They also served to teach the product by example. Wizards were intended to learn from how someone used a program and anticipate what they may want to do next, guiding them through more complex sets of tasks by structuring and sequencing them. Wizards had been in development at Microsoft for several years before Publisher, notably for Microsoft Access, which wouldn't ship until November 1992. Publisher's 'Page Wizards' instead provided a set of forms to produce a complete document layout, based on a professionally designed template, which could then be manipulated with the standard tools. Publisher was targeted at non-professionals, and Microsoft figured that, no matter what tools the program had, users wouldn't know what to do with them.
When developing the first version of its desktop publishing software, Microsoft Publisher, around 1991, Microsoft wanted to let users with no graphic design skill make documents that still looked good. Before the 1990s, 'wizard' was a common term for a technical expert, like 'hacker.' The 1985 textbook Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs was nicknamed the 'Wizard Book' for the illustration on its cover its first chapter says, 'A computational process is indeed much like a sorcerer's idea of a spirit.'