Microsoft Word

Pass the Word

The use of passwords to protect individual documents can be extremely useful if you have to store confidential documents on a network that may be accessible by other members of staff (e.g. pay increase letters, salaries, budget calculations etc.). To set a password select Options from the tools menu, select the Save tab, and enter the password required in the password box, remembering that the password entered is case sensitive.

As can be seen there is the ability to set a password for opening a document and a further password for modification to a document if so desired. The password doesn't show up on the screen, only the line of asterisks shown.

A word of warning – if you forget the password then you will not be able to open the document.

Assign shortcut keys to a command or other item

As well as using the standard shortcut keys (Ctrl B for bold etc.), it may be that you have a certain command that you often use that does not have a standard shortcut. Well the good news is you can assign your own.

You can assign a shortcut key to a command, macro, font, AutoText entry, style, or a commonly used symbol.

On the Tools menu, click Customize Keyboard.

In the Save changes in box, click the current document name or template in which you want to save the shortcut key changes.

In the Categories box, click the category that contains the command or other item.

In the box to the right, click the name of the command or other item. Any shortcut keys that are currently assigned appear in the Current keys box.

In the Press new shortcut key box, type the shortcut key combination you want to assign. Click Assign.

Too Much Help? 

Have you noticed how helpful Word can be? Have you also found yourself, on occasions, cursing the system because it automatically corrects items for you that you do not want changed, for example changing i.e. to I.e.?

To stop the system from making these unrequired changes, click on Tools, then click on Auto correct. Click on Exceptions, make relevant entries such as ‘don’t correct’ i.e. then click OK.

Correct the spell checker

If you are a bad speller then the spell checking capabilities of Word (and other Word-processors) will be wonderful. If, however, the system continually tells you that you have misspelled a word that you know is correct, simply click on Add when reviewing the spelling. This action adds the word to the dictionary so that the system recognises the word in the future.

Lose a page

How often are you rushing to finish the last report for committee or a document that must be in today’s post and the last two or three lines have flowed onto an additional page? You then spend what seems ages changing margins, fonts, page set up and deleting text in an attempt to lose that last page of just a couple of lines. Why not get Word to do it for you?

Click on Print Preview and click on Shrink to Fit icon. Word will lose that last page by decreasing the font size of each font used in the document. You can undo a Shrink to Fit operation by clicking Undo Shrink to Fit on the Edit menu. Beware, however, because once you have saved the document and closed it, there is no quick way to restore the original font size.

Keeping a track of changes

Do you sometimes have to work on large documents that need several changes to drafts before you sometimes have to work on large the final version is published? Fed up with having to remember what changes you have made to the latest version or keep copies with red pen all over them? Then use the ‘Track Changes’ feature in Word.

 

 

 

To use the feature select ‘Tools’, ‘Track Changes’ and ‘Highlight Changes’ before making any changes to your document.

By selecting the Options button you can customise the way that changes are highlighted. This means that all changes made to a document are highlighted on the same document whether new text or deleted text.

When you have reviewed the changes to the document, accepting the changes is easy. Simply select ‘Tools’, ‘Track Changes’, ‘Accept or Reject Changes’.

From here you can accept or reject all changes, or individual changes.

Cut, Copy and Paste quickly

If you are making several changes to a document that involves a lot of cut and paste or copy and paste, it can be a time consuming exercise having to constantly select ‘Edit’, ‘Copy’, ‘Edit’, ‘Paste’ etc.

One short cut is to use short cut keys (Ctrl C, Ctrl V, Ctrl X); alternatively, simply highlight the relevant text and right click. This will list a number of options including copy, cut and paste.

Add Style to Your Bullets

To change the format of the default numbering or bullets, move the mouse pointer to ‘Format’ and left click. Move the pointer to highlight ‘Bullets and Numbering’, and left click.

The window above will appear. Select the required format by clicking on the appropriate box and click ‘OK’.

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