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
You Don’t Have To Be Webster To Write Your Own Dictionary?
Most people know about the Spell Check feature of the MS Office Suite. In fact, we (myself included) find ourselves using it constantly.
It’s a wonderful tool, provided that it’s not your only set of “eyes” proofing your document.
At any rate, have you ever had a word that you constantly use but the program keeps suggesting that it’s… Continue reading
Let’s Get Organized
Have you ever found yourself in MS Word, Excel or PowerPoint trying to use drawing tools to create an organization chart?
How did it go?
I’ve tried it in the past and it was a pain.
It was better than hand drawing one, but it was a constant struggle to group and ungroup things, keep everything on one page, draw connectors that are actually connected, move things… Continue reading
Add-ins? Oh No – I Hated Math Class!
Don’t worry – no need to break out in hives – add-ins have nothing to do with the high school math class that seems to be still haunting you.
Add-ins can be wonderful little computer helpers.
Actually, the best definition probably comes from the online help provided with the programs, so… let’s use that one.
Add-ins are supplemental programs that extend the… 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
Give Me The Value And Just The Value
Have you ever found yourself working in MS Excel and wishing you could paste the value of a formula instead of the formula?
Or maybe you found yourself scrolling back and forth in a worksheet or flipping between different worksheets trying to type the value in by hand – desperately hoping you get it accurate.
You know what I’m referring to, the… 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…
Picture Perfect
Ever find yourself wishing you could put a screen shot into a Word document, Excel workbook, or PowerPoint presentation?
I know I use them all the time, and not just for this newsletter.
As a teacher I use them a lot when creating instructions for student projects or to create handouts to use during staff training.
It never occurred to me how much I’d use screen shots until… Continue reading
Screen Shot? What’s That?
There’s a good chance that you’ve heard someone mention the term “screen shot” before.
Did you know what they were talking about or did you write it off as more computer jargon?
Well it you wrote it off, let’s just pull it out of the “mysterious computer jargon” file and put it into your active vocabulary list.
Basically a screen shot is just like a picture… Continue reading
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
An Office Assistant That Delivers
No not pizza delivery – sorry – but something you can really use.
How about a tip delivered to your desktop at program startup everyday?
If you like reading Office tips in little doses then you’ll love this. The only question is how do you arrange for this little delivery?
Well, the first thing you need to do is to get the Office Assistant running.… 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
Preventing The “Saved Over” Blues
Do you have an Excel file that you constantly change data in and then have to remember to save it under a new name?
Have you ever caught yourself yelling at the computer “STOP!” as you realize that you just saved over the old data—and darn—you needed to keep that too!
While you’re still muttering at the computer, do you then go back and try… Continue reading
What’s up with all those tabs?
Did you ever notice that there are several tabs in the New window when you go to open a template you’ve created?
What’s up with all those tabs?
Well, to tell the truth, the tabs are useful little creatures.
Next time you go to open a template slow down and browse through them.
You’ll find that on the tabs are other… Continue reading
Single Worksheet Templates
We’ve discussed templates in MS Excel that were entire workbooks, but… have you ever wanted just a single sheet for a template?
You know, instead of opening a workbook template, just insert a sheet into another workbook?
Sounds like a good idea to me! After all, I’m willing to bet that someone out there uses a template to copy and paste a single sheet into workbooks already… 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
Quick & Spiffy Tables in MS Excel
Way back in January (January 28, 2003 to be exact) we discussed using the AutoFormat feature of MS Word to give your tables a quick and easy visual “edge”.
(To take a look at the January 28 issue, visit our archives at http://www.worldstart.com/archives)
For those readers who usually use MS Excel for table work… Continue reading
MS Excel Default Font Fun
Do you constantly find yourself changing the font size or type in Excel worksheets?
Is it getting annoying to repeat yourself time after time after time?
I bet a few of you even tried looking in the Format menu for something equivalent to the Font choice found in MS Word.
Didn’t find it, did you?
Nope—that’s because it’s not there.
You can find font choices… Continue reading
MS Excel AutoFilters Part 1—The Basics
Here’s the scenario: you’re working with a spreadsheet and you’re patiently trying to find certain values—maybe you’re looking for the top 3 sales amounts from the list, or all customers who live in a certain city, or all sales made by a certain sales rep.
Whatever it is you’re looking for, you need to know it now—not an hour from now after you’ve sorted… Continue reading
I Thought Filters Were For Things Like Fish Tanks and Coffee Makers?
Have you ever found yourself lost while working with a huge list or set of data in MS Excel?
Did you find that you were continually scrolling through data looking for a particular value?
I bet more than once you caught yourself wishing for a way to just see what you want and get rid of the rest.… Continue reading
MS Excel AutoFilter Part 2—Top 10 and Custom Filters
Let’s get right to it.
To begin I think we should discuss Top 10.
This is pretty much what the name implies—it’s a listing of the top values or percentage of the list.
Let’s investigate further.
After you’ve opened a file and turned on the AutoFilter (Data menu, Filters submenu, AutoFilter choice) pull down one of the AutoFilter lists for a… Continue reading
Changing The View – Not The Selection
I’m sure just about everyone has used the arrow keys in MS Excel to move through their worksheet.
But… sometimes you want to quickly zip out to another part of the worksheet to see something without moving the cell selection and losing your current place. What do you do?
I’m betting that many of you take your hands off the keyboard, use the… 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
