Article ID: 972129 - Last Review: June 10, 2009 - Revision: 1.0

Description of the versions and support for Office Web Components (OWC)

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INTRODUCTION

The Office Web Components (OWC) are delivered in several products and through download from the Microsoft Download Center. This has affected the way this group of products is maintained and updated. This article describes the different versions of Office Web Components that are available and the way that they will be updated. Office Web Components are most frequently used to develop custom applications, especially Web applications.
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MORE INFORMATION

The Office Web Components technology is deprecated. This means that only security fixes are being made to all versions of OWC, and no future versions of OWC will be produced. If you are using OWC, you should start to migrate to a new technology as soon as possible. For more information, see the blog post, "Office Web Components Roadmap." Be aware that the life-cycle dates that are listed in that blog post are less detailed than the life-cycle dates that are described here. For more information about the Microsoft Support Lifecycle policy, visit the following Microsoft Support Lifecycle Web site:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=fh;en-us;lifecycle&SD=gn&LN=en-us (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=fh;en-us;lifecycle&sd=gn&ln=en-us)
There are three versions of Office Web Components:
  • Office 2000 Web Components
  • Office XP Web Components
  • Office 2003 Web Components
Each version was released as a Web download and on the CDs of the corresponding version of Microsoft Office. In addition, each version was re-released together with the next version of Office. Therefore, there is a version of Office 2000 Web Components on the Office XP CDs and a version of Office XP Web Components on the Office 2003 CDs. The Office 2003 Web Components were not released on Office 2003 CDs. However, they were re-released to the Web and included with Microsoft Office Project Server 2007. Although these re-releases carry the same names and functionality as the original release, for technical reasons they are considered separate products for patching purposes.

Each version of OWC, and this includes the re-releases, is supported according to the version of Office with which it shipped. Therefore, the version of Office 2000 Web Components that shipped with Office 2000 is in extended support until Office 2000 leaves extended support on July 14, 2009. However, the version of Office 2000 Web Components that shipped with Office XP is in extended support until Office XP leaves extended support on July 12, 2011. This same rule applies to the other versions of OWC. The following table lists the support milestone dates and release locations for all the different versions of OWC:
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OWC VersionRelease LocationMainstream Support EndsExtended Support Ends
OWC 2000 (Office 2000 version)Office 2000 CD, WebMainstream support has ended.7/14/2009
OWC 2000 (Office XP version)Office XP CDMainstream support has ended.7/12/2011
OWC XP (Office XP version)Office XP CD, WebMainstream support has ended.7/12/2011
OWC XP (Office 2003 version)Office 2003 CDMainstream support has ended.4/8/2014
OWC 2003 (Office 2003 version)Office 2003 CD, Web (versions 1-3)Mainstream support has ended.4/8/2014
OWC 2003 (2007 Office system version)Project Server 2007 CD, Web (version 4)4/10/20124/11/2017
For more information about the support life cycle of Microsoft Office products, visit the following Web site:
http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifeselectoff (http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifeselectoff)
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REFERENCES

Office XP Tool: Web Components
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=982B0359-0A86-4FB2-A7EE-5F3A499515DD (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=982B0359-0A86-4FB2-A7EE-5F3A499515DD)
Office 2003 Add-in: Office Web Components
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=7287252C-402E-4F72-97A5-E0FD290D4B76 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=7287252C-402E-4F72-97A5-E0FD290D4B76)
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APPLIES TO
  • Microsoft Office XP Web Components
  • Microsoft Office 2003 Web Components
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