Microsoft now lets you add your own virtual background image for Teams video calls. Before this change, there was a simple hack to add your own image as a virtual background. Microsoft rushed to add virtual backgrounds to Teams video in response to the popularity of Zoom. A major problem
Microsoft’s Money in Excel is worth looking at even if you don’t want to use it. There are some useful features and formula tricks you can use in your own workbooks. Group Columns Grouping columns or rows is normally for bringing together lists rows or columns. Grouping days into a
Apple is switching their Mac computers from Intel to their own in-house chipsets known as ‘Apple Silicon’. A change in CPU is a big deal and raises questions about compatibility with Microsoft Office. The change from Intel to Apple CPU’s has been expected for some time and will take years
Animated GIF support is coming (finally!) to Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint. We discovered the new feature in a new Insiders build, Microsoft hasn’t announced anything. Here’s an animated GIF playing in Word 365. Paste or Insert an animated GIF now has play/pause buttons included (bottom left corner). The animation
Microsoft has expanded Teams to allow personal groups like families, clubs and groups to use the service. Within Teams it’s possible to text chat, save and edit documents, share calendars and lists. A family could have a grocery list to which anyone can add items before the next supermarket run.
There’s a bug in the activation process for Microsoft Office from Office 2016 way back to Office 2007 which makes it appear that there’s no telephone option available. The message “Telephone activation is no longer supported for your product” isn’t true. Phone activation is still available. Microsoft doesn’t seem interested
Money in Excel shows up on the Home tab once you’ve opened the Microsoft template. Here’s how to remove its button from the ribbon or completely remove the add-in from Excel. As soon as you open and use Money in Excel, it adds itself to the Home tab on the
Microsoft has gone public with their Money Excel template to import and manage financial transactions from bank accounts. There are some undocumented tricks available and an important security recommendation that Microsoft overlooks. Money in Excel can import transaction details (US bank accounts only) and show current balances. And convert that
It’s hard enough for people to keep straight what is the latest version of Microsoft Office without some web sites getting it horribly wrong. The current Microsoft Office products are confusing, no doubt about it. Microsoft keeps changing their product names, policies and features. Microsoft’s ‘fixed’ support policy is written
If you want a list of numbered items using only odd or even numbers; how do you do that? Are you thinking of Word’s automatic numbering feature? The answer is “Yes” if you add little Word trickery. What exactly you need to do is use the Numbering features but leave
The latest global exchange rates can go directly into Excel 365 for Windows and Mac. No plugins or extras are necessary because it’s in Excel 365 though it’s hiding away. Foreign exchange rates are part of the Stock data type. They weren’t part of the original Stocks data feed but
When Microsoft announced it was firing news human editors and replacing them with ‘Artificial Intelligence’, it was only a matter of time before the AI system would get it wrong. No-one expected it to happen so soon, even before all the humans had left the building. There’s a lesson in
Some useful new features have now been rolled out to the public versions of Microsoft 365 (Office 365) for May 2020. Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook all have improvements. Two we’ve already told you about, the other is new. Stock Images, Cutout People and Stickers Or what Microsoft calls “New
If you’ve lost or accidently deleted a Word for Mac document (or Excel or PowerPoint) there are various places to look for it some might not occur to you. This article is also helpful if you’re trying to find and delete any files or documents that must be removed for
Some more tricks for improving or fixing rounded corner boxes in Office. Change the corner angle or roundness even to a stadium shape. Alter the border line a little or a lot. Make a Word text box with rounded corners explains the basics of making the rectangular box into something
‘Tell me’ help box is now in Microsoft/Office 365 for Mac as a way to find features on the ribbon. However it continues to have the same limitations that are in the Windows version. Look for the lightbulb and ‘Tell me’ box beside the ribbon tabs. Type in a phrase
Samsung’s new Access plan lets you pay a set price each month, get a replacement phone every nine months plus a Microsoft 365 ‘subscription’ plan as well. Is the Microsoft 365 element optional or even make sense (especially if you already have ‘Office 365’ as was)? It’s an interesting way
At long last, Microsoft and VMWare have decided to ‘play nice’ and allow their virtual machine products to run on Windows at the same time. Until now, Windows users wanting virtual machines had to choose between Hyper/V (comes with higher end Windows 10) or Vmware Workstation. You could not run
PowerPoint has an option to ‘zoom out’ on a still image from a close-up view to a wider look at the same picture. It’s not a great option and Microsoft could make it a lot easier. Here’s how to do a ‘Zoom out’ on an image This is an endnote
A UK politician got caught sending an email with optional stock phrases and guides still in the message. Is there a simple way to stop that happening? Most organizations have standard wording and stock phrases which is understandable but there’s a risk those helpers are left in an email or
Helen Feddema our Access guru is looking for people to test her Time & Expense application … “After a long delay, I have updated my Time & Expense application for Office 365 (it is my Coronavirus project!). The app uses custom Journal items to record time worked and expenses incurred
Microsoft Excel is the perfect tool to analyze and rank your fantasy football ranking. This article explains how to import players, other rankings and add your own opinion. How to Build Your Own Fantasy Football Rankings “There is no reason to re-invent the wheel by typing out all of the
We continue our look at the options for the ‘Ken Burns Effect’ in PowerPoint by combining the pan and zoom animation features into a complete effect. It adds interest and movement to a still image with two separate animation effects available, in part, in PowerPoint. Ken Burns Effect in PowerPointThe
One of our readers just saved over 20% on her Microsoft 365 renewal using one of Microsoft’s own products – Outlook! Julia A. a long-time Office-Watch.com reader took our advice about early renewal of Microsoft 365 (formerly Office 365). She just bought another year of Microsoft 365 from a retailer
