A bug? And how to report it?

[Crazy Horse]

I think I may have discovered a bug in my WinXP/home (SP2)¹ edition.
It's fairly straight forward to describe and consistently repeats itself
on my system, though I supposed it may not necessarily be repeatable by
others.

This bug occurs as a result of interaction between MS·Office (2000) and
the OS, as follows:
¶ from within an MS·O document (so far tested with Excel and Word) if I
click on a Web link, my MS·IE browser gets activated and the appropriate
webpage gets displayed. After that, an *effects* property of the OS
(which I keep normally keep inactive²) becomes active; I.e., =3FAnimate
windows when minimizing and maximizing.=3F
¶ More often than not, after this has happened, if I do the following:
sysdm.cpl » /Advanced\ » [Settings], the checkbox for this effect has
become checked, but sometimes it is unchecked even though the effect has
become active. In the first case, I can deactivate the effect by
unchecking the box and clicking [OK] or [Apply]. In the less frequent
case (box is unchecked), I can deactivate it as follows: check » [Apply]
» UNcheck » [OK].

As mentioned, this condition is consistently repeatable on my machine.
I don't know if it's technically proper to call it a bug, but at least
in my opinion, it should be labeled as such. In principle, an
application (even, or *especially* a MS application) should *never* be
able to alter an OS setting of the GUI variety or any other.

I'm wondering if anyone out there has seen this bug or can repeat it on
their system. If it's agreed that this is a bug, which has not yet been
reported, how would I go about reporting it.

Thanks in advance, for whatever feedback you might provide.
_______
-CH
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1. running on a DELL Inspiron 1000 laptop
2. I don't find this effect particularly engaging, and it's slow
relative to no animation.

 

[Claymore]

How Crazy Horse!

I've tried to duplicate your condition with Office 2000 and XP SP2.
Can't do it. So, it doesn't seem to be a general condition, but
something peculiar to your setup.

 

[Crazy Horse]

I've tried to duplicate your condition with Office 2000 and XP SP2.
Can't do it. So, it doesn't seem to be a general condition, but
something peculiar to your setup.

Claymore- thanks for getting back to me. This makes it simultaneously
more fascinating and seemingly less likely to ever get fixed. The good
news is that I don't use MS·O with any regularity, so the chances of my
having to deal with this little snafu are rather limited. And when I
do, it's not all that hard to undo it.

That being said, it *does* seem quite peculiar!

Anyway, thanks again for testing this on your computer and getting back
to me.
_______
-CH
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