Re: "Upgrading users should be able to ignore the viewer as before."
I have yet to find Office's online help find anything relevant. It might as well not exist.
The "real" Office online help process appears to be: "Typing in a variable selection of keywords into google until a genuinely relevant online article pops up in the first page of search results. Bonus points are available if it's actually relevant to the version of MS Office you are trying to get help for.".