A new way to infect your computer, via PowerPoint and simply hovering your mouse over a web link. It’s a malicious PowerShell script inside a PowerPoint file. Either a .PPSX (Microsoft PowerPoint Open XML Slide Show) or .PPS (PowerPoint Show ) file. When the PPSX/PPS file is opened, Office will switch to Protected View to protect […]
Each year Office-Watch.com has a little fun seeing how Microsoft Word’s dictionary compares to the winners of the Scripps (US) National Spelling Bee. Word did better in 2017 than past years. Still, no chance of Word reaching the finals in 2013, 2014, 2015 , 2016 and now 2017 despite being much older than any of […]
Support and patches for Office 2011 for Mac have only a few months left to run Mainstream supports ends on 10 October 2017 That date is based on the release of Service Pack 3 on 29 January 2013 plus a special extension by Microsoft. According to Microsoft the 21 month extension was “… to provide […]
Microsoft has released an interesting new tool for Office 2013/2016 which promises to be a major improvement on current ‘speech to text’ options. Most media have just reported Microsoft’s hype, we’ve actually tested Dictate and here’s what we’ve found. What makes Dictate different is the use of Cortana voice recognition technology. It uses the same […]
Here’s how you start writing an Outlook email drafts on one computer and later continue writing it on another machine. If you’re using Office 365 hosting or Exchange Server with Outlook for Windows/Mac only a little tweak is necessary. For others, there are workarounds. We do this often. Most commonly starting an email on one […]
Browser based email is a great standby in case your main email program, like Outlook, goes wrong or the mailbox connection doesn’t work. Here’s how to find the webmail setting for Office 365 or Exchange Server mailboxes. Webmail for Office 365 or Exchange Server mailboxes is called ‘Outlook Web App’ or ‘Outlook Web Access’. Known […]
It’s expected that today (15 June 2017), Microsoft will release ‘Office in the Windows Store’ as a new way to buy Office. Understand the differences between it and ‘Office 2016 for Windows’ or the Windows 10 / Modern apps for Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote. The new release is not just a different way to […]
Most color printers have a secret tracking or forensic code added to every page that lets governments and others know when and where the page was printed. It’s just one result of last week’s NSA leak and later arrest. One piece of evidence against Reality Winner was the secret code on the pages she allegedly […]
Just a few months after a privacy warning about Docs.com, the Microsoft document sharing site is to close. 15 December 2017 The closure is happening on 15 December 2017, so there’s plenty of time to make the move. All files and documents in your docs.com account will be deleted on that date. Microsoft has created […]
This is a really screwy error message. You try to start an Office desktop program and are stopped with the message ‘This app can’t run on your PC’. Here’s the fix. To make it even stranger, some Office programs will work while others say they can’t run? We’ve seen the very latest version of Outlook […]
Microsoft has released ‘guides’ for anyone wanting to move from Google Docs to Office 365. They aren’t guides, they’re sales brochures. There’s not a lot of information to help anyone wanting to move their document, email, calendar and contacts between Google and Microsoft’s cloud services. All this thinly disguised marketing was written by sales people, […]
Microsoft has given some guidance about Office for Mac support on the upcoming MacOS ‘High Sierra’ 10.13. But not without a little encouragement to buy the Office for Mac. High Sierra will be publicly released in the (northern) autumn and some testers will have it already. There will be a public beta release later in […]
According to a classified NSA report, a Russian hack used Word documents as part of their attempts to interfere in the 2016 US Presidential election. The report also shows that some often-repeated security advice is worthless in the 21st Century. The report details how Russian based hackers targeted employees of firms who maintained electoral rolls […]
The latest ‘Fast Ring’ Insiders update to Office for Windows restores the correct versioning between the Fast and Slow Ring ‘Insiders’ releases. Normally, the latest changes and new features appear in the Fast Ring release. After the bugs have been discovered by the fearless Fast Ring testers, an update goes out to the ‘Slow Ring’. […]
Windows will automatically index and let you search Office documents on your computer or network – how can you stop that happening? Maybe the document is personal or so private you don’t want anyone to find it with a Windows Search. Or discover that the document even exists! Password Protection The most direct way to […]
There are many ways to save an Outlook email or other items to a separate file. Which one you choose depends on your needs. One Outlook message or many? Compatible for many people or not? Easy to search or not? Some options work for a single message only. Others can be used to save many […]
We have Office-Watch.com readers and others trying to fix a problem with their Outlook .msg files which have mysteriously become linked to an Acrobat PDF Reader program. The .msg files start sporting the familiar (but quite inappropriate) red and black PDF icon. If you double-click to open the .msg file, Acrobat Reader doesn’t know what […]
Recent updates to Microsoft Office 2016 for Windows include an annoying little ‘flashing’ bug that’s not severe but definitely annoying. Here’s how to fix the flash – either slowly and carefully or right now! Every hour, there’s a ‘flash’. A window appears and quickly disappears for no good reason. This seems to be mostly affecting […]
The US Supreme Court (aka The Supreme’s) has sided with consumers in a case about refilling printing toner or ink cartridges. Alas, printer makers still have other ways to grab extra money from you. Lexmark sued Impression Products who have been refilling ink/toner cartridges. The case alleged that Lexmark’s patents on cartridge technology were being […]
Printer makers are happy to sell a cheap printer because they make big profits on ink, toner and other consumables. Here’s how to save money. Buy in advance Stores and printer makers rely on people waiting until they’ve run out of ink/toner before rushing to get more. You pay a high premium for that rushed […]
It’s now possible to change the default layout for a new Excel PivotTable. PivotTable default configuration has been on the ‘wish list’ for many years. It’s now in Excel 2016 for Windows, Office 365 customers only as part of the May 2017 update. The changed defaults apply to all new PivotTables made on that computer. […]
Microsoft has added another useful option for Office 365 users on OneDrive; expiring links. Send people a link to a file saved on OneDrive has been possible for a long time. That link could be ‘read only’ or let the receiver edit the file (document, worksheet, presentation etc.). Now you can make the link only […]
WPS Office, a Microsoft Office clone, has announced they’ve stopped development on their Linux version. UDPATE: WPS Office now denies there’s a halt to Linux version development and blamed the media for the ‘false’ story (sound familar?). So where did Office-Watch.com and many other outlets get the idea? Errrr, from WPS Linux itself! Their official […]
For a long time, it’s been possible to ‘print’ from any program and put the result directly into OneNote desktop program. Now you can ‘print’ to the OneNote for Windows 10 app. Once the ‘printed’ pages are in OneNote, they’ll get a text version added in the background. You’ll need the separate Send to OneNote […]
Microsoft’s promotion of a new OneNote for Windows 10 feature is, to put it politely, misleading. The updated app doesn’t do what the hype promises. You can’t insert a meeting from ‘Outlook’ and not ‘Outlook 2016’ as Microsoft alleges. Hype vs Reality is something all Microsoft customers are familiar with, but this goes beyond some […]
A few days ago, we talked about Outlook for Windows belated discovery of real emojis. As with all emoji matters, what the receiver sees can vary a lot. This isn’t Microsoft’s fault. It’s in the complex nature of emoji with different fonts etc. The ‘take away’ is that emoji’s are great but keep in mind […]
An upcoming release of Outlook 2016 for Mac will get something that Outlook/Windows users take for granted: Read Receipts and Delivery Receipts. It’s hard to believe but the current and past versions of Outlook for Mac don’t have these features. Source: Microsoft The feature is now available in Outlook 2016 for Mac with the Slow […]
The ability to make a new Outlook item from an existing one by drag and drop is, finally, coming to Outlook for Mac. This feature lets you drag an email to the calendar or tasks folder, Outlook will make a new appointment or task using the email as a basis. Microsoft has been demonstrating Source: […]
It’s not necessary to convert MP3 audio to the better MP4 format for PowerPoint but, if you want to, there are various ways to do it. MPEG-4 audio (.mp4 .m4a ) is recommended by Microsoft for PowerPoint 2016 (Windows and Mac), PowerPoint 2013 and Powerpoint for mobile devices. MP4 audio gives you better sound and, […]
Shrill headlines talking about the ‘death’ of MP3. Here’s how Microsoft Office is affected (hint: not a bit but you might start moving away from MP3 to the better MP4). Audio and video support mostly applies to PowerPoint. Microsoft Office supports a range of different audio formats including MP3 but also other and far better […]
Microsoft is a slow learner. After seven years they’ve finally fixed an annoying emoji bug in Outlook and they’ve done it in a typically sideways fashion. Current versions of Office display an incompatible smiley emoji that often appears as the letter J – instead of 😊 If you’ve ever seen a message with a J […]
The makers of Wannacrypt made some quick money for a small investment. That means other’s will copy their success or take advantage of the fear and confusion. WannaCrypt has received a lot of attention but it’s important to remember that ransomware isn’t new. The global publicity about WannaCrypt changed how it was handled. It’s different from […]
There’s now a way to recover files locked up by Wannacrypt ransomware without paying the attackers a thing but there are some catches. Adrien Guinet at Quarkslab has developed Wcry, decryption code for WannaCrypt. At the time of writing it only works for Windows XP computers, even then, it needs a bit of luck. Windows […]
Microsoft overuses the term ‘exciting’ to describe their latest work but the new ‘Transform by Example’ for Excel looks genuinely exciting. However you get data for Excel, the common problem is ‘massaging’ it to fit your needs. Dates need changing to match Excel, addresses need splitting into address/state/zip and names separated into first/middle/last. Excel’s Get […]
Microsoft is joining the voice device market alongside Amazon’s Echo and Google’s Home with the enticing possibility of making Outlook speak to you via Invoke. Harmon Kardon will be releasing Invoke, a speaker and Cortana powered device. Details are few at this stage however it opens up the possibility of a device that will speak […]
Apple has announced a change to how third-party products, like Microsoft Outlook, connect to iCloud services. From 15 June 2017, you’ll need an ‘app specific password’ for Outlook and other programs to connect with Apple services. This makes two-factor authentication for Apple ID’s compulsory if you use external products. Two-factor authentication is a good thing. […]
A New York Times article raises our blood pressure and not because the paper is a mouthpiece for left wing bleeding hearts and fellow travelers.* In Ransomware Attack, Where Does Microsoft’s Responsibility Lie? accepts the standard line that Microsoft is doing its best to solve security problems as they arise. No mention that Microsoft made […]
Microsoft played a great PR game over the last few days. They managed to deflect responsibility for the WannaCrypt ransomware global outbreak and even make the company look like the victim. Make no mistake, the main responsibility for the WannaCrypt trouble lies with Microsoft. Some blame can be directed to the US Intelligence agencies and […]
Microsoft has released a patch for the latest security bugs in Office 2016 and 2011 for Mac. Three different memory corruption bugs are fixed. A hacked document tinkers with computer memory and tricks the computer into running an unauthorized program. We’ve seen these problems before and we’ll see more in the future. One memory corruption […]
Everyone is talking about ransomware now that the WannaCrypt has spread like crazy across the world. These nasty viruses target your documents and precious files including Microsoft Office files and Windows backups. This is a little embarrassing for us because Office-Watch.com has just released a new book that’s suddenly become very topical. Everyday BACKUPS – […]
