Microsoft Office 97 was a major milestone

Milestone

A milestone is one of a series of numbered markers placed along a road or boundary at intervals of one mile or occasionally, parts of a mile. They are typically located at the side of the road or in a median. They are alternatively known as mile markers, mileposts or mile posts...

 release of 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...

, 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 sophisticated grammar checking. It was published on CD-ROM

CD-ROM

A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....

 as well as on a set of 44 3½-inch floppy disks, and became Y2K safe with Service Release 2. Released on November 19, 1996, it was the last version to support Windows NT 3.51

Windows NT 3.51

Windows NT 3.51 is the third release of Microsoft's Windows NT line of operating systems. It was released on 30 May 1995, nine months after Windows NT 3.5. The release provided two notable feature improvements; firstly NT 3.51 was the first of a short-lived outing of Microsoft Windows on the...

 on i386 and Alpha (only Word and Excel were available for the Alpha). Two service releases (SR-1 and SR-2) were released for Office 97.

Editions

Office 97 was released in five editions. They are as follows:

Office programs	Standard Edition	Professional Edition	Small Business Edition	Small Business Edition 2.0	Developer Edition
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,...  97
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...  97
Outlook Microsoft Outlook Microsoft Outlook is a personal information manager from Microsoft, available both as a separate application as well as a part of the Microsoft Office suite...  97				(initially included in retail version)
Outlook Microsoft Outlook Microsoft Outlook is a personal information manager from Microsoft, available both as a separate application as well as a part of the Microsoft Office suite...  98				(can be upgraded to via coupon or download)
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...  97
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...  97
Developer Tools and SDK
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...  97
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...  98
Small Business Financial Manager 97
Small Business Financial Manager 98
Direct Mail Manager
Expedia Streets 98
Bookshelf Basics Microsoft Bookshelf Microsoft Bookshelf was a reference collection introduced in 1987 as part of Microsoft's extensive work in promoting CD-ROM technology as a distribution medium for electronic publishing. The original MS-DOS version showcased the massive storage capacity of CD-ROM technology, and was accessed while...

Note that there are 2 Small Business Editions.

Microsoft Office 97 Powered by Word 98

Microsoft Office 97 Powered by Word 98 was released in Japanese and Korean editions on 20 June, 1998 . It also included Outlook 98 in all editions and Publisher 98 in the Small Business Edition. Microsoft Word 98 for Windows was only available as part of this package , though Microsoft Word 98 for Macintosh was available in Microsoft Office 98 Macintosh Edition

Microsoft Office 98 Macintosh Edition

Microsoft Office 98 Macintosh Edition is a Mac OS version of Microsoft Office unveiled at Macworld Expo/San Francisco on January 6, 1998. It introduced the Internet Explorer 4.0 browser and Outlook Express, an Internet e-mail client and usenet newsgroup reader...

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Office Assistant

Microsoft Office 97 is notable as the first version of Office to feature the office assistant

Office Assistant

The Office Assistant was a Microsoft Office feature to assist users by way of an interactive animated character, which interfaced with the Office help content. It used technology initially from Microsoft Bob and later Microsoft Agent, offering advice based on Bayesian algorithms...

, a feature initially designed to assist users by the way of an interactive animated character, which interfaced with the Office help content. The default assistant was Clippit, nicknamed Clippy, a paperclip. The office assistant feature would continue to be available in Office versions up until and including Microsoft Office 2003

Microsoft Office 2003

Microsoft Office 2003 is a productivity suite written and distributed by Microsoft for their Windows operating system. Released on October 21, 2003, it was the successor to Office XP and the predecessor to Office 2007.- Overview :...

. In Office XP

Microsoft 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...

 the feature was hidden by default and not installed by default in Office 2003

Microsoft Office 2003

Microsoft Office 2003 is a productivity suite written and distributed by Microsoft for their Windows operating system. Released on October 21, 2003, it was the successor to Office XP and the predecessor to Office 2007.- Overview :...

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Easter eggs in Office 97

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,...

 97 contained a hidden pinball game and 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...

 contained a hidden flight simulator

Flight simulator

A flight simulator is a device that artificially re-creates aircraft flight and various aspects of the flight environment. This includes the equations that govern how aircraft fly, how they react to applications of their controls and other aircraft systems, and how they react to the external...

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