The latest ‘Insiders Fast Track’ Outlook for Windows has an interesting but somewhat incomplete new feature for managing appointments called ‘End appointments early’. It’s an overall setting at File | Options | Calendar | End appointments and meetings early. There are ‘end early’ choices for meetings: Less than one hour One hour or longer We […]
Another way to convert text to dates is by adding zero to the text. This is a trick which forces Excel to convert the text into an Excel value so it can then add the zero. Since adding zero doesn’t change the value, you end up with text converted to an Excel value. It’s a […]
A little side-trick for converting text dates to Excel dates is replacing the text separator. Excel lets you replace text within the selected cells only. If the text dates are in the correct order (e.g. m/d/y ) but use the wrong separator for your Windows regional setting (e.g. m-d-y ). Excel’s Replace function will replace […]
The late and much missed musician Prince wished to be known by single character symbol called ‘Love Symbol Number 2’. Here’s how to enter that unique symbol in Word, PowerPoint or Microsoft Office generally. There are various methods suggested on the Internet, we’ve narrowed then down to one excellent option (SVG graphic) two others that […]
Microsoft Word can print the selected parts of a document, not just the whole document, Select the part of the document you want to print. Word won’t let you print separated selections (made using the Ctrl key). Go to File | Print (or Ctrl + P) and from the Settings list choose Print Selection. The […]
A badly managed switch to Office 365 made it hard for staff and passengers at London’s Victoria Station. An uninstall message for Office 2010 appeared over the important platform display. The Register reports that the platform status displays, not the main board were hard to read because an Office 365 update notice kept appearing. Source: […]
After more than a decade of apathy, Word users will get a document To Do list feature. Finally, Microsoft has listened to customers! For as long as we can remember, Office users have been asking for a To Do list and other notes elements to be added into Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents. Redmond is […]
Yet another breakdown of Office 365 servers makes like difficult for customers. Users were unable to login with their Office apps or to Microsoft hosted Exchange Servers. It’s not clear how widespread the problems were. It happened on 31 October 2018 but took twelve hours to repair. That’s a disappointingly long time. It seems Microsoft […]
Cymulate is reporting how embedded video in Word or other Office documents are another way for criminals and hackers to infect your computer. It’s yet another example of how Word, Excel or PowerPoint documents can be used to get malware onto computers to steal data, becomes bots or other nasties. This trick uses the relatively […]
Office 365 enterprise customers will soon receive tips emails from Microsoft directly and without ‘opting in’. Microsoft calls them “helpful product training and tips” but aren’t being greeted with the enthusiasm that the company might be expecting. They’re reported to be starting on 29 November 2018 to all Office 365 enterprise users who haven’t specifically […]
Speed Running, a gamers pastime has come to Microsoft Word. Finding ways to type the numbers 1 to 100 in the fastest time. If you’re unfamiliar with speed running, as we were, it’s playing and recording a pass through a game aiming to complete as fast as possible. Someone came up with the idea of […]
A new email trick to fool people into clicking a link from Outlook. It’s a ‘warning’ that your mailbox is near it’s size limit. The message was a little sophisticated by pretending to come from the real company that handles the domain. It was sent to an address with a domain managed by GoDaddy (the […]
There’s a special purple color named by Pantone as ‘Love Symbol Number 2’ in honor of the musician Prince. That same purple is possible in Microsoft Word and other Office applications. Only last year, Pantone teamed with Prince’s estate to announce that PQ 7448C was to be known as Love Symbol Number 2. Now the […]
Perhaps the easiest way to convert text dates to Excel dates is using Text to Columns on the Data tab. It’s a simple ‘one off’ method that works well and takes you through the steps. If you need something more automated, for new text dates entered from time-to-time use one of the formulas at Converting Text […]
Changing an Excel formula into the values is amazingly easy. It’s just a copy and special paste. Another way to think of it is deleting the formula but leaving the results in the cells. Select the cells. In this case from our article on converting text cells into Excel dates. Copy them, using Ctrl + […]
Ronny, a loyal Office Watch reader asks “OK, I now understand that entering dates in Excel as plain text isn’t a good idea. How do I convert my cells with MM/DD text into proper Excel dates?” It’s a trap for Excel novices. Typing in a date as plain text seems simple and easy … until […]
The new iPad Pro’s announced today by Apple come with an extra cost to use Microsoft Office. Office Mobile apps for iPad are usually free for everyone. There are some extras for Office 365 customers but most of the app features are available for all comers. But the new iPad Pro’s, like their predecessor Pro […]
The Office Home Use Program (HUP) is a cheap way to buy Office 2019 but there are some downsides. Your money might be better used for an Office 365 Home or Personal plan. The Home Use Program product is very limited in both features and how many computers you can install on. See also Office Home […]
We clear up some of the misunderstandings about the MS Office Home Use Program (HUP), one of the cheapest ways to buy Microsoft Office. In our article Home Use Program or getting Microsoft Office for $15 we explained how many companies can let their staff buy Office 2019 for Windows or Mac for much less […]
The cheapest legal way to get Microsoft Office is the Home Use Program (HUP). It costs just $15 each for Office 2019 Windows or Mac. Like many Microsoft deals, it’s not as good as in the past, but it’s still cheap and worth considering. Many people qualify for the Home Use Program and many don’t […]
It was inevitable that scammers would start using Office 365 as the basis for email scams, here’s what to look out for and how to avoid any dangerous web links. The scams are similar to the fake emails that pretend to come from banks and other large companies. They try to trick you into clicking […]
There are new computers sold with ‘free’ Office 365, what does that mean and how does it work? It’s not as simple or as good a deal as it seems. You’d hope this offer was easily given to customers, but no. It’s made complicated, presumably to reduce the number of people who take the offer […]
With a little Office formatting trickery, you can make a Twitter message that looks like what you see on the Twitter web site or app. Use this trick to recreate a real Tweet that’s part of a document. Or as a fake or joke tweet as part of a presentation. This, very sincere looking Tweet, […]
The 2018 Scrabble World Championship is over. How does the Microsoft Word spell check fare against the Scrabble champs? Microsoft Word has slightly different dictionaries for many English language variations (US, UK, Australian etc). Word’s English dictionaries different from the official Scrabble dictionary. Among the words in the final rounds were: Groutier Zonular Phenolic Maledict […]
A judgement from the US Court of Appeals turned on the Word Count feature in Microsoft Word and how it differs from the rules for court submissions. Most courts have rules about the length of submission which, in this case, were accidently exceeded. The plaintiff is representing himself (‘pro se’) so the judge was more […]
Adding or subtracting months in Excel is easier with the Edate() function. As you probably know, Excel uses whole numbers to calculate dates. Add 1 to an Excel date adds a day. How to add a whole month? How to make Excel jump a whole calendar month? For example from 1 January to 1 February […]
It was surprising and frankly disappointing to see Amazon USA post a very dubious offer for Office 2019 Professional Plus at just US$46.99. Office 2019 Professional Plus sells for around $559 but only as a volume licence. There’s no retail version of Office 2019 Professional Plus. This offer is doubly dubious. It’s selling something that’s […]
Various ‘news’ stories going around promising a trick to getting Office 2019 for free … don’t believe it. We know a way to get Office 2019 cheap, but not free. Maybe these ‘Office 2019 for free’ stories are deliberate clickbait or horribly ill-informed, either way they’re quite wrong. As often happens these days, ‘Office 2019 […]
Microsoft has released Office 2019 for Windows or Mac to the Home Use Program. Just $15 gets qualifying employees Office 2019 Professional Plus for Windows or Office 2019 Home and Business for Mac. The Home Use Program (HUP) is part of the Software Assurance package for Volume Licence customers. Employees who use Microsoft Office at […]
Microsoft has added the Dictation feature to the browser based versions of Word and OneNote. You can speak and words will appear in Word/OneNote using the cloud ‘speech to text’ feature. Source: Microsoft Dictation is already available in Word 365 for Windows. Office for Mac users have a ‘voice to text’ feature available in the […]
The Shrink to Fit or Shrink One Page option hiding in Microsoft Word might solve a common problem. Making a document that’s using part of an extra page (an ‘orphan’), fit into a single page or one less page. Shrink One Page or Shrink to Fit was added to Word a long time ago, at […]
We already talked about the Microsoft Word ‘Shrink One Page‘ feature and its limitations. Here’s suggestions for how to move a few orphaned lines from the top of a page in more subtle and effective ways. Obviously, every document is different so the tricks you use depend on the situation. Pick and try from this […]
Office for iOS (iPhone / iPad ) is getting the Icons or SVG support already available in Word 365 for Windows. Icons now available to Office iOS Insiders on the Insert tab. There are 500 to choose from … Source: Microsoft Available in the Word, Excel and PowerPoint apps for Android. Icons are really SVG […]
Excel for Android is getting the ability to insert numbers and text from a picture. Insert | Data from Picture is now available to Office for Android Insiders and will rollout to the public in coming months. It’s OCR (Optical Character Recognition) specialized for Excel. Source: Microsoft You can get a similar result by taking […]
Coming to Word 365 for Windows are more Ink Editor gestures plus a pop-out pane to explain the gestures available. Ink Editor is on the Draw menu. It’s a way to use a digital pen to edit existing text. For example, draw a squiggly line through some words to delete them. It’s a nifty idea […]
Array formulas are useful for getting the result from a filtered list. Continuing our series on Excel array formulas. Here’s a list of stocks with industries aka Table3. How many stocks are in the ‘Shop’ industry? The array formula in G5 has the answer from the formula: =COUNTIF(Table3[Industry],G4) The expanded version of the array might […]
Array formulas are an important part of Excel and they are about to become a lot more important. You won’t be able to ignore arrays much longer because they will be an unavoidable part of Excel for everyone. This is the start of a series to help you understand arrays in Excel. At the very […]
Microsoft Office for Windows is gradually changing the software name to Office 365 . It’s being done slowly, almost by stealth but it’s happening. Keen eyed readers have noticed a gradual change on the Microsoft web site and software. We first mentioned it back in August 2018 but the software name change to Office 365 […]
We’ve added more to Real Time Excel, our comprehensive guide to adding the latest information into Excel easily and automatically. Real Time Excel already has in-depth coverage of Linked Data Types, a new and truly interesting addition to Excel for Windows. On 15 October 2018 we added a bit more to the already expansive coverage: […]
A New York Times article about parents writing their kids college entrance essay reminded us of a forgotten feature in Microsoft Word. A feature of modern ‘helicopter parenting‘ is helping, if not entirely writing, essays for their children. The article How I Know You Wrote Your Kid’s College Essay by JM Farkas, a college essay […]
