SmartArt

First there was Clip Art, then Word Art, and your good ‘ol Word Diagrams. With the Office 2007 release, there’s a new sibling to the fold called, Smart Art.

David Gainer has a great post that introduces all the details and specifics of SmartArt and it’s goals. I’m just not sure how worked up I get about it. I personally abhor Clip Art, unless you take it and greatly modify and combine it with other items in a graphics program so it doesn’t look so much like clip art anymore.

I’ve used some of the diagram stuff in Word and PowerPoint, but overall I’d say all of those items are some of the most rarely used features for me when using Office applications. At this point, I’m guessing SmartArt will fall in that group as well.

If I had to come up with a reason, it’s because I don’t want my document looking exactly like someone else’s document. Which is one of the reasons (not the main) I was never interested in Frontpage themes. You can spot them from a mile away!

I’d love to hear what you all think about these features. Do you use them? Do you think it’s a great new addition to the feature set? Let us know in the comments.