Different Ways to Display the Hidden Formatting Marks in Word

By Amy Pearson

There are two ways to display the hidden formatting marks placed into Word when keys such as the SPACE BAR, TAB, or ENTER keys are pressed.

Generally the hidden formatting marks are displayed by clicking on the Home tab and within the Paragraph group clicking on the Show/Hide button.  This method displays all the hidden formatting marks which include the ones listed above plus several others. The table explains the hidden formatting marks.

The first figure below shows how a portion of a document appears when the Show/Hide tool has been used to display the hidden formatting marks. Frequently, Word users want to see only the paragraph marks.  The second figure below side shows only the Paragraph marks displayed.

To display only Paragraph marks, take the following steps:

1. Click on the File tab (in Word 2007 click on the Office button).
2. From the Navigation bar, select Options (in Word 2007, click on Word Options). The Word Options dialog box displays.
3. From the Navigation bar, select Display.
4. From the Always show these formatting marks on the screen area, select Paragraph marks (Figure 2).
5. Click on the OK button. In the document only the hidden paragraph symbols are displayed.

Creating Customized Shapes in PowerPoint 2010

Ask Amy November 7, 2011
by Amy Pearson

One of the new features of PowerPoint 2010 is the ability to create custom shapes. You can do this by taking one or more separate shapes and combining them in one of four ways – union, subtract, combine, or intersect. Our Figure shows how an overlapped circle and star behave when each of the four different options is applied.

Although using the union, subtract, combine, or intersect commands is quite simple, finding them is a little more difficult. They are not automatically available when you install PowerPoint. They must be added to either the Quick Access Toolbar or one of the Ribbons.

To customize either the Quick Access Toolbar or a Ribbon, right click on the Ribbon and from the short cut menu, select either Customize the Quick Access Toolbar or Customize the Ribbon. Once the PowerPoint Options dialog box displays, from the Choose commands from drop-down list, select All Commands and then find Shape Combine, Shape Intersect, Shape Union, and/or Shape Subtract and add them to the Quick Access Toolbar or group on the desired Ribbon.

For specific details on working with the Quick Access Toolbar or Ribbon visit our blog and on from the bar on the right hand side, select March and then choose “Adding a Command to the Quick Access Toolbar.”

Amy Pearson is a Senior Instructor for Summit Training, the author of the Ask Amy column that appears on Summit Training’s monthly newsletter, and editor of the both the Summit Training and Connect Learning newsletters. Amy is a Microsoft Office MOS and has been providing Microsoft Office training both in the classroom and online for more than 15 years.

Microsoft Excel 2007 Charts and Pivot Tables

Large worksheets filled with numbers do not do a good job of allowing the user to see trends or spot inconsistencies. This is best done with a Chart. Students learn to create a wide range of charts from the basic Column, Pie, and Stock charts through combination (Bar and Line) charts to the more exotic waterfall and floating charts. They polish charts by learning how to refine the chart’s format and then learn how to create and use custom formats to make future charts easier and more consistent.

A Pivot Table is an interactive, customizable way of displaying data that provides flexibility in the way you view and present the data in your worksheet. More than a simple data table, a Pivot Table allows you to group information—by date, value, or by category—and display varying levels of detail. In this class students learn how to take already-existing Excel worksheets and pull useful information from them by creating and manipulating pivot tables.

Microsoft® Excel 2007, Charts & Pivot Tables: October 31, $225 – Beaumont Classroom. Send 3 or more students to the same class, the same day and pay only $200 each.

My Top 10 Acrobat Keyboard Shortcuts

By David Mankin

Here are my top 10 favorite keyboard shortcuts that I have grown to rely on in Acrobat 9 Professional.  You may know all of them, some of them, or maybe none at all.  Everyone uses their applications differently.  I used to be a mega-mouse-clicker.  Over the years, I have grown to use, appreciate and ultimately rely on keyboard shortcuts to help streamline my workflow.  So, here they are… My Top Ten Acrobat 9 Professional Keyboard Shortcuts:

Drum roll, please…

10.   Ctrl-6 Insert Sticky Note

9.      Shift-Ctrl-D Delete Pages

8.      Ctrl-R Show/Hide Rulers (yes, Acrobat DOES have rulers!)

7.      Ctrl-U Show/Hide Grid (yep – Acrobat has a design grid too!)

6.      Alt-Left Arrow Previous View

5.      Ctrl-0 (zero) Fit Page

4.      Shift-Ctrl-1 Open Organizer

3.      Shift-Ctrl-F Search

2.      Ctrl-D Document Properties

 …and the number 1 keyboard shortcut is…

1.      Ctrl-K Preferences

There are many, many more waiting to be discovered and learned. Learn what PDF technology is all about… and how to use Acrobat to create, edit and enhance your PDF files by taking one of Summit Training’s Acrobat classes. Introduction to Acrobat X is offered online November 2-3. All our online classes are instructor-led. Not sure if you would like an online class? Ask to see one in action. The fee for the 2-day course is $595.

David R. Mankin is a Certified Technical Trainer, desktop publisher, computer graphic artist, and Web page developer. And if that isn’t enough, David is an Adobe-certified expert in Adobe Acrobat.

New Project Management Classes

In addition to our existing Microsoft Project and Oracle Primavera classes, we have added Fundamentals of Project Management and Microsoft Project 2010 to our Houston schedule. Other locations will be scheduled in the future, and on-site training at your location is also availalbe.

Adobe FrameMaker 10: Drag and Drop

By Barb Binder

I was walking to my gate recently, and overheard an elderly woman complaining to a younger woman as they passed me in the airport. All I heard her say was, “Why do they give us so many ways of doing the same thing?” Who knows what she was talking about, but it made me smile because I hear the same sentence all the time in my various Adobe training classes. One of the (many) benefits to having spent so many years delivering software training is that I’ve had the opportunity to observe all of the various learning styles and workflow techniques. I try to let each of my classes know early on that even though some of us might be dedicated right mouse button clickers, others (like me) prefer keyboard commands, and still others like to rely exclusively on the menus, we can still be friends. That usually makes my students smile, and with luck, diffuses the otherwise inevitable frustration that can accompany learning more than one way to do the same thing.

So back to drag and drop. It’s just another way to move (or copy) text and elements. To move something, just select it, press down on your left mouse button, and drag the text or element to its new location. And if you’d prefer to copy, just hold down the Control key and do the same thing. (If you see a ?, FrameMaker is telling you that you are trying to move/copy your object to an invalid location.

But that’s not all. This works with column rows and tables within FrameMaker, as long as you add the Alt key to move and Control + Alt to copy.

But there’s more! And as long as you purchase FrameMaker 10 within the next fifteen minutes (kidding!), you can also drag and drop across other applications that support the drag and drop feature.

That said, I’m a happy keyboard shortcut gal, and it’s not likely that the new drag and drop support will be life changing for me. But we can still be friends.

Barb Binder is the president and founder of Rocky Mountain Training. Barbara has been a trainer for nearly two decades and has been recognized by Adobe as one of the top trainers world-wide. Connect Learning is pleased to have Barb as the instructor for many of their instructor-led, online Adobe courses.

Ask Amy

Question: I have Outlook 2010. When I click on the Print button, it prints the entire email. Is there any way to only print one page or a range of pages?

Answer: Yes. Click on the File menu, to open the Backstage view.  Then click on the Print Options button. This opens the Print dialog box for your printer. From here you can choose to print the Current page or a range of pages.

Primavera Classes

Houston Primavera Classroom 

• Basic Primavera P6 July 25-27 ($1295) or August 1-3 ($1395)
• Advanced Primavera P6 July 28-30 ($995) or August 4-5 ($1095)
• Take Both classes and save July 25-30 ($2190) or August 1-5 ($2390)

We are trying to put together some Primavera training in Beaumont. Please share this with Primavera users at your facility. We know there are lots of P6 users in the area that don’t know about Summit Training or the possibility of getting Primavera training locally. If you are interested in Basic or Advanced P6 classes, please let us know.

Ask Amy

Question: I just moved from Outlook 2003 to Outlook 2010. The option to send someone a “Bcc” is not available. I can't find it anywhere. How do I go to turn on the “Bcc” option?

Answer: “Bcc” can be turned on through the Options tab. The trick is, you must have a message open for the Options tab to be displayed. Follow these steps to turn on the Bcc option in both Office 2010 and 2007.

1. Open a new message.
2. Click on the Options tab.
3. Within the Fields group, click on the Show Bcc button. Once Bcc is turned on, it remains on for all new messages.

Ask Amy

If you are working in Word and you want to find a synonym (a word with a similar meaning) for a word in your document, select that word and press the SHIFT+F7 keystroke combination.  A pane opens with a list of possible words that can be substituted for the selected word. This works in all versions of Word.

Ask Amy

Question: Recently I created a large worksheet and was asked to make the “final” worksheet easier to read by shading every other row. However, it wasn’t really “final” and I ended up removing and reshading the worksheet more than once. Is there an easier way?

Answer: Yes, there is a way to do this so that the shading always affects every other row no matter how may rows you insert and/or delete.

Excel 2007 and 2010

1.    Highlight the area that is to contain shaded rows. Don’t skip this step because the dynamic updating will only work within this range.

2.    Click on the Home tab.

3.    Within the Styles group, click on the Conditional Formatting button.

4.    From the menu, select Highlight Cells Rules.

5.    From the shortcut menu, select More Rules… The New Formatting Rule dialog box displays.

6.    From the Select a Rule Type: list, select Use a formula to determine which cells to format. The bottom half of the dialog box changes.

7.    In the Format values where this formula is true: edit box, enter: =MOD(ROW(),2)=0  .

8.    Click on the [Format] button. The Format Cells dialog box displays.

9.    Click on the Fill tab and select a color for the shading. Lighter colors work best.

10. Click on the [OK] button to close the Format Cells dialog box.

11. Click on the [OK] button to close the New Formatting Rule dialog box. Every other selected row is shaded.

Excel 2003

1.    Highlight the area that is to contain shaded rows. Don’t skip this step because the dynamic updating will only work within this range.

2.    Click on the Format menu and click on the Conditional Formatting button. The Conditional Formatting dialog box displays.

3.    From the first drop-down list, select Formula Is.

4.    In edit box, enter:  =MOD(ROW(),2)=0  .

5.    Click the Format button. The Format Cells dialog box displays.

12. Click on the Patterns tab and select a color for the shading. Lighter colors work best.

13. Click on the [OK] button to close the Format Cells dialog box.

14. Click on the [OK] button to close the New Formatting Rule dialog box. Every other selected row is shaded.

Ask Amy

Working with Tables in Microsoft Word



 - Table Handle



To delete a table, select the Table Handle and press the Backspace key.

To delete the contents of the table while leaving the table structure, select the Table Handle and press the Delete key.

Primavera & Project Classes

New classes added to schedule:

Primavera P6 Basic and Advanced:

• Basic May 16-18 in LaPorte - $1,195 per person
• Advanced May 19-20 in LaPorte - $895 per person
• Take both classes May 16-20 for $1,990 ($100 discount) per person

Microsoft Project 2007 2 day class:

• June 8-9 in Beaumont - $550 per person

For more information or to register, contact info@summit-train.com or call 1.800.405.4151

Ask Amy

Question: I just got office 2010. Print Preview is totally different. I can’t find Shrink to Fit and I use it all the time.
Answer: Yes, Print Preview is very different in Office 2010. To use Shrink to Fit in this version you can add it to your Quick Access Toolbar (QAT) toolbar. From our previous Blogpost on March 8th (see below), follow the steps for adding a command to the Quick Access Toolbar. In step 4, from the Choose commands from drop-down list, choose All Commands. In step 5, scroll down the list of commands, until you find Shrink one Page. The commands are in alphabetical order. Complete the remaining steps; the Shrink one Page button is added to the QAT. The tool tip for this button reads “Shrink to Fit.”

Adding a Command to the Quick Access Toolbar (Q.A.T.)

The Quick Access Toolbar (Q.A.T.) is found at the top left of the Microsoft Office application window and will look similar to one of these:

Q.A.T. Office 2007

Q.A.T. Office 2010

Adding a Command to the Q.A.T.:

1. Click on the drop-down arrow at the end of the Q.A.T.
2. From the menu that appears, select the command to add to the Q.A.T or click on More Commands to open the … Options dialog box that lists all the commands that can be placed on the Q.A.T.
3. If the dialog box has been opened:

What topic?

What topic would you like to see covered in our Free Lunch-&-Learn webinars?

Use the comments feature below this post to let us know.

Keep in mind these webinars are a total of 45 minutes, which includes a demo of the topic and a 15-20 minute Q & A session.

If you are in the Beaumont, TX area....

I have students waiting for the following classes:

They will be held in our Beaumont classroom. Each class needs only 1 or 2 additional students. If you are interested or know of someone who might be, please contact me.

·           Introduction to Excel 2003

·           Advanced Excel 2007

·           Visio 2007

Are you customizing Microsoft Office to your advantage?

Do you use the Quick Access Toolbar (QAT)?

·         If not, you are missing a great tool that allows you to streamline Office 2007 and 2010 by placing commands at the tip of your mouse.

·         Our webinar will show you how to customize the QAT. You will learn how to add and delete commands.

Go one step further, learn how to Customize Ribbons (Office 2010)

·         Create your own ribbons and groups.

·         Hide tabs you don’t use.

·         Add a group to the QAT.

Ask Amy

Question: I work a lot in PowerPoint. Sometimes I want to move an object just a little. Whether I use the mouse or the arrow keys to move the object, it always goes too far. I can’t get it just right. Help!

Ask Amy

Question: I have several Excel files that I use all the time. Is there any way I can make them always available in the Recent Document list? 

FREE! Eat, Watch & Learn

Customizing the Ribbon and Quick Access Toolbar

On February 28th we are kicking off our lunch time series of webinars with Customizing the Ribbon and Quick Access Toolbar. This webinar will be held 11:45 - 12:30 and space is limited.

Ask Amy

A review of ways to select text in Microsoft Word:

• To select a single word, double click it.
• To select a sentence, hold down the CTRL key and click within the sentence.
• To select a paragraph, triple click within the paragraph.
• To select the whole document, press CTRL+A.
• To select from the insertion point to the end of the document, press CTRL+SHIFT+END.
• To select from the insertion point to the top of the document, press CTRL+SHIFT+HOME.

Multiple lines can also be selected by moving the mouse to the left edge of the text (in the margin area). When the mouse turns into a white arrow pointing to the right, click and hold the mouse button and drag down until the desired lines are selected.

Featured Class

Visio 2007 Comprehensive Skills  March 1 and 2, $445 Beaumont Classroom This is a 2-day comprehensive course that covers introductory through advanced skills. Visio is a business tool that can be used to create images that are used to grab attention and to convey information. It is designed to help the user communicate ideas visually without requiring them to know how to draw. It is used to communicate concepts, procedures, product information, specifications, and more.

Ask Amy

Question:  I have a worksheet I use as a template with a cell that brings in the current date every time it is opened. However, once I fill out the template and save it as separate worksheet, I don’t want the date to change. Is there a simple way to keep that date from changing?

FREE! Coming soon...

Eat, Watch & Learn!

Beginning in February Summit Training will offer LIVE webinars for free! Webinars will be held over lunch time so, you can eat, watch & learn! Space will be limited - stay tuned for your chance to register.

Have a topic that you'd like to see covered? email info@summit-train.com