Word For Dummies

If you create professional-looking documents on a regular basis, you require a mighty word processor that offers all the power and capabilities to create them. Enter Microsoft Word! Pair it with Word For Dummies to hone all your word-processing skills. The book is filled with useful tips and suggestions that allow you to get the most out of Word, as well as helpful information on the latest features. It also shows you how to customize and configure Word for your optimal workflow.

Get details on the new Word interface; tools to quickly edit and format your documents; methods to organize your text with tables; techniques to insert charts, photos, and other graphics for visual interest; ways to automate routine document creation tasks; and how best to collaborate, share, and exchange documents with co-workers.

• Use Windows tools to quickly access Word and optimize your productivity
• Seamlessly integrate Word with other Office applications (Outlook, PowerPoint, and Excel)
• Employ document formatting features to create a clean layout and text presentation
• Exchange comments with co-workers using @mention notifications
• Customize the Word interface, including the dark mode feature
• Have a friendly, useful guide on Microsoft Word on hand when you need it

With Word For Dummies by your side, you can once again make working with Word a pleasure. Soon, you'll be creating picture-, letter- and word-perfect documents.

Introduction 1

About This Book 1

How to Use This Book 2

Foolish Assumptions 3

What's Not Here 3

Icons Used in This Book 4

Where to Go from Here 4

Part 1: Your Introduction to Word 5

Chapter 1: Hello, Word 7

Start Your Word Day 7

Starting Word the program 8

Starting Word online 8

Opening a document to start Word 9

Behold the Word Program 10

Working the Word Start screen 10

Examining Word's main screen 12

Working the Ribbon 13

Showing and hiding the Ribbon 14

Working with Word on a tablet 15

Changing the document view 15

Making text look larger or smaller 16

End Your Word Day 17

Quitting Word 18

Closing a document without quitting Word 18

Setting Word aside 19

Chapter 2: The Typing Chapter 21

Input Devices Galore 21

Using the PC keyboard 22

Working an onscreen keyboard 23

Understanding the mouse pointer 24

Keyboard Do's and Don'ts 24

Following the insertion pointer 25

Whacking the spacebar 25

Backing up and erasing 26

Pressing the Enter key 26

Stuff That Happens While You Type 27

Using text predictions 27

Watching the status bar 27

Observing page breaks 28

Working collapsible headers 29

Dealing with spots and clutter in the text 29

Understanding colorful underlines 30

Part 2: Your Basic Word 33

Chapter 3: To and Fro in a Document 35

Document Scrolling 35

Working the vertical scroll bar 36

Using the horizontal scroll bar 37

Using the mouse wheel to scroll 37

Move the Insertion Pointer 38

Commanding the insertion pointer 38

Moving in small increments 39

Moving from beginning to end 39

Return to the Previous Edit 41

Go to Wherever with the Go To Command 41

Chapter 4: Text Editing 43

Remove Text You Don't Want 43

Deleting single characters 44

Deleting a word 44

Deleting more than a word 45

Split and Join Paragraphs 47

Making two paragraphs from one 47

Making one paragraph from two 48

Soft and Hard Returns 48

Undo Mistakes with Undo Haste 49

Undoing the Undo command with Redo 50

Using the Repeat command 50

Chapter 5: Search for This, Replace It with That 51

Text Happily Found 51

Finding a tidbit o' text 52

Scouring your document with Advanced Find 53

Finding stuff you can't type 55

Replace Found Text 58

Chapter 6: Blocks o' Text 61

Meet Mr Block 61

Mark a Block of Text 63

Using the keyboard to select text 63

Marking a block with the mouse 64

Using the F8 key to mark a block 65

Blocking the whole dang-doodle document 66

Deselecting a block 67

Manipulate a Block of Text 67

Copying a block 68

Moving a block 68

Setting the pasted text format 69

Using the mouse to copy or move a block 70

Viewing the Clipboard 71

Chapter 7: Spell It Write 73

Check Your Spelling 73

Fixing a misspelled word 74

Dealing with incorrectly flagged words 75

AutoCorrect in Action 77

Undoing an AutoCorrect correction 77

Adding a new AutoCorrect entry 78

Adjusting AutoCorrect settings 79

Grammar Be Good 80

All-at-Once Document Proofing 81

Reviewing all those errors 81

Rechecking a document 81

Document Proofing Settings 82

Customizing the custom dictionary 82

Disabling automatic proofing 83

Curtailing grammar checking 84

Hiding all proofing errors in a document 84

Chapter 8: Documents New, Saved, and Opened 87

Some Terms to Get Out of the Way 88

Behold! A New Document 88

Save Your Stuff! 89

Saving a document for the first time 90

Dealing with document-save errors 92

Saving or updating a document 92

Saving automatically on OneDrive 93

Forgetting to save before you quit 94

Open a Document 94

Using the Open command 95

Opening one document inside another 97

Recover a Draft 98

Chapter 9: Publish Your Document 99

Your Document on Paper 99

Previewing before printing 100

Printing the entire document 101

Printing a specific page 102

Printing a range of pages 103

Printing on both sides of the page 104

Printing odd- and even-numbered pages 105

Printing a block 106

Printing more than one copy of something 106

Choosing another printer 106

Canceling a print job 107

Electronically Publishing Your Document 108

Preparing a document for publishing 108

Making a PDF 109

Exporting your document 110

Part 3: Fun with Formatting 111

Chapter 10: Character Formatting 113

Text Formatting Techniques 113

Basic Text Formats 114

Selecting a font 114

Applying character formats 116

Text Transcending Teensy to Titanic 118

Setting the text size 118

Nudging text size 119

More Colorful Text 119

Coloring the text 120

Shading the background 120

Change Text Case 121

Clear Character Formatting 122

Behold the Font Dialog Box 123

Chapter 11: Paragraph Formatting 125

Paragraph Formatting Rules and Regulations 126

Formatting a paragraph 126

Locating the paragraph formatting commands 127

Justification and Alignment 128

Line up on the left! 128

Everyone center! 129

Line up on the right! 129

Line up on both sides! 129

Make Room Before, After, or Inside Paragraphs 130

Setting the line spacing 131

Making space between paragraphs 132

Paragraph Indentation Madness 133

Indenting the first line of a paragraph 133

Making a hanging indent (an outdent) 134

Indenting a whole paragraph 134

Using the ruler to adjust indents 135

Chapter 12: Tab Formatting 139

Once Upon a Tab 139

Seeing tab characters 140

Seeing tab stops 141

Using the ruler to set tab stops 142

Using the Tabs dialog box to set tabs 142

The Standard Left Tab Stop 144

Creating a basic tabbed list 144

Creating a 2-tab paragraph-thing 145

The Center Tab Stop 147

The Right Tab Stop 148

Making a right-stop, left-stop list 148

Building a 2-column right-stop list 150

The Decimal Tab 151

The Bar Tab 152

Fearless Leader Tabs 153

Tab Stop, Be Gone! 154

Chapter 13: Page Formatting 155

Describe That Page 155

Setting page size 156

Changing orientation (landscape or portrait) 157

Setting the page margins 158

Using the Page Setup dialog box 158

Page Numbering 160

Adding an automatic page number 160

Starting with a different page number 162

Numbering with Roman numerals 163

Removing page numbers 163

New Pages from Nowhere 164

Starting text on a new page 164

Inserting a blank page .165

Page Background Froufrou 165

Coloring pages 165

Printing colored pages 166

Adding a watermark 167

Chapter 14: Section Formatting 169

Slice a Document into Sections 170

Creating a section 171

Using sections 172

Removing a section break 173

That First Page 173

Adding a cover page 173

Inserting a cover page manually 174

Headers and Footers 175

Using a preset header or footer 175

Creating a custom header or footer 176

Working with multiple headers and footers 178

Removing a header or a footer 181

Chapter 15: Style Formatting 183

The Big Style Overview 183

Finding the styles 184

Using a style 185

Discovering the current style 186

Removing style formatting 187

Make Your Own Styles 187

Creating a style 188

Using the Create New Style from Formatting dialog box 188

Modifying a style 190

Assigning a shortcut key to a style 191

Deleting a style 192

Style Tips and Tricks 193

Changing the Normal style 193

Creating heading styles 194

Customizing the Style Gallery 194

Chapter 16: Template and Themes Formatting 197

Instant Documents with Templates 197

Using a template to start a new document 198

Changing a document's attached template 200

Templates of Your Own 201

Creating a template based on a document you already have 201

Making a new template from scratch 202

Modifying a template 202

The Theme of Things 203

Applying a document theme 203

Modifying or creating a theme 204

Chapter 17:Random Drawer Formatting 207

Weird and Fun Text Effects 207

Steal This Format 209

Automatic Formatting 210

Enjoying automagical text 210

Formatting tricks for paragraphs 213

Undoing an AutoFormat 214

Center a Page, Top to Bottom 214

Part 4: Spruce Up A Dull Document 217

Chapter 18: They're Called Borders 219

The Basics of Borders 220

Putting borders around a paragraph 221

Boxing multiple paragraphs 221

Removing borders 222

The Borders and Shading Dialog Box 222

Creating a fancy title 223

Boxing text 224

Applying a page border 224

Stick a thick line between paragraphs 225

Chapter 19:Able Tables 227

Put a Table in Your Document 227

Working with tables in Word 228

Creating a table 228

Converting a table to text 232

Deleting a table 232

Text in Tables 233

Typing text in a table 233

Selecting in a table 234

Aligning text in a cell 234

Table Modification 235

Adding or removing rows or columns 235

Adjusting row and column size 236

Merging cells 236

Splitting cells 237

Making the table pretty 237

Adding a table caption 238

Chapter 20: Columns of Text 239

All about Columns 239

Making 2-column text 241

Building a trifold brochure 242

Giving up on columns 243

Column Tricks 243

Changing column formats 243

Placing a column break 244

Chapter 21: Lots of Lists 247

Lists with Bullets and Numbers 247

Making a bulleted list 248

Numbering a list 248

Creating a multilevel numbered list 249

Numbering lines on a page 250

Document Content Lists 251

Creating a table of contents 251

Building an index 252

Adding a list of figures 254

Footnotes and Endnotes 255

Chapter 22: Here Come the Graphics 257

Graphical Goobers in the Text 257

Copying and pasting an image 259

Plopping down a picture 259

Slapping down a shape 260

Sticking things into a shape 261

Using WordArt 261

Image Layout 262

Wrapping text around an image 263

Floating an image 264

Keeping an image with text 264

Image Editing 264

Resizing an image 265

Cropping an image 265

Rotating an image 266

Changing an image's appearance 267

Image Arrangement 267

Moving an image hither and thither 268

Aligning graphics 268

Shuffling images front or back 269

Grouping images 269

Chapter 23:Insert Tab Insanity 271

Characters Foreign and Funky 271

Nonbreaking spaces and hyphens 271

Typing characters such as UE, C, and N 272

Inserting special characters and symbols 273

Spice Up a Document with a Text Box 274

Fun with Fields 275

Understanding fields 275

Adding some useful fields 276

Updating a field 278

Changing a field 278

Viewing a field's raw data 278

Deleting fields 278

The Date and Time 279

Adding the current date or time 279

Using the PrintDate field 280

Part 5: The Rest Of Word 281

Chapter 24: Multiple Documents, Windows, and File Formats 283

Multiple Document Mania 284

Arranging open document windows 284

Comparing two documents side by side 285

Viewing one document in multiple windows 285

Using the old split-screen trick 286

Many, Many Document Types 287

Understanding document formats 287

Opening a non-Word document 288

Updating an older Word document 290

Chapter 25: Word for Writers 291

Organize Your Thoughts 291

Entering Outline view 292

Typing topics in the outline 293

Rearranging topics 294

Demoting and promoting topics 294

Expanding and collapsing topics 295

Adding a text topic 296

Printing an outline 297

Large Documents 298

Stitching together chapter documents 298

Splitting a document 299

Avoiding the master document feature 300

Dan's Writing Tips 300

Choosing the best word 300

Counting every word 301

Writing for writers 302

Chapter 26: Let's Work This Out 303

Comments on Your Text 303

Adding a comment 303

Replying to a comment 304

Showing or hiding comments 305

Perusing comments one at a time 305

Printing comments (or not) 306

Deleting comments 306

The Yellow Highlighter 307

Look What They've Done to My Text, Ma 308

Comparing two versions of a document 308

Tracking changes as they're made 309

Reviewing changes 310

Collaborate on the Internet 311

Sharing a document 311

Checking updates 312

Chapter 27: Mail Merge Mania 313

About Mail Merge 313

Understanding Word's mail merge jargon 314

Reviewing the mail merge process 315

Using the Mail Merge Wizard 316

I The Main Document 316

Creating a mail merge form letter 316

Creating mail merge email messages 318

Creating mail merge envelopes 318

II The Recipient List 319

Building a new recipient list 319

Using an already created recipient list 323

Grabbing a recipient list from Outlook 323

Editing a recipient list 324

III Fold In the Fields 325

IV Preview the Merged Documents 325

V Mail Merge, Ho! 326

Merging to a new set of documents 326

Merging to the printer 327

Merging to email 327

Chapter 28: Labels and Envelopes 329

Labels Everywhere 329

Printing sheets of identical labels 330

Printing an address list 331

Instant Envelope 333

Chapter 29:A More Custom Word 337

A Better Status Bar 337

The Quick Access Toolbar 339

Adding buttons to the Quick Access toolbar 340

Editing the Quick Access toolbar 340

Removing items from the Quick Access toolbar 342

Customize the Ribbon 342

Part 6: The Part Of Tens 345

Chapter 30: The Ten Commandments of Word 347

Thou Shalt Remember to Save Thy Work 348

Thou Shalt Not Use Spaces Unnecessarily 348

Thou Shalt Not Abuse the Enter Key 348

Thou Shalt Not Neglect Keyboard Shortcuts 348

Thou Shalt Not Manually Number Thy Pages 349

Thou Shalt Not Force a New Page 349

Thou Shalt Not Forget Thy Undo Command 349

Honor Thy Printer 350

Thou Shalt Have Multiple Document Windows Before Thee 350

Neglecteth Not Windows 350

Chapter 31: Ten Cool Tricks 351

Side-to-Side Page Movement 351

Automatic Save with AutoRecover 353

Accelerate the Ribbon 353

Ancient Word Keyboard Shortcuts 354

Build Your Own Fractions 355

Electronic Bookmarks 355

Lock Your Document 356

The Drop Cap 357

Map Your Document 357

Sort Your Text 358

Chapter 32: Ten Bizarre Things 361

Equations 361

Video in Your Document 362

Hidden Text 363

The Developer Tab 363

Hyphenation 364

Document Properties 364

Document Version History 364

Collect-and-Paste 365

Click-and-Type 365

Translations 366

Chapter 33: Ten Automatic Features Worthy of Deactivation 367

Bye-Bye, Start Screen 368

Restore the Traditional Open and Save Dialog Boxes 368

Turn Off the Mini Toolbar 369

Select Text by Letter 369

Disable Click-and-Type 370

Paste Plain Text Only 370

Disable AutoFormat Features (x4) 371

Index 373

Dan Gookin wrote the first-ever For Dummies book back in 1991. He has authored a number of bestsellers, and his books have been published in 32 languages and have more than 11 million copies in print.