Depending on your job title and the business of your organisation, you may spend most of your time typing straight-forward letters and memos, or you may need to apply advanced IT skills and create complex reports, design tables or produce attractively laid-out publicity material. This chapter will show you how to carry out all the major word processing tasks you are likely to meet.

Common to many organisations is the need to make amendments to documents created by someone else who has used what might be termed ‘unorthodox’ methods. Changing the contents of a table, removing strange paragraph layouts or inserting an extra column of numbers is not nearly so easy if you didn’t create the document in the first place; you must be able to identify what the previous author has done. This chapter ends with an introduction to strategies for detecting other people’s settings.

A WORD ABOUT GRAMMAR (BUSINESS ENGLISH)

You may have excellent writing skills, but it is surprising how many people still trip up over some of the less common grammatical rules. Here is a short summary of how to deal with the awkward grammatical problems you may face.

Starting new paragraphs

If your work is criticised as being difficult to read, it may simply be because you have packed too many topics together into a single paragraph, making the text rather long-winded and indigestible.

To improve any written work, check that paragraphs are really about a single topic or field of interest, and if in doubt, start a new paragraph at a point of change. You should also think about starting new paragraphs simply to cut down on the amount of text in a single block.

Formal/informal English

Documents that will be read by anyone other than very close colleagues need to be formally written. This means that sentences should be impersonal, contain all necessary information including dates and times, avoid slang or the abbreviated form of words such as can’t and won’t, and, occasionally, may require a more stilted turn of phrase than usual e.g. ‘unfortunately it will not be possible . . .’ rather than ‘sorry I can’t. . .’.

E-mails have developed their own conventions, but it is an unwise person who believes it is acceptable to leave in spelling mistakes or use too informal a style when sending business e-mails. If in doubt, err on the side of formality and you won’t be embarrassed.

Semi-colons

The semi-colon has two main uses – it separates out items in a complex list and it can be used to join two short sentences.

Lists: If this includes eggs, bacon, milk and ham, it is easy to read the items when separated by commas. However, what if you have a list that includes:

A large pair of men’s gardening gloves
Two flowerpots decorated with ceramic mosaics
A floribunda rosebush and two clematis plants in a large planter
Several small packets of seeds including 3 varieties of bean

In the middle of a document, these items will become confusing to read unless they are separated clearly. You need to do this by using semi-colons.

The list would then read:

a large pair of men’s gardening gloves; two flowerpots decorated with ceramic mosaics; a floribunda rosebush and two clematis plants in a large planter; and several small packets of seeds including 3 varieties of bean.

Linked sentences: you can use a semi-colon if you want to contrast two different statements or link related sentences.

Terry was hungry; he set out for the chip shop.
The first week was really sunny; the second week was cold and overcast.

Colons

The colon is used to introduce lists, statements or quotations. If you wonder whether to use one in a sentence, read up to the point where it might be required and, if it feels as if you are waiting for an answer, put in a colon.

We need three things from you: .....................
He turned to her and said: ‘...........................
One thing is clear: ........................................

Apostrophes

If there is one grammatical error that crops up everywhere, it is the misuse of the apostrophe. It is not used for plurals e.g. the shop sold videos. There are only two places where an apostrophe is required: to show possession and to replace missing letters in a contracted word.

Possession: The rule with apostrophes is that you must concentrate on the owner of the object/objects, no matter how many things they own. Always put the apostrophe straight after the owner(s) and, if required, add an s.

If one book belongs to a boy, it is the boy’s book
If two socks belong to a boy, they are the boy’s socks
But if one book and two socks belong to two boys, they are the boys’ book and the boys’ socks.

If one house is shared by two families, it is the families’ house
If ten dogs belong to one family, they are the family’s dogs

If one school belongs to the children, it is the children’s school
If twenty hats belong to five people, they are the people’s hats

When a single person’s name ends in s e.g. James, you can choose to add an extra s after the apostrophe or not:

James’s book or James’ book
James’s hats or James’ hats

Contraction: More familiar use of the apostrophe is to represent missing letters e.g.

cannot becomes can’t, will not becomes won’t, shall not becomes shan’t, have not becomes haven’t and they are becomes they’re.

Do not become confused between pronouns and contractions:

Yours, his and its – these are all pronouns with no apostrophe e.g. the coats are yours, the cat is his and the dog lost its ball.

However, it is hot becomes it’s hot, you are early becomes you’re early and he is tired becomes he’s tired.

LETTERS AND MEMOS

Even if you do not take up a secretarial post as such, you are quite likely to type your own letters and memos now and again and these will normally have to follow your organisation’s stationery conventions. This section introduces some of the ways you can save time on this particular word processing task including:

• Templates
• Logos
• Automatic entries
• International characters
• Mail merge
• Envelopes and labels

Templates

In the old days, many companies used paper printed with a letterhead. However, today it would be far too tedious to replace headed paper every time a different printing job was being carried out and so the use of such paper was phased out. Instead, you will find that logos, special layouts and company addresses etc. are stored in templates. You create new documents based on these and the original stays untouched.

(Don’t be tempted to create a normal document and keep re-using it for your correspondence – although you can make amendments and select Save As to save new versions, one day you will click Save by mistake and the original will be lost.)

Templates may be stored in a special folder but are commonly available from the File – New menu. In Office XP you will first be offered the Task Pane (an extra window that opens up alongside your screen offering shortcuts to various files, objects or guidance) that includes a link to General Templates, but clicking this link will open the Templates dialog box.

Preview the template you want to use or click the correct company letter template. Leaving the Create New – Document option selected means that you can treat the document that opens exactly like a normal word processed file. Make all the necessary amendments to names, dates and addresses, type the body of the letter and save as normal.

If you want to create your own customised template based on one already provided, select the Create New – Template option. Change the layout and any entries to be included in all future letters and then click Save. Before doing anything else, check

that the Save as type: box shows Document Template. This will open the Templates folder so that you can save your template with others in the General templates window, or you could even make a new folder to store it in.

Now name the template and click Save and, next time you need to use it, it will be available for you on the General tab or from a new tab you have created.

Logos and watermarks

Not everyone works in an organisation that has templates ready-prepared, and you may need to be more pro-active and prepare a set yourself. One tricky problem may be adding the company logo, and perhaps even turning it into a faded image to appear behind your text.

To add a logo, open the Insert menu and select Picture – From File. You should have been told which drive and folder contains the image, so browse through your computer until you see its name in the main window of the Insert box.

Press Enter or click the Insert button and it will appear on the page.

Resize: If the logo is too large, click to select it and show the border. Now drag one of the black squares (sizing handles) inwards when the pointer shows a 2-way arrow
. orner sizing handle to keep the image in proportion.

Move the logo: To position the logo behind an address, (or just to move it round the page more easily) you must apply a Text wrap. This is available from the Draw menu or you can select it after right-clicking the image and choosing to show the Picture toolbar.

The Tight option will allow you to move the image up close to text, and Behind Text will let you position it underneath your typing. When selected, it will now show white sizing handles and, in XP, a green rotate handle. Drag the image across the page and move it into position.

One option on the Picture toolbar is to change a coloured image to black and white, greyscale or ‘washout/watermark’, if the image is strong enough to be visible in this format.

You may also be required to add a watermark to a printed document e.g. a picture such as your logo, or text e.g.Sample or Confidential that will appear centrally behind the page contents. For pictures in Word 2000, simply follow the above instructions but enlarge the picture so that it fills the page. Text may be more difficult but one way is to create the words as an object e.g. use Word Art™ (described later) or copy or create the text in the drawing package Microsoft Paint™ and then treat as above.

In Office XP you have the option from the Format menu. Select Background–Printed Watermark and then click Picture or Text. Find the picture or type your text and select horizontal or diagonal placement. View the watermark in Print Layout.

AutoText

Templates are not always time-saving as you may simply want to dash off a quick letter or memo on plain paper. Having carefully typed your address or signature details in a chosen font, layout and format, it is useful if you can recall this formatted block of text each time it is needed. One method is to save it as AutoText.

Select the text and then open the Insert menu and click AutoText – New.

A box will appear in which you must type a short memorable codeword or phrase to identify the block of text e.g.colladd (standing for College address). Click OK and the text will be stored in your computer.

To recall it when typing your next letter, type the codeword and immediately press the Function key F3 found at the top of your keyboard.

If you ever forget your (not so) memorable phrase – don’t panic. Open the Auto Correct box by selecting Tools – AutoCorrect Options or go to Insert – AutoText – AutoText. On the AutoText tab, scroll down the list until you find the probable codeword and click it to check that it is the missing entry. You can insert it into your page from here by clicking Insert and will hopefully remember it next time.

If you have made an error with the original block of text, you can overwrite the AutoText entry quite easily. Simply type out the text correctly, repeat setup using the original abbreviation and press Enter. When asked if you want to update the original, click Yes.

Automatic corrections

You may find that the machine sometimes reads your mind wrongly and carries out unwanted actions. For example, if you type 1/2 it may turn this into ½ when you didn’t want a fraction, e-mail addresses may become blue and underlined when you prefer them to remain simple text and, if you type 1st, it changes to 1st.

There are two methods for turning off these corrections – either backspace and you may find your typing returns to its original form, or open the Tools menu, select AutoCorrect Options and click the AutoFormat As You Type tab. Take off the tick against any automatic feature you don’t want and then click OK.

Other changes may take place such as a typing error being corrected automatically, a smiley face appearing when you type a colon and then close brackets :), or two dashes — and > becoming →. These replacements are listed on the AutoCorrect tab.

To add a new Auto Correction, type your chosen abbreviation, symbols or misspelled word in the Replace: box and the new word or symbol you want displayed in the With: box before clicking Add. The replacement will now take place automatically as you type.

Remove unwanted replacements by selecting them from the list in the window and clicking Delete.

Unwanted capital letters

As it is so easy to leave the Caps Lock on and not notice until you have typed a large block of text in capital letters, one trick worth remembering is how to change text from capitals back to normal type. Simply select the block of text, hold down Shift and press the function key F3. This toggles through all upper case, all lower case and Initial capitals. Further options are available from the Format – Change Case menu.

Dates

Don’t waste time typing dates. To add one to letters, select Date and Time from the Insert menu and choose your preferred format. One option is to click the checkbox that will mean the date is always updated in your letter. This is useful if you are delaying printing but want the accurate date on your correspondence. The downside is that, if you check your saved letter later, it will always show the current date, not the date you wrote it.

International characters

When writing to foreign customers, clients or colleagues, it is very professional if you can add the correct accent e.g. the umlaut for Zoë or acute over the e in José. Although there is always the Insert – Symbol box in XP machines, for older operating systems you can add some accents using the keyboard.

• 1.Find the appropriate symbol on the keys: colon for umlaut ü, apostrophe for acute é, comma for cedilla ç and the ¬ key to the left of 1 for grave é etc.
• 2.Type the symbol by holding down Ctrl and then pressing the key (for a symbol on the lower part of a key), or holding Ctrl plus Shift (for an upper symbol). Nothing will appear on the page.
• 3.Now type the letter and the symbol will appear over it.

Mail merge

One job that computers have made almost pleasant is sending the same, personalised letter, invoice or reminder to a large number of people.

You are likely to work in an organisation where extensive databases of client, customer or staff records are already held in the system and you will want to use these names and addresses for your mailing list. This information is known as the data source. Mailing list details can be in any recognisable form though they are commonly Excel spreadsheets or Access databases. However, you can also create a data source from within Word using the ‘helper’ (a wizard) if you need to set up a small mailing list from scratch, or even type a simple table and use that. The important requirement is that each column has a heading (field name) describing the information it contains.

First Name	Surname	Salary	Department
John	Haynes	£23,000	Finance
Peter	Mackay	£45,000	Planning
Heidi	Tims	£32,500	Human Resources

Mail merge allows you to link a data source with your word processed letter – the main document – and then merge the two together. In Office XP you will be given far more guidance on setting up the mail merge than in Word 2000, and must start the process by clicking Tools – Letters and Mailings – Mail Merge Wizard. There are 6 steps to take that guide you through the process.

If you are ready with a letter template or blank page, choose to create a letter using the current document and then select the recipients using an existing list.

Browse through your files until you locate the data source you want to use and select the correct sheet or table before clicking OK. If you need to, filter out any unwanted records first. Each field will have an arrow next to its name that you click to display all the entries. Select one for a perfect match or click (Advanced) and use the Filter and Sort options to set filter criteria.

You can now write your letter and, whenever you need to add a name or address, click the link to More items.

This opens up a window showing the field names in your data source, and each time you come to a relevant point in your letter, select and insert the appropriate field name.

Continue writing until you have completed your letter. The fields will be clearly distinguishable from the rest of the text.

To preview the letters with actual names and details drawn from your data source in place, move on to Step 5 and you will see the relevant information extracted from the first record. Click the arrows to move through your records to view further letters.

The final step involves printing all or selected letters or, by clicking Edit individual letters, creating a new file containing the merged letters set out one to a page. This format is more transportable and may be useful if, for example, you needed to take the letters on a floppy disk to a different machine and would not have room for the full database.

Do not forget to save the main document or data source before closing Word if you have not already done so. They will be linked each time the main document is opened if they are still on the same network.

At the very start of the process, if you create e-mail messages rather than letters, you can carry out a mail merge for e-mails as long as one of your fields includes the full e-mail address of all your recipients. When you reach the printing stage, you will be offered a window in which to add the e-mail address field to your To: box and can then send your messages to everyone in your database.

In Word 2000, the wizard looks slightly different, although the process is just the same.

• 1.Open the letter you want to send, or start a new one using a blank document or template, go to the Tools menu and select Mail Merge.
• 2.In Step 1 click Create to set up the main document and choose Form Letters as this term covers everything except labels and envelopes. To stay with the document you have opened, select Active Window and then move on to the next step.
• 3.Step 2 is where you locate the data source. Click Data Source – Get Data and choose the option to Open a database already stored on your system. You must now browse through the files, looking for the appropriate types of file, until you locate the correct database. If necessary, select a specific spreadsheet or table of data.
• 4.You are now ready to return to your letter to add the personal details. Select Edit Main Document and you will see a new toolbar has appeared across the top of the screen. This is also available in Word 2002 from the Tools menu if you prefer it to the wizard.

• 5.At every point in your letter, insert the correct field name by clicking the Insert Merge Field button and selecting from the list. The letter will appear with fieldnames in place.

• 6.To view actual records, click the ≪ABC≫ button on the toolbar, and use the arrows to move backwards and forwards through the letters.
• 7.There is a shortcut on the toolbar for printing all your letters, as well as one to a new, merged file if you prefer to save the merged letters separately.
• 8.Save the main document before closing, so that it can be used again in the future. It will remain linked to the data source as long as both files remain on the computer.
• 9.To select a sub-set of records to merge to, you will need to return to the Mail Merge wizard and select the Query Options in Step 3.

Labels and envelopes

The mail merge process is also used for creating labels or envelopes based on a mailing list. At step 1, you must select the appropriate object to create i.e. envelopes or labels and then use the next step to set up the correct layout and size. Now continue through the steps in exactly the same way as for a letters mail merge to open the appropriate database and insert the fields into your label or envelope before printing.

MINUTES OF MEETINGS

Minutes are notoriously difficult to type. This is due to the constant numbering changes they usually incorporate. However, if you bear in mind that this is just about ‘levels’ of text, it may make controlling the numbers easier. In Word this is known as outline numbering.

Creating numbered lists

To create the top level text – numbers 1 and 2 in the example, you can click on the Numbering button on the toolbar. Every time you press Enter, the next number will appear.

To create the entries numbered a, b, c, press Enter so that you are on the next line and then press the tab key (left of Q). This takes you down a level and now each time you press Enter you will remain at this level until you want to change.

To go down to a further level – i, ii etc, simply press Enter and then the tab key. To go back up one or more levels, hold Shift as you press tab and the direction is reversed.

Unnumbered lines: If you want to add extra text on a new line that is not a continuation of the numbering, hold Shift as you press Enter. You may have to sort out the indentation from the margin but can then type your text before pressing Enter and continuing with the numbering again. (Alternatively, complete the list with numbers and then click any line and turn off the toolbar button to remove the numbers from that particular part of the list.)

Settings: In many machines, the numbers do not appear automatically. To set these, you must turn on Outline Numbering manually. Do this by opening the Format menu and selecting Bullets and Numbering.

Click the Outline Numbered tab and select your preferred style of numbering.

You may decide that, rather than a, b, c etc. you prefer to see a) b) or even A) B). Change the style of any level of numbers by clicking the Customize button. For any level, select it in the list and then choose a Number style. You can change the font or even type into the Number format: box to remove brackets or add full stops etc. if your exact style is not offered. You can also change the spacing for text or numbers on the page. When you have customised all the levels, click OK.

LONG DOCUMENTS

When you are required to type anything longer than two or three pages, there are a number of techniques that can be applied. Not only will they make your document easier to read but they will also help you manage the process more effectively.

This section covers:

• Spelling
• Page numbers
• Headers and footers
• Moving text
• Replacing entries
• Importing objects
• Styles and table of contents
• Indexing
• Sharing documents

Spelling

As you type, spelling mistakes or grammatical errors are highlighted with red or green lines. Rather than run the spell checker on the whole document, deal with these words as they appear by right-clicking the line and selecting one of the options e.g. replace the word, ignore it, correct it automatically in future or add it to the dictionary.

Page numbers

A quick way to add numbers is to insert them from the Insert menu. Select the position on the page where numbers will appear, and click the box if you do not want the first page numbered.

Headers and footers

To add extra information on each page, you may prefer to work with headers and footers. Including page numbers, these are any entries added in the top or bottom margins that do not interfere with page content.

Select the option from the View menu. In the box that appears, either type your text e.g. a chapter heading or your name, or select an option such as an automatic date, time or page number from the toolbar. Move across the header box to add extra entries by double-clicking your mouse or pressing the tab key, and add entries on a new line by pressing Enter. Click the Switch Between button if you want to add entries in the bottom margin, and then return to your document by clicking the Close button or double-clicking the document text that will be visible but faded.

If required, select a ready-prepared entry from the Insert AutoText box. These include the filename and path, to display the folder location of your document, and a ‘page 5 of 17’ type entry which will be updated as you add further pages.

For many long documents, you won’t want the header or footer to show on the first page. Click the Page Setup button to open the dialog box and place a tick in the checkbox.

You will now find that your first page offers an empty header box labelled differently in which you can type a unique header or can simply leave blank.

Move text (Cut and Paste)

In case you have forgotten, there is a simple way to move a block of text if you decide it is in the wrong position. Carry out the move in 4 steps:

• 1.Select the text to move
• 2.Click Cut (right-click the block to find this option, click the toolbar button or select from the Edit menu)
• 3.Click on the page to position the cursor where the text is to go
• 4.Click Paste and then sort out spacing and formats.

If you want the original text to remain in place but add a copy of it somewhere else, click Copy at step 2.

You may want to copy or cut several items. Later versions of Word have increased the number of items you can retain in the computer’s memory – the Clipboard – and you may find that this opens to allow you to select an item to Paste. In Word 2002 you can open the Office Clipboard from the Edit menu.

If you want to move text a short distance, you can also select it and then drag it into place with the mouse. However, this can be tricky across pages or with large blocks of text so choose Cut and Paste as a more controllable method.

Selecting a large block of text

It is quite common to need to select a block of text that is too long to view and that therefore extends below the screen. Dragging the mouse to select it can prove very difficult, so carry out the selection as follows: click in front of the first word, scroll down to the end using the scroll bar and then hold Shift as you click your mouse after the last word. The complete block will now be selected.

Find or replace text

Having written a 20 page report, it is annoying to discover suddenly that you have typed Mrs Hard instead of Mrs Hand all the way through. To replace the word wherever it appears, open the Edit menu and select Replace. In the Find what: box type your mis-spelt word, and in the Replace with: box type the correct name. As the

words hard, hardly and hardiness may also be present in the document, you won’t want every occurrence to be changed to hand, so click the More/Less button to open the lower part of the window. You can now select options such as replacing whole words only and matching upper and lower case letters, to make sure only Hard is replaced.

If you are now sure the replacement will be acceptable, click the Replace All button. If in doubt, click Find Next to display the first matching entry and then click Replace. Keep doing this, clicking Find Next if you come to a word that you want to leave in the document.Edit – Replace is particularly useful if you need to type a long, complicated word several times. Use an abbreviation in the report and then replace all these entries in one go when the document is complete. Use Edit – Find to locate a particular word in your document – again, click Find Next to move on to the next occurrence.

Page and section breaks

Long documents are often divided into different chapters or sections. To make sure each of these begins on a new page, you will need to insert a page or section break. These entries then won’t be affected by extra text added earlier in the document.

Page breaks are enough if you simply want to ensure the first words start on a new page, but use a section break if you need to maintain distinct formats e.g. you may need to type a different header or footer, or change the page orientation when displaying an imported picture or spreadsheet more clearly.

• 1.Click at the beginning of the word that will start on the new page. A shortcut to a page break is to hold Ctrl and press the Enter key.
• 2.Alternatively, open the Insert menu and select Break. Select either Page or Section break and decide whether this should start on the next page or not.
• 3.You may add a break by mistake. If you turn on the Show/Hide button, you will see the break as a dotted line, so delete it by clicking the line and pressing Delete. .......................................................................Page Break...........................................................................

Import files and objects

Long documents are often made up of files or include objects created using other software applications e.g. database tables, spreadsheets, charts or drawings. Depending on the item, you may want to import a text file, object or picture. All can be brought in relatively easily from the Insert menu.

Go to Insert – File when you want to add a text file. However, if you use this option for pictures you will end up with gobbledygook as Word will not be able to interpret the contents.

For images such as photos or drawings, use the Insert – Picture – from File option. You should be able to preview any pictures before inserting them.

For everything other than pictures e.g. charts, spreadsheets or database tables, go to Insert – Object and select Create from File. Click the Browse button to search for the target file, select it to add its name to the File name: box and click OK.

If you are going to work further on the spreadsheet, chart or database and always want the latest version displayed in your word processed document, click the Link to file: checkbox. Every time you re-open Word, you will be able to update the document with the latest version of your object.

As well as changing their size and position, objects added from the Insert menu (rather than copied and pasted into your document) can be edited fully: double click them and toolbars and scroll bars will appear to enable you to make your changes. With an Excel file, you can also change the display by moving to another sheet. Click on a blank part of the page to deselect the object once you have completed your amendments.

Styles

Next to the Font box on the toolbar, you will see another box that will probably display the word Normal. If you click the drop-down arrow in the box, you will be offered a range of styles that can be applied to your document. So, for example, if you want a heading to be bold, italic, Arial size 14, you can format your selected text to this straight away by applying Heading 2.

Although there are a number of ready-made styles, you can easily make your own.

• 1.Make sure Normal is showing in the style box.
• 2.Type some text and then apply your chosen formats to fonts or paragraph settings.
• 3.With your text selected, click the word Normal or, in 2002 the description that appears in the style box, to turn it blue and then type over it the name for your new style e.g.My Chapter Title and press Enter.
• 4.This new style will now be available for you to apply throughout your document.

Again in 2002, you may prefer to click the Styles and Formatting button next to the Style box and, in the Task Pane that appears, click New Style. A dialog box opens and you can select your formatting options here, name the style and click OK to add it to the list. For it to be available wherever you are in Word, select the option to add it to the style templates.

Table of contents

Styles are particularly useful if your report, booklet or manual needs a table of contents. As long as your document includes at least two different styles, create one as follows:

• 1.Click in position for the table of contents – usually it is found on the first page of a document and you can first type in your headings e.g.Contents and Page numbers.
• 2.Go to Insert – Index and Tables (in 2002 you first select Reference) and click the Table of Contents tab.
• 3.Unless you have applied your own styles, you can leave the computer to pick up the top three levels of heading and simply select a design from the Formats box and click OK.
• 4.Where you have used your own style, click the Options button and make sure the name is included at the appropriate level.
• 5.To update the table as you make changes to your document, click in the block of text and press function key F9 or right-click and select Update.

Format Painter

Styles are useful if you regularly use certain formats, but sometimes you will change the look of a line or block of text once and may then want to repeat this formatting further down the page but not go through the process of creating and naming a new style.

Select the formatted text and then click the Format Painter button . As you move your mouse, the pointer will now show a brush. Click and drag to sweep the brush pointer across any text and it will take on the new formatting.

To repeat this action several times, double click the button first of all to keep it turned on. When you have completed all your amendments, click the button again to turn it off.

Index

Although less common in office documents, you may want an index of words at the back of a long document to help people move quickly to the appropriate page. To create an index, you must mark the words that will be included and then create an index based on these marked words.

• 1.Select the first word(s) to mark and hold down Alt and Shift as you then press X.
• 2.This opens the marking dialog box. Your index entry will be visible in the Main entry box – change the wording if necessary and then click Mark.
• 3.You will now see all keystrokes that have been used to create your document and the marked words will display their index entry inside brackets {XE ‘word’}.

• 4.The marking box stays open so click on the page to return to your document and scroll down to the next word. Repeat the marking until all words have been marked.
• 5.Click where you want your index – usually on a new page at the end of the document – and add a title if you want one. Now go to Insert – (Reference) – Index and Tables and click the Index tab.
• 6.Choose a style of index and click OK.
• 7.To update the index if you add new pages or want to mark extra words, click an entry and press function key F9 or right-click and select Update.

Sharing documents

It is quite common for several people to work on the same documents, and so Word allows you to track changes that have been made.

• 1.Open the Tools menu and select Track changes. This adds the Reviewing toolbar to the screen.
• 2.As you work on a document, your amendments will be highlighted and annotated in the margin. When you receive an amended document, hover over any coloured text in the document with your mouse if you want to see details of the author who changed that particular part.
• 3.If you don’t want to make a change but simply highlight something for the next author to follow up, double click a word and then click the New Comment toolbar button or go to Insert – Comment. A new balloon will appear in which you can type your comment. If you receive a document including comments, you can type into the balloon with your answer.
• 4.To revert to an earlier version of an amendment, select the coloured text and click the Reject Change button.
• 5.To save different versions of a document, open the File menu each time and select Versions. The history of earlier saves will be visible. Click Save Now to add your comments in the box that will appear and click the checkbox if you want to save new versions every time you close the document.

TABS

These are used to line up entries in neat columns across the page. The quick way to set tabs is to make sure your cursor is ready on the left (after typing column headings which are easier to adjust if not entered using a tab) and then click on the ruler, just below the markings, wherever you want your columns to start. You won’t need to set a tab for the first column if this begins at the left margin.

If you don’t want initial characters in every column to line up, select a different tab style from the default Left tab by clicking the button on the left of the ruler until your choice is displayed:

Left tab – initial characters line up on the left

Centre tab – entries are centred down the column

Right tab – last characters line up on the right

Decimal tab – decimal points line up for numerical entries

Once tabs are set, type the first entry and then press the tab key (left of Q) once. This will jump directly to the position for typing the second column. Repeat across the page and then press Enter to start entering your next line of entries.

Amendments

Remove a tab: Click on the unwanted symbol, hold down the mouse button and then gently drag the tab off the ruler. When you let go, it will disappear.

Move tab positions: When columns have been set using tabs, you often find you have set them too close or need to add a new line where entries are too long and interfere with those in a separate column. It is extremely easy to get yourself in a tangle over tabs as most people make the mistake of changing the tab stop position for the problem line only.

Now the whole set of data becomes impossible to work with as different tab stops apply to different entries.

Fortunately, you should have no trouble if you follow the golden rule:

Always select every line that has been typed using the tabs before making changes.

If you do this, you can easily drag tabs along to a new position to accommodate extra-long entries as the changes will always apply to the whole column.