Remember Clippy? Well here comes Copilot!
In the early days of Microsoft, one of the company’s most well-known products was its Office Suite, which included a word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software. One of the features that came with these programs was a virtual assistant known as Clippy, who provided helpful tips and suggestions for Users as they worked. Decades later, Microsoft has introduced another virtual assistant in the form of Copilot. In this blog post, we’ll compare and contrast the two and see how they stack up against each other.
Clippy was introduced in 1996 with the release of Microsoft Office 97. It was intended to be a helpful tool for users who might be struggling with the software or need guidance on how to use certain features. However, its intrusive nature, with the cartoon paperclip popping up on screen unexpectedly, quickly became the subject of many jokes and parodies. Despite its initial popularity, Clippy was eventually phased out and discontinued in 2007 with the release of Office 2007.
On the other hand Copilot was introduced in 2021 and is designed to be a tool for developers. Unlike Clippy, which was more of a general-purpose virtual assistant, Copilot is specifically targeted at developers working in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). It uses GPT-3, the latest version of OpenAI’s language model, to generate code snippets and provide suggestions for developers as they work.
While both Clippy and Copilot share some similarities in their role as virtual assistants, they differ in their target audience, functionality, and implementation. Clippy was designed for a general audience, whereas Co-Pilot is specifically tailored to developers in the AI field. Additionally, Clippy provided tips and suggestions for users as they worked, whereas Copilot generates code snippets and provides suggestions for developers.
One significant difference between the two is their implementation. Clippy was a standalone feature included in Microsoft Office, while Copilot is a separate application that users can install and use within their integrated development environment (IDE) of choice. This allows developers to integrate Copilot more closely with their workflow and take advantage of its advanced capabilities.
Another difference between the two is the nature of their assistance. Clippy was designed to provide helpful tips and suggestions to users as they worked, but it was ultimately up to the user to decide whether to take advantage of them or not. Copilot, on the other hand, generates code snippets automatically, making it a more proactive tool in the development process.
While Clippy and Copilot are both virtual assistants developed by Microsoft, they serve different purposes and are designed for different audiences. Clippy was a general-purpose assistant designed for users of Microsoft Office, while Copilot is a specialised tool for developers in the AI field. Despite their differences, both are examples of how technology can be used to make our lives easier and more productive.
So how will Microsoft Copilot assist everyday Users?
Whilst Microsoft Co-Pilot is primarily designed for developers, particularly those working in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), there are ways in which everyday Users can benefit from Copilot’s capabilities as well.
One potential use case for Copilot for everyday Users is in the context of writing. Copilot uses natural language processing to generate code snippets based on User input, and this same technology can be applied to other forms of writing, such as emails or reports. For example, Co-Pilot could help users generate more professional-sounding emails by suggesting phrases or sentence structures based on the context of the message.
Another potential use case is in the context of web browsing. Copilot could be used to generate more accurate and relevant search results by analysing the User’s search query and providing suggestions based on its understanding of the User’s intent.
Earlier this month (16th March) Microsoft announced it was introducing the the power of next-generation AI to its workplace productivity tools with Microsoft 365 Copilot. This is anticipated to greatly enhanced the Users’ experience of M365.
This is currently being tested with selected commercial customers, but it is anticipated Users will experience Microsoft 365 Copilot in two ways: –
- Embedded in the Microsoft 365 apps people use every day — Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams and more.
- With Business Chat. Business Chat works across the Microsoft 365 Apps, and a User’s calendar, emails, chats, documents, meetings and contacts to do things that people weren’t able to do before. With natural language prompts like “tell my team how we updated the product strategy,” Business Chat will generate a status update based on the morning’s meetings, emails and chat threads.
“Copilot combines the power of large language models with your data and apps to turn your words into the most powerful productivity tool on the planet.” “By grounding in your business content and context, Copilot delivers results that are relevant and actionable. It’s enterprise-ready, built on Microsoft’s comprehensive approach to security, compliance, privacy and responsible AI. Copilot marks a new era of computing that will fundamentally transform the way we work.”
Jared Spataro – Corporate Vice President, Modern Work and Business Applications – Microsoft
Give me more examples!
Essentially Microsoft 365 Copilot will be seamlessly integrate in the Apps people use every day, helping them to ‘work smarter’ and, in so doing, focus more on the task at hand and less on mundane activities.
Microsoft 365 Copilot Use Cases/The Important Bit:-
- Copilot in Word – writes, edits, summarises and creates content right alongside people as they work.
- Copilot in PowerPoint – enables the creation process by turning ideas into a designed presentation through natural language commands.
- Copilot in Excel – helps unlock insights, identify trends or create professional-looking data visualisations in a fraction of the time.
- Copilot in Outlook – can help synthesise and manage the Inbox to allow more time to be spent on actually communicating.
- Copilot in Teams – makes meetings more productive with real-time summaries and action items directly in the context of the conversation.
- Copilot in Power Platform – will help developers of all skill levels accelerate and streamline development with low-code tools with the introduction of two new capabilities within Power Apps and Power Virtual Agents.
- Business Chat – brings together data from across documents, presentations, email, calendar, notes and contacts to help summarise chats, write emails, find key dates or even write a plan based on other project files.
So there you have it. AI and particularly Microsoft 365 Copilot will be pervading more and more of our everyday working activities and hopefully for the better.
Thanks
Richard
