Underline With Pizzazz In MS Word
Have you ever wished you had a better way to emphasize your point? (Besides raising your voice of course. MS Word seems pretty immune to that tactic. Too bad – I can be pretty good at that one when I need it!)
You’ve done the normal bold, color change and underline thing. But, this time you’re looking for a little something “extra”. (Like the… Continue reading
The Key To Print Preview
Many of us find the Print Preview option in MS Word a very useful feature.
It’s an excellent way to double check your layout before you waste paper and ink / toner printing something that really isn’t ready to go.
I don’t know about you, but I usually get to the Print Preview window either through the File menu or by using the button on… Continue reading
The Ultimate Word Keyboard Shortcut List
Quite often I receive email requesting complete lists for keyboard shortcuts.
Unfortunately, I never really have one. Most of the lists I put in this newsletter are lists I compile from a variety of references.
And… to be quite honest, I wasn’t too worried about the “whole” list because most people I’ve worked with have difficulty learning that much material all at once.
But… Continue reading
Now Where Was I?
Have you ever found yourself looking for the last place you were working in a long Word document?
You know, it’s a 10 – 20 – 30 page monster and you were working on something somewhere in the middle when you last saved and closed the document.
When you re-opened the document the cursor was on page one, top left corner. Now here you are patiently… Continue reading
Using Watermarks In MS Word
Now that you know what a watermark is, would you like to know how to create one?
It’s a good way to turn this…
into this…
Sound like a great idea? Yeah, it did to me too, so let’s get started.
The first thing we should do is to change our view to Print/Page Layout. (If we don’t, we won’t be able to… Continue reading
One Key Pasting In MS Word
Ever find yourself continually pasting the same item over and over?
Tired of constantly needing the mouse or the Ctrl + V combination?
Wish you had a quick and easy one-key paste?
Well, you can – if you’re not to attached to the Insert key. (The key that toggles between new text overwriting old text and new text being inserted between old text.)
Want… Continue reading
Pain-Free Spiking
Now that you have some idea of what an MS Word spike is let’s get to the part of how to use one.
An Electronic Desk Spike?
You know, a desk spike… the metal spike on a desk that you impale papers on to keep them handy and in place.
(Granted, I never used one for two reasons. First, the idea of having a hole in the middle of a page doesn’t sit well with me. And second, between my lack of coordination and my bad luck I’d probably put the thing right… Continue reading
Formatting Information in MS Word
MS Word will tell you the formatting information of any paragraph you choose.
Yep—that’s correct.
It will tell you, with only a couple of clicks, information concerning formatting of a paragraph.
This can help if you’ve got a document that someone else created and you need to check on formatting. It summarizes information—saving you the aggravation of tracking this stuff down from different areas of… Continue reading
Picture Perfect Envelopes
In connection to a tip I ran last week about changing the font, in MS Word, on an envelope or label, a reader wrote in wondering how to add pictures to envelopes.
Good question!
So this week I went in search of an answer—and thankfully, I found one.
(I also figured that if one person is interested enough to write in then there must be others that… Continue reading
List of More Keyboard shortcuts for MS Word
Here’s another installment to add to your ever-growing list of keyboard shortcuts for MS Word.
Give these a whirl—they could come in very handy!
Justification Shorcuts:
Jazz Up Your Tables In MS Word
How would you like, with only a couple of clicks, to change this ordinary MS Word table
into this…
or maybe this…
or any of over 3 dozen styles?
Sound too good to be true?
Well, maybe it does, but let me assure you it is 100%, absolutely true!
Want to know how?
Yeah—of course you do. After all… Continue reading
I Put What In The Custom Dictionary? Now How Do I Get That Out Of There?
Here’s the scenario…
You’re running a spell check in MS Word, cruising along and suddenly you realize that you just accidentally clicked the Add button in the spell check window.
In other words, you just added your misspelled word to the custom dictionary. Now the incorrect spelling will be accepted as correct.
What do… Continue reading
Psst… What’s The Password?
Have you ever had a MS Word or Excel file that you just didn’t want anyone to read? Or maybe it was OK for them to read it but not change it.
I know I have a few of these. Being a teacher it’s nice to be able to protect files containing tests. You know, just in case a student gets in them.
Anyway, I’m sure… Continue reading
Copy / Paste Keyboard Shortcuts
Since today’s tip revolves around copy and paste I thought I’d take this opportunity to quickly review the keyboard shortcuts for copy / paste and deletion functions.
I’ve also found a keyboard trick in MS Word for moving text around in a document.
So, let’s get to it…
Creating A Table In MS Word Without A Mouse
What?
You can create a table without a mouse?
Are you sure?
Yes – I am and it’s easier than you might think.
All you need to know is how to line up your plus and minuses.
(Yeah – I said plus and minuses.)
To get Word to draw a table, without a mouse, you need to start by going to… Continue reading
Table Headers
Here’s the scenario, you’ve made a perfect table of information in MS Word and you’re getting ready to print your document. As you’re looking things over you realize that your table prints on several pages and your column titles are on the first page but not the others.
What do you do?
Do you make extra rows at the top of every page and manually… Continue reading
No More Splitting
Here’s the scenario: you’re working on a table in MS Word and suddenly a row splits in two—that is—part on one page and part on the next page.
You’re looking this new development over, all the while thinking to yourself: “this just won’t do—the topic in each row really can’t be split apart”.
At this point you’re trying to come up with a solution. You need an… Continue reading
Table Toppers
Did you know that with just a couple of clicks you could have MS Word automatically repeat your table headings at the top of each page containing the table?
If you answered “No” then you’ll want to take a quick moment to read on because here’s the trick to beautiful table headings.
First thing you’ll need to do is to select the row or rows you want repeated… Continue reading
Word Created TOCs
OK. So we’re ready to discover the secrets of MS Word’s automatic table of contents feature—let’s get right to it.
The first thing you need to do is establish your document with heading styles. You need to use consistent headings for chapter / section titles and then consistent headings for the subsections below each section title.
For example, you may apply Heading 1 to each section title… Continue reading
TOC?
I’m confused, do you mean, as in “tic toc”?
Have you ever been working with MS Word online help and run into that little gem? Was it explained to you, or did you file it in the back of your mind as another one of the many unexplained Microsoft mysteries?
Just in case it’s in your “unexplained” category let me tell you—they were referring simply to a “table of… Continue reading
Formatting & Updating MS Word TOCs
Now that you have the basics of Word’s TOCs you’re probably wondering about appearance, updating and other uses.
Well, it’s good that you’re wondering since that’s what we’re going to cover today.
Let’s begin with the appearance.
You may not be thrilled with the font style or size in the TOC. Fortunately, this is absolutely no problem.
You can highlight all or part of… Continue reading
More Indent Please
Good news for my MS Word using keyboard enthusiasts!
I don’t know about you, but I’m thoroughly annoyed every time I have to take my hand off the keyboard to change indenting and hanging indents.
(Hanging indents happen when the paragraph’s first line is on the left margin and all other lines of the paragraph are indented.)
Hands off keyboard, hand on mouse, find what you need… Continue reading
Setting Indents Using The Word Ruler
Have you ever wondered what all the little “triangle-looking things” are on the Word ruler?
If you haven’t noticed them, then take a quick look. See them now? They must be there for a good reason—want to know what it is?
Yes? Good, you’re in the right place since that’s what we’re going to cover today.
The “triangles” are actually markers for different paragraph… Continue reading
Making the Ruler Measure Up
Did you know that MS Word comes with a built in ruler?
No?
Well, it does if you’re using the Page / Print Layout view or the Normal view—and it’s pretty easy to access.
I find the Word ruler very helpful with layout decisions, setting tab stops and for making quick changes to paragraph settings.
To display Word’s ruler, simply use the View menu, Ruler… Continue reading
MS Word Footnote Fun
Here’s the scenario: you’re working in MS Word, happily moving through the material, creating a complete masterpiece. Suddenly you realize you need to footnote a statement. What do you do?
Well… you could do as I’ve seen so many do—type until you’re close to the bottom of the page and simply type the text into the middle of the document. Looks ok on the first run… Continue reading
MS Word Themes
OK, so you’ve decided a theme might be the way to go and you’re ready to take a look at all the choices.
Yeah 
Let’s dive right in.
To find the themes you need to go to the Format menu, Theme choice. (Alt then O then H works too.)
The Theme window will open.
On the left you have a list of themes to choose… Continue reading
