There are shortcuts that automatically format bold and italic text in Word. The same shortcuts and more work in WhatsApp texting as well. AutoFormatting Bold and Italics as you type In Microsoft Word and Outlook it’s possible to make words bold or italic as you’re typing. For touch-typists that’s faster than stopping to highlight text […]
The current Google Drive plug-in for Microsoft Office will stop working near the end of June. There’s an improved update already available for some customers and an alternative for the rest. If you’re using the Google Drive plug-in, you’ll start seeing a warning about the plugins death on 26 June 2019. Source: Google There are […]
An update for Excel users on the upcoming new Imperial Era in Japan and how to type the Reiwa era name in Office documents The Japanese government has now announced the new Era name that will coincide with new Emperor. From 1 May 2019 we’ll be in the 令和or Reiwa era. This might not seem […]
Converting SVG icons into JPG is essential for older Word and Office versions that don’t have native icon/SVG support. SVG’s are great with many advantages for Office 365 and Office 2019 users. Not everyone has the latest Microsoft Office or shares documents with others who have earlier versions of Office. Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) are […]
One of the first major Word viruses, the Melissa virus, is 20 years old. It’s amazing to see how much and how little has changed over two decades. Office viruses today follow much the same pattern as they did back in the 20th Century. Melissa was a Word macro virus which infected computers then spread […]
Laundry care symbols you see on clothes tags can be typed or inserted into Word, Excel or PowerPoint in various different ways. Laundry care symbols can be for laundry area signs or for fun like this t-shirt. T-shirt seen in a Zurich clothing store Or alternative symbols in a PowerPoint slide. All five symbols were […]
Which font to use if emulating a true laundry care or clothing text label in Word, PowerPoint or other Office program? We’ve already talked about how to put standard laundry care symbols in Word, Excel or PowerPoint but what about the text that usually goes with the icons? In our research we couldn’t find any […]
What can you do when Outlook won’t connect to a new mailbox no matter what you try? Long time Office Watch reader, Phil, found himself with an especially stubborn Outlook which would not connect to his new mailbox. He’s changed Office 365 mail servers so had to reconnect Outlook to the new mailboxes for him […]
Among the usual grab bag of non-security updates this month is an important Access 2016 update and bug fix for Outlook 2016 This patch only applies to Office 2016 with a stand-alone .msi installed – NOT Click to Run installs. It’s a single patch KB4462214 that applies to both Outlook 2016 and Access 2016. Access […]
Updated Microsoft Office 365 icons have started appearing in the preview ‘fast track’ Office 365 for Windows and we could not be more excited. No … not really. When it comes to changed Office icons; if we were more apathetic, we’d be in a coma. Office 365 icons for Word, Outlook, Excel and PowerPoint on […]
Microsoft has released a browser based version of Skype. It’s great news but maybe not for the reasons Redmond expects. Skype on the Web is an alternative to the bloated and annoying Skype for Windows or Mac. What is Skype for Web? It’s Skype with most of its standard features running on a web page. […]
How to insert the Registered Trade Mark ® currency symbol into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. Both in Office for Windows and Office for Mac. Registered Trade Mark ® not to be confused with the Unregistered Trade Mark ™ symbol Registered Trade Mark ® codes These are the important code numbers or values you’ll […]
Type the Trademark ™ TM symbol into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. Both in Office for Windows and Office for Mac. Trademark ™ TM symbol is, strictly speaking, called the Unregistered Trademark symbol. Its counterpart is the Registered Trademark ® Trademark in Word and Outlook The Trademark ™ sign has an inbuilt shortcut in […]
Color fonts are coming to Microsoft Office and Windows but progress is slow and patchy. Here’s a quick summary of color fonts and the occasional, erratic support in Outlook, Word and other Office programs. What are color fonts Since the beginning of Mac and Windows we’ve had single color fonts. Usually black but can be […]
Type the Yen ¥ currency symbol into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. Both in Office for Windows and Office for Mac. Yen is used for Japanese currency and sometimes other currencies like the Chinese Renminbi / Yuan. ¥ symbol is easy on some keyboards but for most there’s no specific key for Yen. Word […]
The Microsoft Office Home Use Program (HUP) is a great way to save on Office 365 or Office 2019 for employees of many companies, organizations, governments and even some military personnel. Here’s details on the savings possible with the recent changes to the HUP. What’s changed? The Home Use Program (HUP) is changing to the […]
Here’s who can qualify for cheaper Office 365 Home or Personal under the revised Home Use Program and how to get the lower prices. Employer qualification Your employer must have a Microsoft Office Volume Licence agreement with Software Assurance Maintenance (SAM). If Office is widespread in your organization it’s likely they have a volume licence, […]
How to insert the Pound £ currency symbol into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. Both in Office for Windows and Office for Mac. £ symbol is easy on a UK keyboard but for other keyboards there’s no specific key for Pound. Pound is used for British Pounds Sterling and also other ‘pound’ currencies like […]
How to type the Cent symbol ¢ into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook plus any Windows program. Word and Outlook The Cent ¢ symbol has an inbuilt shortcut in Word and Outlook: Ctrl + /, C Hold down the Ctrl key while pressing / then type C (upper or lower case). Alternatively use the […]
The full match schedule for the 2019 Rugby World Cup can appear in Outlook calendar. Internet calendars can be added to your regular appointments or placed in a separate Outlook calendar that can be viewed side-by-side or overlaid on your regular calendar. 2019 Rugby World Cup calendar First, find an online calendar in the webcal […]
The current Home Use Program with Office 2019 sold for a mere $15 is about to end. If you want the perpetual licence Office 2019 for Windows or Mac, you’d better hurry. The full impact of the changed Office Home Use Program (HUP) is becoming clear. We’ve already noted that Office 365 subscriptions are becoming […]
There are three different ways to change an Office icon or SVG graphic. The two official methods with their in-built limitations or some choices before inserting into Office. Within Office Limited SVG/Icon changes are available from the Graphics Tools | Format tab. In this article we’re using an SVG from Wikipedia which has the features […]
Some simple changes to SVG graphics can bypass some of the more annoying limits of SVG support in Word, Excel and PowerPoint for Office 2019/365. Here’s a simple SVG with three parts: the circle <circle> the rectangle <path id=”bar” …> letters are defined in other <path … > and <use …> statements. In this article […]
There are a lot more Office Icon or SVG graphics available than the ones in Office. Office 365 and 2019 has Icons which is Microsoft’s name for SVG graphics. You can find Microsoft’s gallery of SVG graphics at Insert | Icons. That’s just a fraction of what’s available. There are a lot more SVG’s available […]
Here’s a quick and easy way to totally erase file, folders or free disk space so there’s no trace of the original data. Also erasing an entire drive before handing over or selling. As you may know, deleting a file doesn’t really remove it from your computer. Even after deleting from the Recycle Bin, the […]
It’s the Chinese Year of the Pig and there are some symbols in Word, Excel and PowerPoint to mark the occasion in Office for Windows or Mac. The Unicode standard has three Pig related emoji, Pig, Pig Face and Pig Nose. Once you know the names or hex value, they can be found with the […]
Web based email is very common these days but it’s not the best way to handle your email. At worse, webmail can leave you stranded and out-of-touch. A lot of people now use webmail as the only way to access email on their computer, not realising, until it’s too late, that there’s a better way. […]
How can you tell if you’re reading email in a web browser or using email software like Outlook for Windows or Mac? This might seem obvious to some but many people use ’email’ without understanding the important difference between webmail and email programs. There are two ways to read and send emails: use software/apps like […]
Type or enter the ° Degree symbol into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Windows programs generally. Degree ° is a common symbol and should be available in most fonts. If not, try another font or one of the fonts with a very wide range of characters like Arial Unicode MS or Ludica Sans Unicode. Typing […]
Office 365 hosted customers in Europe are recovering from an outage of about two days. Affected customers should make sure Microsoft gives them the downtime discount they’re entitled to. The outage affected Office 365 email and other hosting in the UK and parts of Europe, like The Netherlands and Belgium for about two days late […]
Outlook’s Clutter feature is going away in favor of the Focused Inbox. Both have the same limitation that Microsoft doesn’t talk about much. Clutter was a hyped Outlook/Exchange feature which shunted lower priority messages to a separate folder. Marketing emails, group messages etc could go to Clutter leaving, in theory, important emails only in the […]
If you like Reddit but want to hide it from your boss, co-workers, partner etc then we’ve got a web site for you. It makes Reddit look like Outlook Web Access (aka OWA). Go to https://attaxia.github.io/MSOutlookit/ or http://pcottle.github.io/MSOutlookit/ There’s a web page with the latest Reddit posts in the familiar form of Microsoft Outlook. The […]
As a quick example of what’s possible, here’s a quick look at some photo editing options in Microsoft Office, Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook emails. Since it’s Christmas, we’ll use one of the famous Apollo 8 Earthrise images. We’ve already talked about how Apollo 8’s Earthrise, as we know it, is a cropped, rotated and […]
If you’re sending meeting requests or invitations there’s an important Outlook option to check. Normally, Outlook within a company, uses Microsoft’s own method for including meeting details. That’s OK ‘in-house’ where you can be sure everyone has Outlook. But you don’t know what people outside the organization use to manage email and calendar. Buried at […]
Icons are a relatively new part of Office 365 for Windows/Mac but can they be used in emails that go to people not using Office 365? SVG graphics are widely supported in web browsers but not all email programs know what to do with these new images. What do they see if you’ve used an […]
Meeting or party invitations don’t have to be plain, old white background emails, go for something a little more fancy or useful. Officially, Microsoft suggests using their Stationery themes to change the look of an email. But that’s not available for invitation emails. There are some formatting choices also missing from invitation emails. Whenever formatting […]
Sending out party and other non-business invitations is quite possible in Outlook. While the system is primarily intended for meetings in companies, individuals can use it too. All that’s in our article Easy Invitations with Outlook still applies today. Microsoft has tinkered with the look of Outlook but the fundamentals remain the same. Using Outlook […]
Office Watch reader, Meredith M. asks a question we’ve heard many times before. Why can’t you buy individual Office programs instead of paying for an Office bundle with programs you don’t need? “My issue: I need ONLY Word, Excel and Access–but I NEED them. I know that I cannot buy them separately but does anyone […]
It’s been five years since the Word, Excel, PowerPoint and other Office icons were given a new look. Now they’ve been announced and, frankly, we could not care less. New look icons don’t make any difference to anyone’s daily use of Office. It’s like supermarket groceries that boast ‘New Packaging’ as if any customers care? […]
Looking for some Christmas images, pictures or graphics? Microsoft Office has some in-built options for the festive tide of Yule. Add these images into Word documents, Outlook emails, PowerPoint slides or even Excel worksheets. Unsubtle Hint: Christmas Cheer with Office has a collection of festive cards, letters, gift tags, emails ready to open, edit and […]
