Tips & Tricks for Microsoft Word

Transcription

1 T 330 / 1 Discover Useful Hidden Features to Speed-up Your Work in Word For what should be a straightforward wordprocessing program, Microsoft Word has a staggering number of features. Many of these you d never find unless you purposely went looking for them or were happy to experiment with things to see what happened. That s a shame, because some of them are very useful indeed! In this article, I ll bring you a collection of little-known, but very handy, tips and tricks that make Word more useful than you ever thought it could be. Microsoft Word By Sheila Reeves Easily Copy Formatting with the Format Painter Read or Edit 2 Sections of a Document at Once Quickly Generate Dummy Text for Design or Testing Add Notes and Comments Without Altering the Text This article shows you how to:... Use handy tricks for formatting your text... Hide text in a document that won t appear when printed... Sort a list of items into alphabetical order T 330 / 2 T 330 / 5 T 330 / 6 T 330 / 13 67

2 T 330 / 2 Quickly copy formatting to one or more places in your document Easily Copy Formatting with the Format Painter Here s a situation you might run into quite frequently in Word.You ve formatted some text in a special way perhaps using a particular font, size, and colour, a fancy style of underlining, and so on. Now you d like to apply this formatting to several other pieces of text in your document. Does that mean you have to work through each piece of text, laboriously setting the same font, size, colour and style for each in turn? Not at all! Word includes a timesaving feature named the Format Painter for exactly this job. Here s how to use it: 1. First, highlight the word, phrase or paragraph that uses your special formatting. 2. Now locate the Format Painter button in Microsoft Word, which has an icon that looks like a paint brush: In Word 2010/2007, you ll find it on the Home tab of the Ribbon, in the Clipboard section. In Word 2003/XP you ll find it on the toolbar alongside the Cut, Copy and Paste buttons. 68

3 T 330 / 3 3. If you want to copy the special formatting to just one other place in your document, click the Format Painter button once. If you want to copy the formatting to two or more places, doubleclick the button. 4. Move the mouse back into your document and you ll notice that the usual I-shaped mouse pointer has gained a little paint brush beside it, as pictured in the margin, letting you know that the Format Painter is switched on. 5. Now find the piece of text in your document to which you want to apply the special formatting. If it s a single word, just click somewhere within that word. If it s several words or a whole paragraph, click at the end of the last word and swipe the mouse over the phrase or paragraph, keeping the left mouse button pressed. 6. When you release the mouse button, Word will instantly apply the formatting of the text you selected in step 1 to the text you just clicked or swiped. 7. If you clicked the Format Painter button just once in step 3, the Format Painter feature will switch itself off again now you ve used it. If you double-clicked the button, the feature is still switched on (so you ll still see the little paint brush symbol beside the mouse pointer), and you can find another piece of text in your document and follow steps 5 and 6 again to apply the same formatting to that text too. When you ve finished using the Format Painter, either press the Esc key on your keyboard to switch it off, or click the Format Painter button again. You can copy the same formatting to several different places 69

4 T 330 / 4 Word determines for itself where to wrap lines Keep words together by placing a nonbreaking space between them Prevent hyphenated terms from being split over two lines Keep Phrases and Hyphenated Words on a Single Line As I m sure you know, when you re typing text into Microsoft Word (or indeed any word processor), you don t treat it like a typewriter, pressing the Enter/Return key when you reach the right-hand margin and need to start a new line.word does this for you automatically, wrapping your text on to the next line when the word you re typing won t fit on the current line. In most cases you re content to let Word do exactly that. However, once in a while, you may be typing a few words that you d really prefer to keep together, all on a single line you don t want to find half the phrase at the end of one line and the rest at the beginning of the next. If so, there s a simple trick you can use. Rather than typing ordinary spaces between the words, hold down the Ctrl and Shift keys when you type the space. This inserts something called a nonbreaking space which, despite looking just like a normal space, tells Microsoft Word that the two words connected by this space must be kept together on the same line. (Of course, if you re typing a longer phrase, you can insert non-breaking spaces between each word in the phrase to ensure that the entire phrase will be kept on one line.) The same trick applies to hyphens as well. Microsoft Word regards a hyphen as a legitimate place to wrap a line, so you might type a word like coordinated and find the co- at the end of one line and the ordinated at the beginning of the next. If you want to avoid this, hold Ctrl and Shift when typing the hyphen to make it a non-breaking hyphen. 70

5 T 330 / 5 Read or Edit 2 Sections of a Document at Once Here s a trick that comes in handy when you re working on a fairly-long document. If you need to refer to one part of your document while typing into another, you can spend a lot of time scrolling upwards and downwards between the two sections. Don t do that use this split screen editing feature instead: 1. To the right of your document, look at the very top of the scrollbar and you ll see a little rectangular button. In Word 2010/2007, it s a thin blue bar (pictured on the left below); in Word 2003/XP, it s a thicker grey button (pictured on the right). 2. Move the mouse on to this button and doubleclick it.when you do that, Word will split the view of your document into two sections separated by a horizontal bar, as shown in the next screenshot. Both sections contain the single document you re working on, but you can scroll up and down in each section, allowing you to see (for instance) the beginning of your document in the upper section and the end of it in the lower section, or vice versa. 71

6 T 330 / 6 Drag the bar up or down to resize the sections, or double-click it to stop using the split-screen view You can type into either section Use this feature when you need some text to work with 3. You can still edit your document in the usual way, and you can do so in either section. Just click in the section you want to work on and start typing. 4. If you want to change the relative sizes of the two sections, just drag that separating bar upwards or downwards. 5. When you want to return to the usual singlescreen view of your document, move the mouse on to that separating bar and double-click it (or, if you prefer, drag it all the way up to the top of the window). Quickly Generate Dummy Text for Design or Testing Every so often, you might wish you could quickly write a page of text in Word for test purposes. Perhaps you want to experiment with formatting styles for a document you re about to write, or try out a Word feature you ve read about, and you need some text any text at all on the page. If so, Word has an unusual feature that can do this for you in an instant. At the beginning of a new line, 72

7 T 330 / 7 type this, making sure you don t include any spaces: =rand(3,6) Press the Enter key, and Word will immediately replace this odd-looking line with text. Using the example above, you ll find three paragraphs, each containing six sentences, but you can choose how much text you want. The first number specifies the number of paragraphs, the second the number of sentences in each, and you can enter any figures you like, such as =rand(10,8) for 10 paragraphs of eight sentences each. In Word 2003/XP, this dummy text consists of the repeated sentence The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. In Word 2010/2007, the text is a more natural-looking explanation of some of Word s formatting features. However, Word 2010 and 2007 offer two other types of dummy text. If you d prefer the quick brown fox text of old versions, type this: =rand.old(3,6) Alternatively, you can generate the widely-used Latin-like text known as Lorem Ipsum by typing this: =lorem(3,6) In either case, of course, you can adjust the figures in the brackets according to how many paragraphs and sentences you want to produce. Include Hidden Text that Won t be Printed Another feature that can be useful on occasions is the ability to hide text in your documents: although you ll be able to see the text when you look at the document in Word itself, it won t be included when you print the document on paper.you might use this trick to include notes for your own reference, or if there s a paragraph you don t think you ll include, 73

8 T 330 / 8 Start by setting up Word correctly but you don t want to delete it in case you change your mind. Before using this feature for the first time, it needs a spot of setting up to ensure it works properly, so begin by following the appropriate steps below: Word 2010/2007: 1. In Word 2010, click the File tab at the left of the Ribbon and choose Options; in Word 2007, click the circular Office button and choose Word Options. 2. In the window that appears, click Display in the left-hand section. 3. Below the heading Always show these formatting marks on the screen, tick the box labelled Hidden text. Lower down, in the Printing options section, make sure there s no tick beside Print hidden text. Tick this option Make sure this option isn t ticked 4. Click OK. Word 2003/XP: 1. Choose Tools > Options. 2. In the window that opens, select the View tab. 74

9 T 330 / 9 3. In the section headed Formatting marks, tick the box beside Hidden text. 4. Now select the Print tab. 5. In the section headed Include with document make sure there s no tick beside Hidden text. 6. Click OK. Now you ve set up Microsoft Word in such a way that you can include hidden text in your documents and still see it, but it will be ignored when you print the document. So how do you hide text? As easily as this: Now you can easily hide text 1. Select the text you want to hide, which can be as little or as much as you like. 2. Press Ctrl+D to open the Font dialog. 3. In the section headed Effects, tick the box labelled Hidden. 4. Click OK. If you have another look at the text you selected, you ll see that it now has a dotted underline: this is Word s way of indicating that it s hidden and won t be included when you print the document. Hidden text is indicated by a dotted underline If you want to un-hide the text, simply select it again, press Ctrl+D and remove the tick you added in step 3. 75

10 T 330 / 10 Insert a page break wherever you need one How to remove a page break Start a New Page for the Next Paragraph Just as Word works out for itself when to wrap text on to a new line, it also works out when to start a new page. When you reach the end of one page, Word simply adds another and that s where your typing appears. But what if you haven t yet finished a page and you want the next heading or paragraph to appear at the top of the next? Simple just press Ctrl+Enter. Word will add a new page to the document, place the cursor at the top of it, and you can carry on typing. Although you can t see it, Word has entered a hidden symbol in your document where you pressed Ctrl+Enter which tells it that whatever text follows should appear at the top of the next page. Therefore, even if you insert several paragraphs or even several more pages of text earlier in the document, that hidden symbol will still be there, and what follows it will always be fixed to the top of the next page. If you change your mind about this page break, it s easy to undo. Place the cursor at the left of the first character on your new page, then press the Backspace key on your keyboard once or twice. This deletes that hidden page-break symbol and moves the text on the new page upwards to the preceding page. Let Microsoft Word Help with Your Spelling! When you want to use a particular word but you re not sure how to spell it, what do you do? If you tend to sit and ponder it, or go in search of the dictionary, here s a quicker way. Just have a go at typing it the way you think it should be spelt, following it with a 76

11 T 330 / 11 space or a punctuation symbol (such as a comma or full stop). You may surprise yourself and get it right first time. However, if you haven t, Word will place a squiggly red underline beneath it to let you know. Right-click the misspelt word and you should see its correct spelling near the top of the menu that appears. Click it, and that correctly-spelt word will be inserted to replace the word you typed. Word should show you the correct spelling If that doesn t work, or you really haven t a clue how to go about spelling the word, here s another trick. Think of a simpler word that means much the same thing and type that instead; then right-click the word you typed and move the mouse down to Synonyms on the menu that appears. If you re lucky, you ll find the word you really wanted among the alternatives offered, and you can click it to use it. Of course, this Synonyms feature is also worth remembering for those occasions when you know there s a better word than the one you have in mind, but you can t think what it is, or when you find yourself using the same word too often and need to add some variation. Quickly Sort a List into Alphabetical Order There are several ways you can create lists of items in Word. You can create bulleted or numbered lists by clicking the Bullets or Numbering buttons on the Home tab of the Ribbon (in Word 2010/2007) or on the toolbar (in Word 2003/XP), or you can simply type one item per line by pressing Enter after each. If you want your list to be arranged alphabetically, you might carefully try to insert new items at the correct points, but there s really no need. Just type 77

12 T 330 / 12 your list in any order you like and then let Word put it into alphabetical order for you: 1. Start by highlighting all the items in your list, taking care not to miss out the first or last items: 2. Now do the following, depending on your version of Microsoft Word: In Word 2010/2007, switch to the Home tab of the Ribbon and click the AZ button in the Paragraph section, pictured in the margin. In Word 2003/XP, choose Table > Sort. 3. A dialog will appear offering quite a variety of options, but you don t need to change anything: just click OK. 4. As simply as that, Word arranges your list into alphabetical order: If you need to include more items in the list in future, just add them to the end.when you re ready, select the whole list once more and follow the same steps to make Word sort it again. 78

13 T 330 / 13 Add Notes and Comments Without Altering the Text Microsoft Word includes some powerful features for reviewing documents, allowing several people to edit a document and each see the others changes. Most of these features won t be of interest to PC Knowledge for Seniors subscribers, but there s one related feature you certainly may find useful: the ability to add comments to your text. You might use this feature to include notes to yourself about why you ve written something, reminders that a section needs more work, or references that tell you where you found particular information. The nice thing about these comments, as you can see in the next screenshot, is that they don t get in the way of your text itself, but they re impossible to overlook. Comments appear in colourful boxes in the margin Adding a comment is a quick and easy job. If there s a particular word, sentence or paragraph to which the comment should apply, begin by highlighting it; otherwise just click anywhere in the paragraph beside which the comment should appear. Then do the following: In Word 2010/2007, select the Review tab on the Ribbon and click the New Comment button in the Comments section. 79

14 T 330 / 14 In Word 2003/XP, choose Insert > Comment. A coloured comment box will appear in the right margin, with a line pointing to the text you selected. The cursor is already flashing expectantly in this comment box, and you can simply type the note you want to make, which can be as long or short as you like. When you ve finished typing, click anywhere in your document s text to continue working. You can edit this comment at any time in the same way you edit other text in your document. Just click inside the comment box and make any changes you need. Right-click an unwanted comment If you want to delete the comment box from your document, right-click anywhere inside it and choose Delete Comment from the menu that appears. Choose Delete Comment 80