As Microsoft releases products, service patches and OEM releases of its primary product range, updated versions of the library are installed with each product such as Microsoft Office Suite, Microsoft Visual Studio and Microsoft Internet Explorer. In addition, other software developers may include these automation library files with custom built applications as they are released on the market. There are four key files as far as we can ascertain at this stage that make up the automation library. These files are installed either by the operating system software OR by selected other Windows based software application that you add to your inventory. It seems as though there are three distinct rules that have been created by Microsoft for these automation library files.
User determined - make a note now.
The significance of this may be minor or major depending on whether you were doing long range financial forecasts or keeping historical data. NT you can use Explorer to locate the file then click on the Properties button and this has a tab for Version. And the following screen is displayed. There are potentially VERY serious year 2000 issues that could result from different users having different versions of the automation libraries across a large or even a small organisation. These date interpretation issues with two digit year dates will occur where users have developed spreadsheets, database and macro files that contain two digit structures for years.