ". Kaiyou-k.jp. 2004-07-18. Retrieved 2011-12-22.
  13. ↑ "Microsoft Agent home page". Microsoft.com. 2009-05-01. Retrieved 2016-02-10.
  14. ↑ "Office Assistant Animations Start Slowly". Microsoft. 2004-10-29. Retrieved 2007-05-08.
  15. ↑ "Microsoft's Office Assistant". Dickinson College. Archived from the original on 2007-02-12. Retrieved 2007-05-08.
  16. ↑ "Office 97 Assistant: Kairu the Dolphin". Microsoft. 1998-06-07. Retrieved 2007-05-08.
  17. ↑ "Microsoft Agent download page for end-users". Microsoft. Retrieved 2007-05-08.
  18. ↑ "Top 10 worst products". CNET.com. Retrieved 2011-12-22.
  19. ↑ publicblast (February 7, 2007). "Microsoft Word 2007 Word processor reviews". Reviews.cnet.com. Retrieved 2011-12-22.
  20. ↑ Conniff, Richard. "What's Behind a Smile?" Smithsonian Magazine, August 2007 pp. 51–52
  21. ↑ Chris Gentilviso (May 27, 2010). "The 50 Worst Inventions: Clippy". Time. Retrieved October 25, 2013.
  22. ↑ "UserFriendly Strip Comments". Ars.userfriendly.org. 2000-07-15. Retrieved 2010-09-05.
  23. ↑ "UserFriendly Strip Comments". Ars.userfriendly.org. July 21, 2010. Retrieved 2010-09-05.
  24. ↑ "Clippy downloads". Microsoft. 2001-08-06. Archived from the original on October 10, 2003. Retrieved 2011-12-22.
  25. ↑ "Microsoft.com". Microsoft.com. Retrieved 2011-12-22.
  26. ↑ Jessica Catcher (2014-04-01). "Clippy Returns in Microsoft Office April Fools' Day Gag". Mashable.com. Retrieved 2016-02-10.
  27. ↑ "Found a Clippy Easter Egg in Cortana! - Windows Central Forums". Forums.windowscentral.com. 2014-04-15. Retrieved 2016-02-10.
  28. ↑ Dennis Liu (2009-07-09). "Office 2010: The Movie". YouTube. Retrieved 2011-12-22.
  29. ↑ "Ribbonhero.com". Ribbonhero.com. Retrieved 2011-12-22.
  30. ↑ Chris Bristow (July 2015). "Delta Heavy - Ghost". dadhat.com. Retrieved 2015-08-08.
  31. ↑ Leonard Delaney (March 2015). "Conqured by Clippy". Forest City Pulp. Retrieved 2015-12-31.
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