When and how to switch from Office 2010 – your questions answered
Office 2010 ends support on 13 October 2020 and we’ve been receiving questions from readers asking about switching to newer Microsoft Office. We’ll answer questions about when to update, what to replace Office 2010 and important factors to consider. We’re hearing concerns about privacy in modern Office, reliability and the constant, monthly, changes in the […]
Do you have Application Guard for Microsoft Office?
Microsoft 365 Enterprise customers can now try Application Guard as a new way to protect against malicious documents infecting computers.What is Application Guard and what it means for Office 365 Application Guard is a combination of Windows 10 Defender and Office programs that opens a suspect document in a special way. With hardware virtualization, the […]
Nifty new adaptive mini-toolbar coming to Word 365
Microsoft Word is getting the adaptive mini-toolbar. The extension to the mini-toolbar appeared in preview versions of PowerPoint recently. Now it’s in Word previews as well. The buttons on the right change according to how you use Word. Compare that to the current Word mini-toolbar with a fixed list of buttons. The Word 365 adaptive […]
Fill in a PDF form with your signature
There are several ways to fill in a PDF form and add your signature with Microsoft Word, Acrobat Reader or online services. All these tips are free with nothing to pay. It’s possible to ‘sign’ a PDF form and return it without making a paper copy. Paper forms are so 2019 <g>. There’s no need […]
Easy Office document hacking with VBA Stomping or Purging
Common programming tools can be used to make malicious Office workbooks which bypass both online security checks and Microsoft’s own protections in Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Access. We’ll explain what’s happening and what Microsoft could do better. VBA Purging or VBA Stomping are clever tricks to make an Office documents (e.g. .xlsm Excel workbook) with […]
Customer login now required to use Microsoft 365 apps
There’s a change in the way Microsoft 365 works with a sign-in to a Microsoft account. This applies to Word 365, Excel 365, PowerPoint 365 and other Office apps. Up to recently, Microsoft 365 / Office 365 has worked normally either when signed into a Microsoft account or not. Having a Microsoft account wasn’t required […]
Easy Voting by email in Outlook
Microsoft is releasing a ‘Quick Poll’ option in Outlook ignoring the very similar, voting buttons, option that’s already in Outlook for Windows and Outlook for Mac. Use Voting Buttons to ask a question and Outlook will automatically collect responses. Office Watch also explains how recipient see the voting options and respond. Voting buttons have been […]
Format text with Dictate voice commands in Word
Dictate now has formatting commands with two ways to apply bold, italic, underline and other text formatting as you speak. Dictate with formatting is now available in Word Online (in a web browser) for Microsoft 365 customers. It’ll spread to other Word releases (for Windows, Mac etc) later. To use voice formatting, choose Home | […]
Microphone setup and settings for Dictate and Windows 10
Setting up and testing a microphone to work with Windows 10 is necessary before using Dictate in Office. Go to Windows settings to control which microphone is used by Word 365’s Dictate. Dictate has no microphone settings of its own (in Word for Windows or Word Online). Both use the Windows default recording device. That’s […]
Dictate into documents with Word 365 for Mac
Mac Word 365 and Outlook 365 have the same powerful ‘Speech to Text’ option, Dictate, that’s in the Windows version of Word and Outlook. No compromises or differences except the setup is a LOT easier. Dictate is only available to Microsoft 365 subscribers with Office 365 software for Mac, Windows, iPhone, iPad and Android devices. […]
Did Dictate disappear in Word?
Click on Dictate in Word Online (in a web browser) and it looks like nothing happens. Don’t worry, you can still speak to Word and it’ll type but the interface has been minimized. Instead of opening a Dictate pull-down list, it’s now a trio of icons at the bottom of the document. You’re fully forgiven […]
Left Right arrow ↔ in Outlook, Excel, PowerPoint and Word
Type the Left Right arrow ↔ into Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint or Outlook. Both in Office for Windows and Office for Mac. How Left Right arrow ↔ looks in different fonts. Here’s some examples of how Left Right arrow ↔ looks in common Office fonts. Left Right arrow ↔ codes These are the important code […]
Three extra audio formats that work with Microsoft 365’s Transcribe
According to Microsoft, there’s only four audio formats accepted by their new Transcribe option to convert audio into a text transcription. That’s not true, there are more formats possible with no conversion necessary. The official list of audio formats for Transcribe is .MP4 .M4A .MP3 and .WAV. Strictly speaking that’s only three formats because .MP4 […]
Double Key encryption coming to Microsoft 365
Microsoft is making an important step towards cloud storage security with the public preview of Double Key Encryption. That means, for the first time, Microsoft customers can secure their data from access, even by Microsoft itself. All the ‘secure’ cloud storage from Microsoft can be accessed by Microsoft. For all their talk about security, the […]
Tricks to formatting Word’s Footnotes and Endnotes
Change the look of Microsoft Word footnotes and endnotes. You can change the look of footnotes and endnotes using their linked styles: Footnote Reference Footnote Text Endnote Reference Endnote Text The two ‘… Reference’ styles create the look of the numbers, usually just superscript positioning of the default paragraph font. Changing the style could radically […]
Introducing the Notes Pane for Footnotes and Endnotes
The Notes Pane is the key to some useful Footnote and Endnote options Now that Print Layout is the main editing view in Microsoft Word, the Notes pane has been somewhat forgotten but it’s the home of details in the Footnotes and Endnotes. Get to the Notes Pane Switch to the References tab and choose […]
