MS Office 101

Click And Type

So, you're working in MS Word 2000 and you're trying to make a title page for your latest masterpiece. What do you do?

Do you adjust the top margin to about 5 inches to get the title in the middle of the page?

Well... you could, but then you have to go back into the page settings and change the margins back for the rest of the document. (Not my idea of efficient.)

You could create the title page in a whole different file—but then you've got two files to keep track of. (Definitely not an improvement to the situation.)

Hitting the Enter key over and over again until you get to the center of the page is a common solution to the situation. That could be ok, but it takes a while and let's just face it, we'd all really much rather simply go straight to the location and type.

And, while we're on the subject of just going to a location and working, wouldn't it be nice to just click into that empty space and insert your graphic or table?

As a long time user of Word 97 I've found myself frustrated with all the extra work you have to do to get to an empty space as well as all the extra blank lines it tends to create.

Yeah, that going straight to a location and immediately working sounds like an excellent idea to me.

You agree?

Good—since that's what "Click and Type" is all about and we're on to the "how to" next.

Office Tip of the Day

Get There & Work Now!

So, you've read all about MS Word 2000's Click and Type and you're ready to give it a try. Let's get right to business.

The first thing you need to do is to double check that the Click and Type feature is enabled. To check go to the Tools menu, Options choice. On the Edit tab you're looking for the "Enable click and type" check box.

Make sure it's checked and click OK.

Next you need to make sure you're in either the Print Layout or Web view. (These are located in the View menu.)

With those two items taken care of you're ready to begin.

Move your mouse pointer to a blank area in the document and click once. (Title page you would move to the center of the page, etc...)

You should notice that the pointer changes. One of the following I-beam pointers should appear.

Each pointer indicates the way the text will be formatted when you double-click in that location. Move the pointer to different locations to get different formatting.

When you've got the pointer you need, double-click.

Immediately your cursor is placed in the area you chose with the formatting the pointer indicated - no extra Enter keys, tabs or formatting required.

Bet you're wishing you'd had that one a long time ago! (I know I am.)

~ April