21 November 2019

Header and Footer Keyboard Shortcut

Dear Ms. Bytes, Word

Dear Ms. Bytes

I would like to know if there is a Header and Footer Keyboard Shortcut which would allow me to jump into the Header of my MS Word document?

Sincerely – Maureen W.

Dear Maureen W.,

Yes, there is! It’s a very good question because oftentimes, as we are editing documents, it would be so convenient to be able to move quickly to the Header and/or Footer area. This can be easily done using a keyboard shortcut. While in the body of your document, press ALT+V, then press H. Once you are in the Header, if you want to move to the Footer, press the down arrow (the navigation arrows on the keyboard). Pressing the up arrow will move you to the Header. To close out of the Header or Footer area, you can press the ESC key.

Sincerely – Ms. Bytes

Happy Formatting!

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7 August 2019

Working with Headers and Footers

The Big Byte, Word

Working with Headers and Footers

Headers and Footers are great for adding additional information to your document like file names, dates, and page numbers. Generally, the information you add to a Header shows up at the top of every page. And, information you add to a Footer shows up at the bottom of every page. You can specify a Different First Page Header and/or Footer. This will allow you to specify text that is unique and only appears on the first page. Additionally, with the addition of Section Breaks, you can specify different Header and Footer information for each section. You can also specify a Different First Page for each section. This means that each section behaves like a mini-document within the larger document container. Working with Headers and Footers can be as simple and easy as you need, but this feature can also handle more complex page formatting needs for larger documents.

Adding a Header

To add a Header (or a Footer), you have a couple of options. The most direct method is double-clicking in Header (or Footer) area of your document (see figure below).

Double-clicking in this space will automatically open the Header/Footer ribbon and you will see some features worth noting. First, the new ribbon is called the Header & Footer Tools: Design. This ribbon is only available/visible when you are actively in either the Header or Footer area. Second, on the left side of the workspace you will see that the Header area is actually inside the Top Marin space. Using the vertical ruler, you can adjust either the top margin (making it larger or smaller) and /or the space for the Header.

After adding the information you would like repeated at the top or bottom of each page, you will want to click the Close Header and Footer button.

Have fun formatting!

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17 July 2019

Copy Styles in MSWord

Byte of the Day, Word

Dear Ms. Bytes

There are Styles in an older document that would like to use in my current document – is there an easy way to copy styles in MSWord between documents?

Sincerely – CeCe R.

Dear Cece R.,

You are in luck! 2 easy methods come to mind when you need to copy styles in MSWord.

Using Copy and Paste

First, open both documents – sometimes I like to arrange them so that I can see them at the same time, but as long as they are both open and you know how to switch between them, you’ll be okay!

In your older document – the one that has the Styles you want to copy – select a paragraph that has the Style already applied to it. It is very important that you select the paragraph marker at the end of the paragraph. Here is a visually of what I’m talking about:

Once you have the paragraph selected, press CTRL+C.

No, you need to move to the other document. You might want to go to the end of the document (press CTRL+END) because you are going to be pasting the that paragraph and style into this document and you don’t want to affect the document text in any way. Click to place the insertion point and press ENTER a couple of times.

Now, press Ctrl+V. Using this method will bring the paragraph AND the style into the current document. You can now delete the paragraph text and paragraph marker. Don’t use the Undo command or CTRL+Z to remove the paragraph.

Heads up… I wouldn’t suggest using this method if the style you are copying are MSWord’s built-in styles or if the styles exists already in your current document.

Using the Format Painter

Another great way to copy styles and/or formatting – within your current document OR between two different documents – is the Format Painter. Similar to the Copy/Paste method, this works great if the style you are copying does not exist in your current document. You can use the Format Painter to copy the formatting of the paragraph style and apply that formatting to your current documents paragraph, but the style itself is not updated in your current document.

Using the Organizer

Depending on the version of MSWord you are using, the Organizer can be used to manage, toolbars, AutoText, and macros. Luckily, the one feature that remains consistent between versions is the ability to use MSWord Organizer to manage Styles. If you would like to use this method to copy styles between documents, check out this blog.

Happy Copying!

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24 June 2019

Use MSWord Organizer

The Big Byte, Word

Use MSWord Organizer

Built-in styles are combinations of formatting characteristics that you can apply to text to quickly change its appearance. For example, if you have several headings throughout your document and you want them to look the same, you could select them and apply several formatting options i.e. font, font size, bold, underling, uppercase, spacing after, etc. You probably know some faster methods of applying these formats to each heading – using the format painter comes to mind. But the best way is to apply a Style. For an introduction to Styles, click here. If you have created a custom Style in one document and you want to use it in another document, use MSWord Organizer to copy styles so you don’t have to recreate it.

The Organizer

Depending on the version of MSWord you are using, the Organizer can be used to manage, toolbars, AutoText, and macros. Luckily, the one feature that remains consistent between versions is the ability to use MSWord Organizer to manage Styles.

Some of our clients have purchased a third-party macro package and their version of MSWord has been customized – if this is you, your Home ribbon will not look the same as as non-customized (or “native”) MSWord environment. Fortunately, it doesn’t matter which version or which type of environment you have!

Open the Organizer

Press Alt+Ctrl+Shift+S. This Styles Pane can be moved around to a location that suits your needs. I prefer to have it docked, so I move it to the far right side of my MSWord window.
Click on Manage Styles. At the bottom of the pane, look for 3 icons and click on the 3rd one “Manage Styles”.

Click on Import/Export. At the bottom of this dialog box, click on the “Import/Export…” button. Note: if you work with Styles in a native MSWord environment, this dialog box should be your best friend.

View the Organizer. There are 2 sides in this dialog box. The left (indicated with #1) shows the document that was open on your screen and displays the Styles in this document. The right (indicated with #2) will show either the Styles in the Normal template but, if you had multiple documents open, could display one of the open documents and the Styles in that document. Whichever side you click on will become your “source” document and the other side will become the “destination” document. Try it out: click into one side and watch the top-center “Copy” button switch direction.

Let’s assume that the document that was open open when you viewed the Organizer is the document that does not have the custom Style you need. Do you see the “Close File” button in the section on the right (indicated by #2)? Click that button and it will turn into an “Open File…” button. You will need to know which document holds the custom Style you need. Click the “Open File…” button and navigate to the document that holds the custom Style.

Changing the Type

The default is to show Templates, or *.dotm, *.dotx, *.dot files. If the document that holds the Style you want is not a template, you can still access it but you will need to change the type to All Word Documents or Word Documents.

Now that you can see all Word documents, it will be easier to find the document you need. Select the document and click “Open”.

At this point, you will scroll through the list on the right and find the Style that you wanted to copy into the document on the left. Select the Style, click the “<-Copy” button and then click “Close” in the lower-right.

The Style will now be available in your document and you can apply it to text.

Have fun using the Organizer!

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7 May 2019

Stop Spell Check in MSWord

The Big Byte, Word

Stop Spell Check in MSWord

It’s okay… sometimes your document will contain misspelled words, names, abbreviations, table names, etc. These words will be caught by the Spell Checker! As you spell check your document, abbreviations and other specialty words (or words unique to you), you can choose to add them to the Dictionary. Over time, your custom dictionary will contain the words you use making spell checking your documents fast. However, you may have the type of document which contain abbreviations that do not need to be added to the Dictionary. Yet, every time you run the Spell Checker, you have to respond to each one of those words which makes running the Spellchecker tedious. The following information will be helpful if you would like to stop spell check in MSWord – or skip certain sections of text – in your document.

Add the Abbreviations to the Custom Dictionary

Adding the word or abbreviation to the custom dictionary is by far the easiest option to stop spell check in MSWord. The downsides are that it may take awhile to organically add each unique word to the custom dictionary as it comes up in your documents. Also, your dictionary could end up containing a bunch of irrelevant abbreviations. The upside is that it will create a faster spell check experience in the long run.

No Proofing

You can easily select a portion of your document and format it as a different language classification called “No Proofing”. Doing this will stop spell check in MSWord for that section. First, select the portion of your document you do not want spell checked. Then click the Language option. Then select Set Proofing Language. Last, check the Do not check spelling or grammar checkbox. You can turn off this option by reversing the steps and unchecking this option.

Happy spell checking!

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6 May 2019

Editing Hyperlinks in MSWord

Byte of the Day, Word

Editing Hyperlinks in MSWord

If you are browsing, navigating or searching on the internet, you have used a hyperlink. A hyperlink allows you to quickly move from web page to another simply by clicking the link. You can use hyperlinks in your MSWord documents which provides an easy way for your readers to visit a supporting web page. Editing hyperlinks in MSWord is very easy and is sometimes necessary when web pages are moved, renamed, or deleted.

Edit the Hyperlink

First, locate the hyperlink in your document that needs to be edited. Right-click on the link.

In the Address field at the bottom of the dialog box, replace the incorrect link with a new link and click OK.

Happy Linking!

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6 May 2019

Remove Blank Pages in MSWord

Dear Ms. Bytes, Word

Dear Ms. Bytes

When I print my document, it always prints a blank page at the end. How can I remove blank pages in MSWord?

Sincerely – Arthur M.

Dear Arthur M.,

Dear Arthur,

This should be an easy fix. The blank page(s) printing at the end of your document simply means that you have several hard returns, or empty paragraphs, at the end of your document. To remove blank pages in MSWord, you will need to find and delete the extraneous hard returns at the bottom of the document.

You may not see the hard returns unless you turn on the Show/Hide feature which will display the non-printing characters in your document.

Turn on the Show/Hide feature

Find the Show/Hide button on the Home ribbon and click it to turn on and to turn off the non-printing characters in your document.

The non-printing characters will appear in the document – these marks are very helpful when editing a document and will display characters such when you press the TAB key, or when you press the SPACEBAR, or when you press ENTER, and others. You will need to see these non-printing characters to remove blank pages in MSWord.

Find Empty Paragraphs

One easy way to get to the end of the document is to press CTRL+End. Now that you can see the non-printing characters, you will probably see several empty paragraphs, or hard returns. You can delete them by pressing the BACKSPACE key until you have removed them or you can select them all at once and press DELETE.

Blank Page Following a Table

MSWord requires that there is a paragraph mark (hard return) at the end of every document, so you may run into an issue when using tables. You will not be able to remove or delete the paragraph mark that appears after a table. An option that you can try would be to decrease the font size of that last paragraph mark (hard return) so that you can remove the blank pages in MSWord.

Happy Deleting!

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19 March 2019

Jump Around in an MSWord Document

Byte of the Day, Word

Jump Around in an MSWord Document

Why would you want to jump around in an MSWord document, you ask? It’s sounds fun, but how can it help me work faster? Well, it may not be “let’s all go to Disneyland” fun, but it is a cool thing to know and comes in handy when you want to move your cursor quickly between different parts of your document.

It’s super simple. MSWord will remember the last 4 places where you have made an edit. You can use Shift+F5 to jump to – or switch between – the last 4 edits. My favorite use for this tip is when you open a document, pressing SHIFT+F5 will take you to the last place you edited before closing the document. Happy Jumping!

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18 March 2019

Extended Clipboard in MSWord

Dear Ms. Bytes, Word

Dear Ms. Bytes

Is it possible to CUT more than one selection at a time?

Sincerely – Sheri T.

Dear Sheri T.,

MSWord has a very cool tool called “Spike.” This feature is an extended clipboard in MSWord documents. I’m sure you are familiar with the CUT/COPY/PASTE function, right? Well, the Spike feature allows you to CUT text from several places in a document and PASTE them in a new location, all at once. So instead of performing CUT/PASTE several times, you can gather up several selections and then go to the location in your document where you want the items placed and drop them in.

To Use Spike

Start by selecting some text, then press CTRL+F3. Select another piece of text, then press CTRL+F3. Continue this process of “spiking” selections to the extended clipboard in MSWord. You can select and append several entries this the active Spike.

To PASTE the spiked entries, click in your document where you would like the entries to appear and press CTRL+SHIFT+F3 and the contents of the Spike will appear in that location.

Happy Spiking!

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15 March 2019

Sorting Addresses and Contact Information in MSWord

Byte of the Day, Word

Sorting Addresses

Let me first say – sorting addresses is best done in Excel (or another database program). There, I’ve said it. If you have a long list of individuals that will become part of a merge, for example, do yourself a favor and put the information into Excel where the data can be manipulated easier. At the very least, you could put the information into an MSWord table. However, there are definitely times where you might want the information to stay in a “block” or paragraph format and not in a table format with rows and columns. If you have a list of contacts (names and addresses) and you would like them to appear in alphabetically order… take a deep breath and read on.

To make this happen, you must follow these rules. I’m serious.

Each address must be an individual paragraph. In the samples below, the first example has the information (name, address, city/state/zip) separated by a hard return at the end of each line. In the second example, the information (name, address, city/state/zip) is separated by a manual line break (Shift+Enter). The only place a hard return (Enter) should be is at the end of the contacts information (after the zip).

2. Connect the words using a non-breaking space. You want to sort by the last name? No problem! Take a look at the following examples. In each of them, the first line has a different set of information. “Ms. Lilly Buckhold” has three words. “Richard Eldridge” has two words. “Ms. Andrea L. Harkness” has four words. Yes, the initial counts as a separate “word.” The goal is to tell MSWord to look at the last name when sorting addresses. To do this, you will need to connect all of the words, except the last name, using a non-breaking space (Ctrl+Shift+spacebar). Note: you only need to use the non-breaking spaces on the words in the first line.

In this way, when sorting addresses, we have asked MSWord to consider all words which are connected by a non-breaking space as ONE WORD. So “Ms. Lilly” becomes one word and the second word of the line is Buckhold. “Richard” is one word and Eldridge is the second word. “Ms. Andrea L.” is now considered one word and Harkness is the second word. With me so far? Great job!

If you have made the necessary changes to your list of addresses, you can now sort them.

Select the list of addresses
Click on the Home tab, if necessary.
In the Paragraph section of the Home tab, you will see the Sort option. After clicking on the Sort option, you will see the following dialog box:

Click on the Options button.

Here, you are choosing to separate fields (words) using spaces. Click on the Other option and make sure it contains one space. This seems tricky because a space is “invisible”, but if in doubt you can select anything in that square and delete it. Then, carefully press the space bar. This works because you set up the first line of the paragraph so that the only SPACE is right before the last name.

Then click OK. You will be back to the Sort by dialog box.

In the first section, click on the Sort By drop-down list and choose the Word 2 option. Remember, the second word is the last name!
Click on OK.

Your list should now be sorted alphabetically by last name. If you understand the concepts in this technique, you can use this information to sort all kinds of text in MSWord.

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