Re: Word 2007 -- How Alone Am I?

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Beth, thanks so much for your time in helping me to see some different values
in Word 2007. What you wrote will be very helpful. Much of my frustration
stems from going to help for answers only to get information that references
things in a new way that sends me back to help to understand the "help" I am
getting -- thus I'm going in circles. What I don't understand is why certain
things have been renamed, i.e., in the control panel why "display" became
"personalization" -- I felt like a complete idiot as it took me forever to
find it until I discovered several other people including a tech who had the
same problem, as well as why certain things needed to be eliminated, like
easy access to information re what keystrokes activate what commands (I'm
finding more and more people have come to realize that keystrokes are faster
than removing your hands from the keyboard and using the mouse). I'm all for
advancing and improving the functionality of Word but at the same time it
does seem that to a certain extent it is being revised with the non-business
user in mind versus those of us to whom it is a staple of our work day -- at
least that seems to be the consensus in my field of law.

Again, thanks Beth for a productive response to my question.

Jann

"Beth Melton" wrote:

I felt the same way when I first started using Office 2007. My trusty menus
and toolbars were gone and it seemed like it took more clicks to accomplish
a task than the previous versions. I hated it, I hated every minute I spent
with it. BUT then I started discovering the new features that were
introduced and ever since then I've never looked back. The key is two-fold.
1) If you are trying to use the applications exactly as you did in the past
you may find it more cumbersome. 2) While some tasks take more clicks other
tasks, many tasks that used to involved several changes have been reduced to
a couple clicks. I found the time-saving steps are a bit of a trade-off.
Take the Margin galleries for a quick example. If you need to modify your
margins, several frequently used options are available on the Page Layout
tab in the Margins gallery for Word and Excel. All you have to do is open
the gallery, click your selection, and the margins are changed for you.

I suspect once you learn how to efficiently use the new UI then you'll
discover as I did, and numerous others who hated it initially too, things
you wondered how you ever lived without. :-) Here are a few tips and
resources that may help:

- Learn more about the Quick Access Toolbar (the small toolbar next to the
Microsoft Office Button that has Save and Undo on it by default). It's easy
to customize and add those commands you frequently use. To add a command,
right-click the command, either on the Ribbon or those found under the
Microsoft Office Button, and then click "Add to Quick Access Toolbar". To
add an entire group, such as the Font group on the Home tab, right-click the
group name instead of a command in the group. To remove a command,
right-click it and you'll see the Remove command. To reorganize commands,
right-click the Quick Access Toolbar and then click "Customize the Quick
Access Toolbar". I set mine up in the beginning so it looked exactly like
the first part of the old Standard toolbar and the first part of the
Formatting toolbar. What a difference that made!

- Right-click *everything*. Unlike previous versions, some commands can only
be found by right-clicking a command. This includes the Galleries as well.

- Use Interactive Guides to help you find commands you're unable to locate.
They can be found in Help or by using these links:

Excel : http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel/HA101491511033.aspx

PowerPoint: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/powerpoint/HA101490761033.aspx

Word: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word/HA100744321033.aspx

- Spend a little time on Office Online. It contains a wealth of resources
from tips and tricks to training.

Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email cannot be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Coauthor of Word 2007 Inside Out:
http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/books/9801.aspx#AboutTheBook

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/

"Jannr" <Jannr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1221ADF6-144D-45DB-9402-AE7006CDA2B9@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I know I'm not alone, but I'm wondering how "not alone" I am in thinking
that
Word 2007 must have been "designed by committee," in terms of that phrase
denoting a negative. I honestly would like someone who uses Word for the
majority of their work day to tell me if they have found any advantages.
I
realize new software always takes time to learn, but this seems
counter-intuitive to me and laborious to use, wasting time. For the
record,
I temped for a long time and was used to switching from all versions of
Word
to to WordPerfect, as well as using and switching between dozens of other
software programs. I am fairly savy on catching on quickly, but this,
well,
as they say in the Land of Oz, is a horse of a different color.



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