Word Tips

Fun with Copy & Paste (DG)

Before you can cut or copy text, you need to be able to highlight it.

There are several ways to do this.

1. Move your mouse to the beginning of your text, hold down the left mouse button and slowly move the mouse to the end of the text. When the text you want to use is highlighted, release the mouse button.

2. With your mouse, click once at the beginning of your text. Hold down the "Shift" key on your keyboard, and click once at the end of the text. Everything between the first click and the second will be highlighted.

3. Using the arrow keys move the cursor to the beginning of your text, hold down the shift key while using the arrow keys to move to the end of your text. This method works well for web pages where the text you want to copy is larger than the screen.

4. Now we will copy what we highlighted. When you copy something, you place it in a part of Windows memory called the clipboard.

5. To do this, you first highlight your text, and then click on "Edit" and "Copy". Even though you can't see any changes, you will now have your text on the clipboard.

6. To paste, you simply click where you want the text to go and click "Edit" and "Paste".

Lets say that you want to send just this article in an e-mail to your mother. First, you would highlight the article, then click "Edit" and "Copy". Next, you open a new e-mail and address it to your mom. Now click in the body of the e-mail where you want the article to go, and click "Edit" and "Paste".

Your article is now in the new e-mail

An even easier way to do this, is to first highlight your text, and then using your keyboard, press Ctrl + C.

This is the same as "Edit" and "Copy" and you will now have your text on the clipboard.

To paste, you simply click where you want the text to go and press Ctrl + V.

Not only is it faster and easier to use the keyboard shortcuts, but it works in places where there is no "Edit" menu available.

If you can highlight the text, you can usually copy it.

Paste Special (DG)

You can tell Word how to paste your text before you paste it, by using the Edit, Paste Special command. If you don't see this command on the Edit

menu, click the down arrow at the bottom of the Edit menu. The full menu appears, including the Paste Special option.

Choose the Paste Special command. The Paste Special dialog box appears, which lists several options for pasting in the text: Document Object,

Formatted Text, Unformatted Text, Picture, and so on. Each of these items tells Word how to paste in the information. To discover what each options

does, select it from the list and read the description in the Result area of the dialog box.

For example, if you want to paste in some text from a Web page but don't want all that HTML-blah-blah formatting, choose the Unformatted Text option.

Click OK, and the text is pasted into Word as plain text and not as some Web object.

Inserting a Copyright Mark (DG)

There are a number of special symbols that are often used in the course of creating a document. One common symbol is the copyright mark, which is a small letter C surrounded by a circle. Copyright marks are easy to add to your document, assuming you are using a version of Word that has AutoCorrect and that it hasn't been turned off or modified. If this is the case, you should be able to type a lowercase C surrounded by parentheses--as in (c)--and Word will automatically change the three characters to a copyright mark.

If you have AutoCorrect turned off, there are a number of other ways you can insert a copyright mark. If you use the keyboard a lot, you can simply press Ctrl+Alt+C. If you prefer to use the mouse, you can follow these steps:

Choose Symbol from the Insert menu. Word displays the Symbol dialog box.

Make sure the Special Characters tab is selected. Choose Copyright from the list of available characters.

Click on OK.

Drawing a Table (DG)

You can "draw" complex tables into your document by using the handy Table and Borders button on the Standard toolbar. Basically, you draw the table first and then fill in the rows and columns later.

To put a table in the middle of your document, follow these steps:

Click the Tables and Borders button (it looks like a square, divided into fourths, with a yellow pencil).

If you weren't previously in Print Layout view, Microsoft Word switches you there automatically. (You can't place tables while in Normal view.) Ensure that the Draw Table button is "on" in the Tables and Borders palette.

The Draw Table button should be active (looking like it's selected). If the Draw Table button isn't on, click it. The mouse pointer changes to a pencil, referred to as the pencil pointer. Drag the mouse to "draw" the table's outline in your document.

Start in the upper-left corner of where you envision your table and drag to the lower- right corner, which tells Word where to put your table. You see an outline of the table as you drag down and to the right. Don't worry about making the table the right size; you can resize it later. Use the pencil pointer to draw rows and columns.

To draw a row, drag the pencil pointer from the left side to the right side of the table.

To draw a column, drag the pencil pointer from the top to the bottom of the table. As you drag the pencil pointer, a dashed line appears, showing you where the new row or column will be split. Also notice that you can split columns or rows into more cells simply by dragging the pencil pointer inside a cell and not across the entire table.

Click the Draw Table button when you're done creating the table's rows and columns.

This step turns off table-creating mode and switches you back to normal editing mode. Now you can fill the text into your table or modify the table or whatever.

Background Save (DG)

You already know that it is important to periodically save your documents. This helps protect your work in case of catastrophic power failure or inadvertent massive edits (such as those imposed by an errant macro). When your document is small, saving to disk can be done very quickly. As your document grows, or as you start saving your document to storage devices that aren't that speedy, saving can take quite a bit longer to do.

To overcome the delay normally associated with saving a document, Word uses what is known as "background saving." This simply means that Word allows you to continue working as it actually writes your document to disk. The benefit is that you can keep right on working as Word does its housekeeping. You can tell when a background save is taking place because an animated disk appears on the status bar. When the disk disappears, the save is complete.

You can control whether Word utilizes background saving in the following manner:

1. Choose Options from the Tools menu. Word displays the Options dialog box.

2. Make sure the Save tab is displayed

3. If the Allow Background Saves check box is selected, Word will use the background saving feature.

4. Click on OK to dismiss the Options dialog box.

 SEQ CHAPTER \h \r 1Using the Format Painter

Sue Crane, Big Bear Computer Club, CA

The Format Painter icon can be used to copy character or paragraph formatting from one portion of text to another.

1.      Click in the paragraph (or word) that is formatted the way you want.  Then click on the Format Painter icon:

2.      Click on the word you want to copy the formatting to, or for multiple words, drag to select that portion of text.

To copy the formatting multiple times, click in a portion of text with the formating to be copied, double-click on the Format Painter icon, and copy the formatting as many times as you want.  When you've finished, click the format painter icon once again to de-select it.

Adding a Work Menu

Sue Crane, Big Bear Computer Club, CA

Sue.crane@charter.net

 SEQ CHAPTER \h \r 1Word keeps a list of most recently used documents in its File menu, but I find that if I'm working on multiple documents, the file I want isn't listed in the recent list.  In order to quickly access the files I use frequently, I've added a Work menu to my list.

To add a Work menu, click on the Tools menu, then select Customize.

In the Customize Window, click on the Commands tab and in the Categories:  option list, click the Built-in Menus option.  Next, in the Commands: option list, find the Work option and click and hold your mouse button.

Drag the Work option to where the other menus are located.  Release the mouse and your new Work menu will appear.  Using the Work menu once you've created it is easy.  When you open a document you often use, click on the Work menu, then click on the Add to Work Menu option. The document will be added to the Work menu list and can be opened from that menu in the future.

Smiley Faces

Maggie Smith, Editor, The Data Line, Tacoma Area PC Users Group, WA

If you don’t get a ‘happy face’ when you type :-) and hit the space bar in Word, here’s how you can get one.

Insert a symbol by using AutoCorrect

Go to Tools| AutoCorrect Options| Auto Correct tab.  Just under the Replace: _____ With: _____, the 5^th thru 10^th replacements (at least in mine) are different smiley faces.  If the ones you want aren’t there already, you can add them.  To add them go to Insert|Symvol.  Use the Wingdings font and click on the smiley face you want.  In the lower left hand side is a button, Autocorrect…  Click on that and it will have inserted the smiley face in the Replace With… box.  (Just type in :-)  or :) in the Replace: box and then click Add, OK.

Type this          Get this

:) or  :-)                 J    

:| or  :-|               K

:( or  :-(               L

If text is not replaced with a symbol, you may need to turn on the AutoCorrect feature.  On the Tools menu, click AutoCorrect Options, and then click the AutoCorrect tab.  Select the Replace test as you type check box.

Deleting Words (applies to Word versions 6, 97, 2000, 2002, 2003)

Karen Tangeman, Big Bear Computer Club, CA

While editing documents, it is not uncommon to delete words, phrases, and the like. Different people take different approaches to the task. For instance, some people just select the text and press DELETE, while others may simply hold down the DELETE or BACKSPACE keys until the unwanted characters disappear.

If you are in the latter group, and you spend a lot of time pressing DELETE or BACKSPACE, you may be interested in a handy shortcut provided by Word. All you need to do is hold down the CTRL key to speed up your deletions. Using CTRL+DELETE deletes text from the insertion point to the end of the next word. For instance, if you wanted to delete four words to the right, simply press CTRL+DELETE four times. Likewise, CTRL+BACKSPACE deletes words to the left of the insertion point.

An interesting use of these shortcut keys is to speed up editing tasks, not just mass deletions. For instance, let’s say you wanted to change the word “sidestep” to “sideways.” Normally you would find some way to simply delete “step” and type “ways.” This could involve pressing DELETE or BACKSPACE four times to get rid of the unwanted portion of the word. You can make your edit faster if you just position the insertion point at the beginning of “step,” press CTRL+DELETE once, and then type “ways.”