All about Microsoft Office Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook, Microsoft 365, Office 2021 and earlier versions.
Add Apollo 11 events and anniversary into Outlook
The 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 is our excuse to show-off some features in Outlook for Windows/Mac. How to add past events, post events in other time zones, get reminders of upcoming anniversaries and set reminders for longer times than Outlook allows. Adding Past Events Outlook can save details of past events. That it’s in […]
Why Venice invented italics … you can use that trick in Microsoft Word.
Back in the 16th Century, italic fonts were invented and that trick can still be used today in Microsoft Word. Italics let you fit more text into the same space. An innovative Venetian publisher, Manutius, needed to make small and affordable books. Paper was expensive so anything that put more text on the page was […]
German schools should not use Office 365 says Privacy Commissioner
The Privacy Commissioner for the German state of Hesse says that Office 365 should not be used in schools due to privacy concerns and access to the data by US authorities. It’s the result of Microsoft withdrawing from a previous arrangement to have German located servers which only the German authorities could regulate. In 2018, […]
July security bug roundup and documentation errors
It’s time for the July roundup of patches for yet more security bugs in Microsoft Office including Office 365 and Office 2016 for Windows plus Office 2013 and 2010. Plus the latest example of confusing documentation errors. Office 365 and Office 2019 A bug which lets Office Javascript doesn’t check the web page requesting details […]
Do you have the right SPF for your emails?
Anyone with their own domain name for email needs to make sure their SPF setting is correct. These days not just recommended, it’s critical to ensuring email reaches its destination. We’re not talking about sunscreen but Sender Policy Framework which is a method of verifying that emails for a domain name come from an authorized […]
Font gives away fake document but it’s blamed on time travel
Here’s another case of someone trying to backdate fake documents and being caught by hidden details in the file. The font is the giveaway but not in the usual way. It’s the ongoing saga of Craig Wright, once a big name in the cyber-currency game. He’s now involved in a court case about the alleged […]
The Windows update you really do need to install today
There’s a security bug in Windows that’s so serious Microsoft has released fixes for version of Windows they don’t officially support anymore. Here are links to the critical updates necessary or workaround if updating isn’t possible. About Bluekeep The Bluekeep security hole is being used by criminals to attack computers to install ransomware or steal […]
Translate a whole Word document to another language
Word lets you translate an entire document in one go, either right click anywhere in the document, right click and select Translate, or go to Review | Translate | Translate Document. As with translating a selection, the Translator will open in a sidebar, where you can select the languages to translate from and to. Generally, […]
Translating selected text in Word
Word has a feature to translate text from one language to another. Whilst the translation may not be perfect, it does give you a starting point to understanding what the text says. You can either translate a selected piece of text, or the whole document. Translate works slightly differently depending on which you choose. Choosing […]
Make a distraction free Microsoft Word
If you’re the sort of person who’s easily distracted, or just want to focus on the content of your document without worrying about formatting, there are a number of ways you can clear the distractions from Microsoft Word, so you can focus on the text you’re writing. Minimize the Ribbon Remove the entire ribbon from […]
Office 2016/2013/2010 bug fix lists for July 2019
Here’s a summary of the July non-security updates for Office 2016, Office 2013 and Office 2010. These updates should be automatically installed via Microsoft Update or you can apply them manually. Install them now if there’s a listed bug you need fixing, otherwise play it safe. Leave some time for any bugs in the patches […]
Iranian hackers attack using old Outlook security bug
The US government has issued a new warning about malware which takes advantage of a security lapse in Outlook for Windows, which was patched over 18 months ago. The warning generated a lot of scary headlines, especially since there’s suspect Iranian involvement. If you’ve been taking standard precautions and updated your Office for Windows there’s […]
Excel’s Power Query security exploit is a worry, but not a big worry
The Power Query exploit in Excel is a concern but one that most Excel users are already protected from. Look past some of the shock headlines (e.g “120 million users personal information at stake due to Microsoft Excel flaw”) . Mimecast did a good job tracing this security bug in Power Query which has existed […]
Windows 10 Registry %@$-up by Microsoft is no accident
There are times when we wonder about the decision-making process at Microsoft and the revelation about the stopping of registry backups in Windows 10 is a sad example of a bad choice. We’ll explain what Microsoft secretly did last year to make Windows 10, Office and other programs less reliable and how you can fix […]
Lame Icons in Office 365 isn’t helped by adding 300 more
Microsoft is hyping the addition of 300 more icons to Office 365 perhaps hoping to distract customers from the many problems finding and using the Insert | Icons feature in Office 365. We like the addition of SVG graphics (Icons) into Office because it opens up a much wider range of scalable graphics. Office lacked […]
300 more Icons in Office, but which ones and where?
Microsoft is boasting that the Office 365 ‘Icons’ collection now has 300 more graphics but no information on what they are and no help finding them. The release of more Icons just emphasizes the problems with this cloud feature. Icons is a cloud service that delivers SVG graphics to Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook for […]
