Office Web Components (XP)

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I have reread Woody’s Office Watch 7.03 in preparation for installing SP-1 for Office XP and am trying to make sense of what I should do about Office Web Components. The newsletter says, “You need to go to Control Panel | Add/Remove Programs | Microsoft Office XP Web Components and uninstall the Office
Web Components. Then go to http://office.microsoft.com/downloads/2002/owc10.aspx and download the 8MB latest version of OWC. Once that is installed you can apply the SP-1 patch.”

Well, OWC does not appear under Control Panel | Add/Remove Programs | Microsoft Office XP Web Components, but it is installed as part of the Office XP installation. So should I remove OWC via the Office installer and install the download? But the MS download site (http://office.microsoft.com/downloads/2002/owc10.aspx) says that if it is installed as part of Office XP then I do not need the download. I am thoroughly confused. Should I download and install this file even though MS says it is not necessary?

Fafner

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(Edited by jscher2000 on 14-Sep-02 13:49. )

I think he is saying (archived newsletter) that if you have updated OWC with the latest and greatest versions, the change in those files blocks or otherwise interferes with the SP-1 update. You might not need to remove them, particularly if you never updated them, but as a preventive, you could do so. But then you have to reinstall them.

Does that make it clearer?

Note: The newsletter pre-dated the August 20, 2002 updates. So the above is incorrect. See Post #179300.

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I don’t think I have ever updated OWC. That is, the installed version is the original version from the Office CD. So that means that I’m ok, right. But I gather that being on the safe side means remove it using the office installer (to make sure i get rid of any updates that I probably didn’t apply), then reinstalling the same thing with the office installer, then applying SP-1. Right?

I suppose I could do that.

Fafner

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(Edited by jscher2000 on 14-Sep-02 13:39. )

This post was confused: see Post #179300.

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OK, now I am more confused. Woody’s newsletter, as quoted in my initial post, says to install the new and improved OWC before SP-1, presumably so that the service pack will be applied to OWC as well as to the rest of office. And it still says on the Microsoft owc download site that if you have Office XP you don’t need the download. Who is right?

Fafner

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Oops, my last post was wrong. WOW said that you should remove OWC, then install the latest updated OWC before trying to install SP-1. This applies to you particularly if you downloaded a pre-SP-1 interim update to OWC. If you did not download any interim updates, this extra step should not be necessary, at least in theory.

Now, you might be wondering, how can one tell? Unfortunately, tracking down the various version/build numbers one would need to verify which version is on your system has been very difficult, and I don’t have the complete history. These are what I found:

Knowledge Base Article Q322382, OFF: Office Web Components Security Update: August 20, 2002, which I believe refers to the latest set of updates:
[indent]

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After the [August 20, 2002] Security Update is installed, the following files have the listed attributes or later:

   File name     Version 
   ----------------------
   Owc10.dll  10.0.4109.0
   Msowc.dll   9.0.0.6430

[/list]

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[/indent]Knowledge Base Article Q300552, OFFXP: Overview of the Office XP Web Components Update: August 9, 2001, which I believe refers to the last pre-SP-1 interim update:
[indent]

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How to Determine Whether the Public Update Is Installed

The Office XP Web Components Update makes changes to the OWC10.dll. The version of the product does not change when you apply the patch and remains 10.0.2627.01.

To verify whether the installation of the update was successful, check that the version of the Owc10.dll file on your system is equal to 10.0.2922.0. By default, the file Owc10.dll is in the following location on your computer: C:Program FilesCommon FilesMicrosoft SharedWeb Components10 To check the last four digits, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, point to Programs, and then click Windows Explorer.
2. In Windows Explorer, right-click the file and then click Properties on the shortcut menu.
3. Click the Version tab.

---

[/indent]Say what?!?! If this latter piece of advice has you scratching your head, welcome to the club.

Both of the above articles were “last reviewed” in August of this year. “Reviewing” could have meant “changing,” which means it’s very difficult to be sure which version numbers correspond to which actual updates.

The WOW article refers to Q305406, OSER: Error Message 1642 When You Update Office Web Components Installed from the Web, which says that the problem lies in an interim update prior to August 9, 2001. Buried in the installer error message is the string ProdVer: 10.0.2623.0, which, if those four digit numbers are sequential, precedes all of the above numbers.

Finally, the current update page tells you to purge any update prior to August 14, 2001!

Where does this leave us?

• If you have a version of OWC10.DLL version higher than 10.0.2627.0 or maybe 10.0.2922.0, very good odds that you can just go ahead and run the SP-1 update. (But as noted below, you probably should update now anyway.)
• If you have 10.0.2623.0 through 10.0.2627.0, then uninstall/update appears mandatory to get SP-1 loaded.
• If you have a version number lower than 10.0.2623.0, you probably can install SP-1 without difficulty.[/list]But… you will eventually want to get the updated OWC10.DLL made available through the August 20, 2002 KB article, because SP-1 does not contain that update (SP-1 was released on December 13, 2001per Q307841). So, it is not a waste of time to download and install that one. I believe the installer is smart enough not to overwrite newer files with old ones, so you should be able to safely do this before installing SP-1.

  On the other hand, in theory, the August 20 update is included in Office XP SP-2, but that’s another story.

  I hope this helps. You can get the new download and detailed instructions here.

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Thanks a million. Actually, your post does make it pretty clear. I have version 10.0.2621. Now I know what I need to do.

Fafner

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FYI: Office XP SP2 patch updated OWC10.DLL on my computer to v. 10.0.4109.0

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