One Slide Show—Many Uses
What do you do when you have to take an MS PowerPoint presentation tailored for one audience and alter it for a slightly different audience?
I mean, the bulk of the presentation material will be the same but you’ve got to accommodate some differences.
Maybe the presentation is two hours long and you’ve got to do the job in just one hour.
Or… maybe you’ve got… Continue reading
Link It Up
So, it seems that we’re all ready for our adventure into the land of MS PowerPoint hyperlinks, so I’ll get the ride underway.
Besides having the presentation open, you need to decide where you need to make a jump.
“Jump where?” you ask.
Well, just about anywhere you might need to go—another slide in the show, a custom show, a URL on the web, a different presentation… Continue reading
Choose Your Destination
Let’s see—a beautiful beach somewhere with a warm tropical breeze…
Keep dreaming.
Unfortunately, I’m not talking about a vacation destination (sorry to let you down). I’m talking about a destination in or out of your PowerPoint presentation that doesn’t happen to be the next slide.
We all know about hyperlinks in Web pages—got to love all links—just a quick click and boom, you’re off to the next… Continue reading
Typos Be Gone!
OK—so we all have them.
You know, those nasty little typos we make time after time after time.
It seems that no matter how we may try to train our fingers to do a better job, the outcome is always the same.
Oops—hit the wrong key! Now we need the Backspace key to get rid of it and finally we can carefully type it the right way.… Continue reading
Changing the Normal Template
We’re all here to find out how to make changes to the Normal template – so I think we should get right down to business.
Step 1: Locate and open your Normal template.
Working With The Norm
Do you find yourself constantly making the same changes in MS Word over and over again? (Things like tabs, paragraph settings, etc… whatever you need to get the job done right.)
Frustrated with all the repetitive work?
Yeah, me too.
Want a better way—maybe a way that has all blank documents delivered to you with these settings ready to go?
Was that a “Yes!” I heard?… Continue reading
Time For A Font Change-Up
It’s beautiful!
You’re MS PowerPoint presentation is “picture perfect”.
Well… almost.
You just happen to be looking it over and realize that maybe your choice of font wasn’t the best decision.
But then you think of all the time it could take to make a change. Yeah, too much. This font will just have to do.
Too bad—now that you’ve gone down this… Continue reading
Relocate In Seconds
Last month (November 4 and November 13, 2003 to be exact) we discussed charts—also known as graphs—in MS Excel. During the creation of the chart we had to pick a location, in other words, where did you want Excel to put the graph?
You had two choices: you could embed it as an object in a worksheet or you could… Continue reading
Give The Assistant A Vacation
Tired of the Office Assistant popping up every time you turn around?
Want to access the online help directly – no middle ‘man” needed?
Well, if you’ve got a new version of Office (sorry – this isn’t in the 97 version) then you’re in luck!
To get the little guy to take a semi-permanent vacation then here’s the scoop.
First, you need to get to… Continue reading
What’s Up With The ##### In My Worksheet?
Have you ever found yourself happily working in MS Excel only to be befuddled by the sudden appearance of #### in a cell where there should be a number?
Or maybe something along the lines of 2E+15 appeared?
Now what is that?
Good question, and believe it or not, there’s a good answer. (You may not like the answer—but it’s a valid… Continue reading
Do you know how to set the vertical alignment of a Word document?
That is, you can tell Word whether to align the text at the top of the page, the bottom of the page, the center of the page or to justify the text on the page.
This one sure could come in handy if you’re trying to accommodate some weird spacing or simply are looking for the “finished”… Continue reading
Using Excel’s Report Manager
So, you’ve decided that the Report Manager might be just the thing you need and, fortunately, that’s what I’m here to discuss today—so let’s get right to it.
The first thing you need to do is to see if the report manager add-in was installed.
Go to the View menu and check out the bottom of the menu.
Do you see the Report Manager listed?
Yes—then… Continue reading
Manage Your Reports
Do you have a single MS Excel file from which you print many different reports? Are they the same set of reports each time? (You know—these pages for person A, then other pages for person B—each time?)
What do you do?
Do you find yourself constantly resetting the print range so that each person gets exactly what they need—no more, no less?
Or, do you print the… Continue reading
What Version Do You Want?
Do you have an MS Word document that you find you’re constantly revising?
Do you find yourself wishing you still had an earlier draft of the document somewhere?
Maybe, at one time you did, so now your solution is to continually save the file under a different name each time you revise.
This is a solution that certainly provides you with the ability to return… Continue reading
Mouse-less Navigation & Highlighting
Have you ever found yourself editing a document and madly jumping between the mouse and keyboard, making adjustments every few words or lines?
Are you muttering to yourself the whole time that there must be a better way?
Yeah, me too.
Fortunately, for both of us, there is.
One way to speed the process up is to navigate through the document using the Control, Shift, Home… Continue reading
Fast & Efficient Highlighting
Highlighting in a document can often be a trying event. With the speed of many of today’s computers you find yourself zooming past your intended stopping point before you realize you’ve even begun.
There is more to highlighting than just clicking at your starting point, holding the left mouse button and dragging the highlight through the document (often missing your intended stopping point several times).
The… Continue reading
“Which One Is It?”
Ever ask yourself that question while you’re looking for a particular file?
Let’s say you’re in MS Word (or maybe Excel or PowerPoint) and you’ve got a whole list of files. Unfortunately, the names aren’t giving you enough information to decide which one you’re actually looking for.
What do you do?
You could systematically open each suspect file until you find the right one.
Or…
You… Continue reading
Quick View Changes In MS Word
It seems that everyone has a preference for the way they view their MS Word documents.
Some people prefer the Normal View, some prefer the Page/Print Layout View.
Whatever your preference, it’s always a good thing to know how to get to a different view. Sometimes you’re trying to accomplish a task that lends itself to a view different from your usual way of… Continue reading
From One to the Other
Have you ever found yourself recreating a slide for a PowerPoint presentation?
When I say “recreate” I mean actually creating a slide identical to one you have in some other presentation.
What were you thinking as you went through all the hassle?
Aggravation? Frustration?
Yeah, you bet.
Even if you’re doing the old copy / paste thing, it’s still time consuming and irritating that you… Continue reading
Quick Worksheet Relocations
What do you do when you need to move an Excel worksheet into its own workbook?
I’d bet that for many people it’s a matter of copying the worksheet, pasting it into a new workbook and then going back to delete the sheet.
Not necessarily a bad way, but probably not very efficient either.
Want a drop and drag way to move that worksheet into its own… Continue reading
Customizing The Recently Used File List
So, now that you know what the list is, are you interested in learning what kind of control you can exert over that list?
Yes?
Then let’s get started.
To find the settings for the Recently Used File List you’ll need to go to the Tools menu, Options choice.
The Options window will open and you’re looking for the General tab.
On this… Continue reading
Recently Used File List
Have you ever noticed the file names at the bottom of the File menu?
Ever wonder what was going on there?
They look like your files — in fact, they look like the files you’ve recently opened, don’t they?
Well, that would be because they are exactly that.
Yep, that’s right, MS Office programs keep track of the files you’ve recently used and displays them… Continue reading
MS Excel Cell Alignment
Ok, so now that we all know what cell alignment is and why we should all know how to control it, let’s get to the actual aligning.
The first thing you need to do is to select the cell(s) that you want to format. You can select a single cell, highlight a group of cells, select entire row(s) / column(s) or the entire worksheet. It’s all… Continue reading
Align It Your Way
Think about the MS Excel files you have and the way the data is placed in the cells.
Ever find yourself sitting back thinking “That spacing looks all funny”?
Yeah, me too.
I just can’t stand it when titles look strange or when I have some large amounts of text in some cells and small data in others on the same line. I mean, the small… Continue reading
International Character Keyboard Shortcuts
Have you noticed all of the international symbols?
If you use those frequently then I bet you’re wishing they were on the keyboard and not buried in the Symbol window.
Well, in a way they are on the keyboard—if you know the right key combinations.
Let’s take a look at some common international symbols and their key combinations.
To create accents such as à, è, ì… Continue reading
Symbols In MS Word
Have you ever found yourself trying to find a key on the keyboard that just doesn’t exist?
Let’s say that you’re trying to put one of these into your document…
Or, how about those cute little “pictures” that some people always seem to have at the right place in documents?
Maybe something like these?
Basically, anything that you need but just isn’t on the… Continue reading
Show Me More Tabs Please
So, you’ve got a pretty large Excel workbook—lots of worksheets—and you find you’re spending a ton of time scrolling back and forth between the different sheets.
Some people like to use the old Ctrl + Page Up / Down to navigate between their sheets and some prefer the old “click on the tab” method.
The only problem with the click on the tab idea is… Continue reading
