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
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
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
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
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
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,
Emoji in emails should be used with great care because what the receiver sees can be very different from the emoji you entered. 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
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.
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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.
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
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
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
Microsoft has moved quickly to block a security hole in their own anti-virus software, Windows Defender. We’re used to seeing email or instant messaging used to infect a computer when opening a document in Word or Excel, maybe an email in Outlook. But this is quite different and very worrying.
Coming soon is a new version of Windows, the Windows 10S. What does it mean for Microsoft Office users? The 10S is a stripped down and limited version of Windows 10. Some advanced features aren’t available while others are set to Microsoft’s preferences automatically. To buy 10S is cheaper than
There’s no doubt that the Microsoft Surface is a nice piece of kit but you pay extra for it and even more than that! Microsoft’s usual trick in promoting their Surface machines is to EXclude the price of the keyboard. That lets them promote a lower headline price which most
Adding fonts into Microsoft Office is easy but the standard advice doesn’t always work. We’ll show you how to install a font and avoid the trap. Font installation has nothing to do with Word, Excel or PowerPoint. It’s all done in Windows. Firstly, download the new fonts. There are many
