TABLES

Tables are an alternative way to display columns but are also commonly used for forms, invoices or timetables.

Create a table

To create a simple table, click on the page in the correct position for the table and then click the Insert Table button and drag your mouse across the number of columns and rows you think you will need. When you let go, the table will appear.

It is likely that, on occasion, you will need a more complex table design. Draw your own by opening the Table menu and selecting Draw Table. Your pointer will now display a pen and you can sketch out your preferred layout.

Edit a table

It is easy to increase or decrease column widths and row heights simply by dragging a square (cell) border – your mouse over any edge will show a 2-way arrow. However, it is a good idea to find the column boundary on the ruler and drag from here, rather than within the table. You won’t then change a single cell dimension in the middle of a column.

You can also open the Table menu, select Table Properties and set the size for the whole table, alignments within cells or column widths more exactly.

If you find you need extra rows at the bottom of a table, click in the last cell and press the tab key. You can also insert rows or columns anywhere by clicking a neighbouring cell and then opening the Table menu and selecting an Insert option.

When you click in a table, a small square will appear in the top, left hand corner. Click this to select the whole table or click and drag the square to move the table across the page.

To delete a table, select it and then go to Table – Delete Table to remove it completely from the page. Pressing the Delete key will only remove cell entries in a selected table and leave empty cells.

To customise a standard table, perhaps to create clear headings etc. you can merge selected cells together and then centre the contents.

Table formats

Without gridlines, tables can be an easier way to display columns of text and numbers than using tabs. This is because amending an entry in one cell does not affect neighbouring columns in the same way. Keeping gridlines and adding shading and borders on the other hand can make headings or data stand out very effectively.

To remove the gridlines, select None from the Borders tab in the Format – Borders and Shading menu. To add effects, select the columns or rows and then add a boxed border or grid setting and colour the cells from the Shading tab.

To change the look of a table quickly, open the Table menu and select Table AutoFormat. You can now choose a complete design to apply.

Sorting

With a large table, you may like to display the information it contains in alphabetic order or from highest to lowest price etc. To sort the entries, it is easier if you select the headings as well as table contents as these will be labelled properly, rather than show as Column 1, 2, 3 etc. when you select options from the dialog box. Now go to Table – Sort and check the Header row box to remove them from the re-ordering process. Select the appropriate column in the Sort by box and make sure entries will be displayed in the correct order. You can select three levels of sort if preferred e.g. first by date, then by time and then by duration.

Calculations in tables

For invoices and other financial tables, you can include formulae to total, average or multiply your figures. To do this, each cell must contain a distinct numerical value.

Click the cell where you want the result to appear and then open the Table menu and select Formula. A dialog box will open with a formula for totalling your column already in place. If this is the wrong formula, amend the entry manually. Although columns and rows do not display letters or numbers, the first cell in the table is Al and alternative formulae can be written exactly as in a spreadsheet application e.g. =AVERAGE(B2:B6). (See Chapter 4 for help on formulae.)

The answer will appear against a shaded background.

If you change any entries, update the total by right-clicking the cell and selecting Update Field.

Changing text to tables

A final, useful facility offered by Word is to change text into tables and vice versa. This is particularly important if you want to copy data from a word processed document into a spreadsheet. As long as the entries are separated by simple spaces or tabs, select the block of text and go to Table – Convert – Text to Table. Set the number of columns and, if not showing, click in Other and press the appropriate key for the type of separator.

When the table appears, copy the data across to a spreadsheet as follows: select the data, click Copy and then move to your spreadsheet application. Click one cell and select Paste.

PUBLICITY MATERIAL

At some stage, you are quite likely to be asked to produce a leaflet, advertisement, poster or other publication. Later in this book you will find out how to use the dedicated desktop publishing (DTP) package Publisher, but it is quite possible to create publications using the facilities in Word.

Useful items to include:

• Appropriate text types
• Dropped capitals
• Pictures
• Borders
• Columns
• Word Art

Text types

Some text is easier to read than others:

Selecting the appropriate font is important, and as well as the look of individual fonts there are three main font ‘families’ to consider: script that looks rather like handwriting; serif where the letters have little extra lines at the ends e.g. Times New Roman; and sans serif fonts such as Arial that are plain in style. Experiment with fonts as you may find some are more effective than others for headings or main text.

Dropped capitals

To start each paragraph or page with a flourish, you may like to add a dropped capital.

• 1.Click the first word and go to Format – Drop Cap.
• 2.In the dialog box, select a font type and letter position, set the size in terms of number of dropped lines and then click OK.

Pictures

There are three sources of picture you can add to a word processed document: the clip art gallery provided with most Office applications; any image files saved onto your computer or on a disk; and pictures or photos copied directly e.g. from the World Wide Web, camera, scanner or drawing package such as Paint.

Insert Clip Art

• 1.Click the Insert Clip Art button on the Drawing toolbar. In Word 2002 you will be offered the task pane, but a gallery will open in Word 2000.
• 2.Type a subject into the box and press Enter or click the Search button. With Word 2000, you can also click a category heading and view related pictures.

• 3.When images appear in 2002, scroll down and click any one to add it to your document. If you do not like any of them, click the Modify button to start a new search. You may need to insert the Microsoft Office CD-ROM to provide pictures that have not been installed.

• 4.In earlier versions of Word, after selecting the image you need to click the top, Insert Clip button and then close the gallery.

• 5.Once on the page, the selected picture will have a black border. Resize it by dragging a corner box – to preserve proportions – when the pointer shows a 2-way arrow.
• 6.Re-align a picture by using the normal alignment buttons. To be able to move the picture round more easily, open the Draw menu or right-click the picture to click Show Picture Toolbar and select Text Wrapping – Tight. The black sizing handles will become white and you can now drag the picture into position. In 2002 you will also have a green circle on a rotating arm – drag this with the mouse to rotate the picture.

Insert a saved image: Click the toolbar button or select Insert – Picture – from File and locate the file within your computer. Preview it in the window and click the Insert button to add it to the page. (See the earlier section on importing files and objects.)

Copy a picture across: having drawn or scanned in a picture, or opened a camera image, make sure it is selected and then right-click to find the Copy option or select this from the Edit menu. Click in place in your document and click Paste.

With a Web image, right-click to open the menu. (As you cannot use original artwork that is subject to copyright, search using the word ‘clipart’ to help locate free images.) You can select Save Picture As if you want it to remain on your computer for future use, but select Copy to copy it straight away. Once again, return to your document and paste it in.

One problem you may find with Web images is that sometimes the picture was created as a hyperlink, opening a new Web page when clicked. As this can be a nuisance when editing a picture, right-click and remove the link.

Borders

You can border selected text and/or shade the background with a colour by selecting options from the Format – Borders and Shading menu. You will need to click a Setting: option e.g. Box or Shadow to add the full border, or use the Preview buttons to set odd borders e.g. without a top or side line.

Check the entry in the Apply to: box if you want the border to extend across the paragraph or simply emphasise the actual text. You can also add attractive borders to

a whole page by clicking the Page Border tab and selecting a picture from the Art: box. Change the point size of any artwork if it makes the border too wide and apply colours to black and white designs.

Columns

Setting text in columns can sometimes make the words easier to read. Either start with the format on or apply columns to a selected block of text.

• 1.Click the Columns toolbar button and drag across to apply a two or three column format. You will notice that shading on the ruler shows you have set columns and, when you reach the bottom of the page you will continue into the second column automatically.
• 2.To add a line between the columns, or set different column widths, go to Format – Columns to open the dialogue box.
• 3.Having created columns, you may want to return to normal typing at the end of the text. Do this by pressing Enter, opening the Columns dialogue box and selecting One column. In the Apply to: box, make sure you pick This point forward.
• 4.Within the columns, if you would like the second or third column to start with a particular word or sentence or need to readjust the text to balance the two columns more equally, click in front of the word you want at the top of the second column and then open the Insert menu and select Break – Column break.

Bullet formats

Lists can look more fun if items are separated by coloured or shaped bullets rather than the plainer ones automatically selected. To change them, select the full list and go to Format – Bullets and Numbering. You may see a style you like in the boxes on display, but find more examples by clicking the Customize button. Here you can select Character to open the Symbol box or Picture to display coloured bullets. If you have a picture on your computer, you can even use this as bullets if you click Import and locate the picture file.

WordArt

As an alternative to normal text, add words in the form of a shaped object known as WordArt. You can add and amend this in 4 simple steps:

• 1.Click the toolbar button on the Drawing toolbar to open the gallery and select a style from the display before clicking OK.
• 2.Type your own text in the box, making changes to the font if you want to at this stage. Then click OK to return to your document.
• 3.The Word Art will appear and if you click it you will show the toolbar. Use this to amend colours, shapes, spacing etc. As with pictures from the Clip Art gallery, apply a text wrap to allow you to drag the Word Art around the page.

MACROS

When you regularly carry out the same repetitive tasks, whether complex or those as simple as changing the page orientation and adding your name and contact number to a footer, Word allows you to save these actions in the form of a program called a macro. Once created, you can run the macro any time to carry out the job for you.

• 1.When you are ready to carry out your task, open the Tools menu and select Macro – Record New Macro.
• 2.In the dialog box, type a name to identify the macro – do not leave any spaces between words – and add a short description e.g. my name Arial 12 in footer. You could click the buttons to add the macro to your toolbar at this stage, or create a shortcut via the keyboard if you will use the macro regularly.

• 3.Click OK and a button will appear on your screen. Now carry out your task as efficiently as possible. Every key stroke and mouse click will be ‘recorded’ to create the program. Note that you won’t be able to select words by dragging the mouse – hold Shift and click an arrow/cursor key in the appropriate direction instead.
• 4.When you have finished, click the Stop button.

• 5.Next time you need to perform the same task, open the Tools menu and select Macros. Select the correct macro in the window and click Run. It will now carry out your tedious task for you. The window also offers the option to delete an unwanted macro or edit it if you need to make minor changes.
• 6.To add the macro as a button to your toolbar so that you can click it to perform your task without using the menus, click the Add or Remove Buttons arrow at the end of any toolbar. Click Customize and find the Macros category from the list. Click the labelled macro button and drag it up onto your toolbar.

SYMBOLS AND SPECIAL CHARACTERS

When adding a French or German name to correspondence, it is pleasing for your respondent to see their name printed out accurately with the appropriate accent. In the same way, adding little pictures of scissors or books, a tick in a box or the copyright symbol © may all be necessary at some time.

Using a version of Office earlier than Word 2002, you need to add accents in the following way:

• 1.Hold Ctrl and press the relevant punctuation symbol e.g. use a colon for an umlaut and an apostrophe for accent acute. If the symbol is at the top of a key, hold Shift at the same time.
• 2.Press the appropriate letter key e.g. e or u as normal
• 3.Type the next letter and the e or u will now appear as é or ü.

For symbols (and accents for Office XP), find them from the Insert – Symbol menu option. There is a wide choice of fonts each offering a different range of symbols, as well as a separate tab for characters such as copyright or Trademark. Recently used symbols may be available on a shortcut bar.

Having located and selected your symbol, click Insert and then close the window to return to your document.

DETECTING OTHER PEOPLE’S SETTINGS

When asked to edit someone else’s document, you may be faced with a strange layout that doesn’t seem to make sense. By looking very carefully at all the instructions the computer has been given, you may be able to locate an unwanted key stroke or changed setting which you can then put right.

Key strokes

If you cannot apply a paragraph format or print a document properly, you may need to know if someone has used a tab key, space bar or pressed Enter. To do this, you must turn on the Show/Hide button which reveals all the key strokes in the form of special symbols e.g. an arrow for tab and dots for spaces.

Once these are revealed, corrective action is often simple. For example, if the Enter key has been pressed at the end of every line within a paragraph, each line will be treated as a new paragraph when you try to apply an alignment. Simply delete these unwanted key strokes and close up the spaces to return to normal.

Menu options

When a paragraph simply won’t start at the left margin, or you cannot carry on with your normal line spacing, you need to find out if an unusual setting has been imposed by mistake. Extra tabs or changed markers on the ruler may reveal the problem but it is easier to open the most likely menu e.g.Format – Paragraph and check all the settings boxes. If you spot the culprit e.g. a hanging indent or extra spaces inserted after each paragraph, you will be able to take these off again.