In Word 2010:

1. Click on the File button in the top left-hand corner of your screen.
2. Click on Save and Send in the menu that pops up.
3. Double-click on Create PDF/XPS Document at the bottom of the next menu.
4. Type a name for the file next to File name in the box that pops up.
5. Click on Publish at the bottom of the box.

In Word 2007:

1. Click on the round Office button in the upper left-hand corner of your screen.
2. Move your arrow down to hover over Save As.
3. Click on PDF or XPS on the right-hand side.
4. In the box that pops up, make sure it says PDF next to Save as Type.
5. Name your document.
6. Click on Publish at the bottom of the box.

You can either just follow along or get hands-on experience by downloading the PowerPoint presentation to your computer. To do that, click on the Download button below. Printing these instructions might be a good idea too. The print icon is at the bottom of the page below the tutorial.

Download

Copying the Text

1. Open the Pasting Presentation. Click on Slide 1 in the Slides Paneon the left.
2. Select the title text “This is a tutorial.” (Selecting is also commonly known as Highlighting.)
3. Copy the text. There are three ways to do this:
• Hold down the Ctrl key on your keyboard and hit the C key.
• Click on the Copy button on the very left-hand side of the Home tab in the Clipboard group.
• Right click on the text, and then left click on Copy.

Copying the Title

Pasting the Conventional Way:

1. Click on Slide 2 in the Slides Pane .
2. That text should disappear.
3. Choose one of these ways to paste:

• Hold down the Ctrl key on your keyboard and hit “V”.
• Click on the Paste button in the Clipboard group on the Home tab. It looks like a clipboard.

Pasting the Boring Way

The text looks pretty plain, huh?. Boring! Also, you’ll probably see a little annoying Paste icon in the bottom right-hand corner of your text. Click outside of the text box to make it disappear for now. We’ll get rid of it permanently later.

More Paste Options

Let’s move on. Watch what happens now:

1. Click on Slide 3 in the Slides Pane.

2. Click anywhere in the box that says “Click to add title” to make that text disappear.

3. Click on the tiny arrow under the word Paste, again located on the very left-hand side of the Home tab to get to the Paste Options box.

The Paste Options Box

4. Hover your mouse over the far left button in the box. See the formatted text previewed on the screen? The text converted to the format used on this slide.

5. Next hover your mouse over the far right button. This is the Keep Text Only button. It confuses me because, when you hover over it, the text appears formatted for the current slide. That doesn’t seem “text only” to me! It just gives the same result as the far left button.

6. However, this time we’ll see a different result. Hover your mouse over the Paintbrush icon and click. The text is now formatted based upon its original slide, the first one. That actually doesn’t look too bad.

7. Click on the tiny arrow below the Paste button again. Then click on the Picture button, which looks like a mountain. Clicking this button will paste the text into the slide in the form of an image.

8. You can’t edit the text when it’s in this form. I’m not sure how often you’d want to use this Picture button. But I guess it’s nice to know the option is there.

That’s it for now. I hope you found this tutorial interesting and that it helped you.

To learn more about PowerPoint or the other Microsoft Programs, I teach remotely all over the world. For more information please click here.

Frustrated that you can’t move that photo or image to where you want it? Here’s how to make it so you can drag your pictures all over the place. This tutorial’s first part tells how to move a single picture in a particular document. To change Word’s settings so you’ll always be able to move pictures around, click here.

First, of course, you need to insert the picture you want to move:

1. Click on the Insert tab on the ribbon at the top of your screen.
2. Click on Picture in the Illustrations group.
3. Browse to your picture and insert it into the document.

Now let’s make it move:

1. Click once on the picture to make sure it selected.
2. Click on the Format tab under where it says Picture Tools above the ribbon. (This Format tab is called a “contextual tab” because it only shows up when an image is selected.)
3. Click on the Wrapped Text button toward the right-hand side in the Arrange group. The button has a picture of a dog on it.
4. You have many choices now to make the picture move around. However, my favorite is Behind Text. This is in case you want to type on top of the image. So go ahead and click Behind Text.
5. Move your mouse into the middle of the picture until it turns into a four-pointed arrow. Then you should be able to drag the image all over the page!

Wrap the Picture Behind the Text

Ah ha!But what if you don’t want to go through that every time. Well then, you can change it permanently! Here’s how:

1. Click on that File tab in the top left-hand corner of your screen.
2. Click on Options near the bottom of the left-hand side in the box that pops up.
3. Click on Advanced on the left-hand side of the next box.
4. Scroll down to the Cut, copy, and paste section.
5. In that section, on the left-hand side, you’ll see some text that says Insert/paste picture as. Across from it, on the right-hand side, is some text with a drop-down arrow beside it. Click on that arrow.
6. Click on Behind text.
7. Click OK to get out of the box.

You should now be able to move your pictures forevermore!

Permanently Move Pictures Around

If you’re interested in learning more about Microsoft Word or the other Office programs, I teach remotely all over the world. For more information please click  here.

1. Click on the File tab in the upper left-hand corner of your screen.
2. Click on Save & Send near the bottom of the menu that pops up.
3. Click on Change File Type in the middle of the box.
4. In the middle of the box on the right, double-click on PowerPoint Show.
5. In the box that pops up, name your presentation, navigate to where you want to save it, and click on Save.

Now you should be able to attach the presentation to an email and send it off!

Saving a PowerPoint Slide Show

Sample Sales Spreadsheet

1. You’d click in cell E4 and type an “=”.
2. Then you’d type the letter “m”. A box would pop up listing all the formulas starting with that letter.
3. You’d double-click on the word “MAX.”
4. Next you’d select cells B4 through D4. You’d see a dotted line around them.
5. Last, you’d hit the Enter key. The number 7 would appear.

I hope you were able to follow that! Maybe you’ll now be able to apply it with other formulas in your own spreadsheets.

If you’d like to learn more about Excel or the other Microsoft Office programs, I teach remotely all over the world. For more information please click here.

Here’s the first way:

1. Type a column of numbers, such as B4 through B15 under the name Juanita.
2. Click in cell B16.
3. Click on the AutoSum button on Excel’s Home tab. It’s located near the right-hand side in the Editing group. Be sure to actually click on the ∑ rather than the black arrow next to it.
4. Press the Enter key. You would see the total (85).

AutoSum button on the Home tab

Here’s the second way:

1. Type another column of numbers, such as the numbers in cells C4 through C15 shown above under Josephine.
2. Click in cell C16.
3. This time click on the other AutoSum button. It’s on the Formulas tab near the left-hand side in the Function Library group.
4. Press the Enter key again.

AutoSum button on the Formulas Tab

The third way:

You could use a keyboard shortcut instead. Type another column of numbers and click in cell D16. Then hold down the Alt key and press the “=” key. And of course, press Enter afterward.

Also, did you know you can look at your formula at any time? Just click on the cell, and look up in the Formula Bar. This is the long white bar located above the spreadsheet and below the Ribbon.

The Formula Bar

If you get an inkling to see your formula in the actual cell again, press the F2 key on your keyboard. Then press Enter to go back to your total.

This blog post will explain the many ways to color text in Microsoft Word. However, these instructions also apply to the other Microsoft Office programs, including Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook.

The Easiest way to Color Text:

To begin with, find the Font Color button in Microsoft Word. It l looks like the letter “A” and is located in the Font group on the Home tab of the Ribbon. Click on the dropdown arrow to the right of it. This reveals the color picker.

The quickest way to change your text color is to click on either a Theme Color or Standard Color in the box that pops up. The Theme Colors are light and dark shades based on the default Office theme. (You can see other theme choices by clicking on the Themes button on the left-hand side of the Page Layout tab.)

By the way, clicking on “Automatic” will change the text back to its default black color.

On the other hand, the Standard Colors are highly saturated colors. These colors stay the same even when you choose a different theme.

Are the Standard Colors in the box too boring? There are other Standard Colors to choose from:

1. Click on where it says “More Colors” at the bottom of the box.
2. Click on one of the hexagons.
3. Click OK. Now your text should be that color!

More Standard Colors

Custom Colors

Now here comes the fun part. Try this:

1. Click on the dropdown arrow and then “More Colors” again.
2. Choose a hexagon again.
3. Click on the Custom tab at the top of the box. You should see a black arrow pointing to your color in a vertical bar.

In this box there are several ways to choose and adjust your color. To begin with, you can drag the black arrow up and down in the vertical box choose a lighter or darker shade.

You can also click anywhere in the box to choose a completely different color.

But there are also more specific ways to choose colors. Below the colorful box you’ll see the words “Color model”. Beside it are the letters “RGB”. These letters stand for red, green, and blue, and represent the color combinations used in televisions and computers.

Every color you can use in Microsoft Office is represented by red, green, and blue color values. Each value is a number ranging from 1 to 255. For instance, I chose a shade of red, and the number that showed up in the red box was 235, the green box 7, and the blue box 5. If you already know the specific values for the color you want, you can type them in the boxes yourself.

Custom Colors

HSL

Next, click on the dropdown arrow next to where it says “Color model”. Click on HSL. The acronym in this instance stands for hue, saturation, and luminance. (The terms can vary depending on who’s using it.) Here’s what the terms mean that Microsoft uses.

• Hue -a color of the rainbow. Click on the arrows to see the marker moves horizontally across the spectrum in the box.
• Saturation – the intensity of the color. A color with low saturation looks washed out. Click on the arrows to watch the marker move up and down. Notice how vivid or pale the color gets.
• Luminance  – how much light is being reflected from the color. At least that’s the textbook definition. To be honest, I don’t see much of a difference between Saturation and Luminance.

 There you have it! Again, these color choices apply to the other Microsoft programs as well.

1. Click on the File tab in the upper left-hand corner of the screen.
2. Click on “Options” in the menu on the left.
3. Click on “Mail” near the top left in the box that pops up.
4. In the top section, under “Compose Messages”, see if it says “Rich Text” next to “Compose message in this format”.
5. If so, click on the dropdown arrow and choose “HTML”.
6. Click OK to get out of the box.

You can also check to see if individual emails you’re writing or replying to are in Rich Text. To do this:

1. Open the email.
2. Click on the Format Text tab on the ribbon at the top of your screen.
3. Near the left-hand side, in the Format group, check to see if “Rich Text” is highlighted. If so, click on HTML instead.

See if your attachments now appear below the Subject line instead of the body of the email.

If you’d like to learn more about Outlook or the other Microsoft Office programs, I teach remotely all over the world. The cost is $15 for 15 minutes, with only a 15-minute minimum. For more information please click here.

Creating Your First Slide

When you first open PowerPoint you’ll see a large square in the middle of the screen. This square represents your new presentation’s first slide. Ignore everything else in the window for now.

The slide should contain two rectangles marked by dotted lines. There’s also some text inside. These rectangles are calledplaceholders because they’re places where you’ll type.

The top placeholder is meant to contain your presentation’s title and the bottom its subtitle. Thus, this slide is called the Title Slide. You’re not required to start your presentation with a title slide. You can actually begin with any slide type you want. This is just Microsoft’s suggestion.

The text in the slide’s top placeholder says “Click to add title.” Go ahead and click anywhere in the rectangle. The text should disappear and leave a blinking black line, the cursor, in the rectangle’s center. The cursor represents where your text will appear when you start typing and is used in the other Microsoft office programs.

Type the title of your presentation. As you do you’ll see the text center perfectly inside the placeholder. The border will disappear.

Title Slide

Next, click in the box below and type the subtitle if you have one. Let’s say, though, you don’t want to have a subtitle for your presentation. We can delete that placeholder then. Here’s how:

1. Move your mouse arrow on top of the box’s dotted border until it turns into a black, four pointed arrow. You make have to fiddle a bit to see it. Then click.2. Hit the Delete key on your keyboard.

Adding New Slides

Let’s insert a couple more slides. There are several ways to do this.

The first way is to click on one of the two New Slide buttons on the Home tab. The buttons are located in the Slides group near the left-hand side of the tab.

It looks like there’s only one New Slide button, but there are actually two. The one on top looks like a white square (or rectangle). The one below says “New Slide,” and has a tiny black triangle beside it. These triangles are actually called dropdown arrows. Click on the white square.

New Slide Square Button

Doing this inserts a new “Title and Content” slide into your presentation. This slide type is the default. In other words, if you don’t specifically choose what type of new slide you want to insert, you’ll automatically insert a “Title and Content” slide.

Inserting Other Types of New Slides

However, if you click on the bottom button you’ll get a whole array of new slide formats to choose from. The format you choose depends on what you’re planning to put on your next slide. For instance, you could insert a content slide, which lets you easily insert pictures, tables, charts, and other visuals. There’s also a blank format that acts as a clean slate you could do anything with.

Normal View

When you first opened PowerPoint your slide appeared in Normal view. Your slides should still appear that way because Normal view is the default, and you haven’t changed it.

You’ll notice there are a couple parts to Normal view. The slide itself is located in the Slides Pane. There’s also a white strip below that says “Click to add notes.” This strip is called the Notes Pane. This pane can be enlarged, and is where you can type notes about the slides for either yourself or your audience.

On the left-hand side of the window is the Overview Pane. This pane contains two tabs, the Slides tab and the Outline tab.

The Slides tab shows thumbnails of the slides in your presentation. Clicking on a thumbnail will make that slide show up in a larger view on the right (in the Slides pane).

On the Outline tab you can type text for all the slides and also see what text is on them. Personally, though, I hardly ever use the Outline tab. I’d rather just click on the thumbnails on the Slides tab. That way I can see a larger view in the Slides Pane of what I’ve written on each slide.

Normal View

Try it!

OK, time to get hands-on. Please insert five new slides, each a different type. Afterward you should have enough slides in your presentation to work with.

Now type some text on each one. Click the thumbnails on the Slides tab to move from one slide to another.

Please don’t skip the exercise because you’ll need these slides to follow the next instructions! (You thought you could get away without doing it, huh. J)

Other Views

Looking at your slides in other views besides Normal makes creating certain aspects of your presentation easier. There are two ways to change views. One method is to click on the View tab on the Ribbon (the last tab on the right). You’ll see several view choices on the left-hand side.

The second way, and in my mind the quickest, is to click on the view buttons in the lower right-hand corner of your screen.

View Buttons

Slide Sorter View

The leftmost view button is Normal view, the view you’re in now. The next one over, made of four little squares, is Slide Sorter view. The third and fourth buttons are for Reading view (not very useful), and Slide Show view (very useful)!

Click on the Slide Sorter view button to see what your slides look like. When you’re in Slide Sorter view it’s easy to move slides around, as well as add transitions or animation.

Reading View

Reading view is new to PowerPoint and wasn’t available in the 2007 version. This view is supposed to provide you a way to look at the slides exactly as when you play your slide show. My personal opinion is that this view isn’t necessary, and I myself don’t plan on using it. There are enough ways to preview slide shows without causing more confusion. So, for the sake of this tutorial, we’re going to skip Reading View.

Slide Show View

The last icon to the right is the Slide Show button. I think it looks like a trophy cup. You click on this button to actually play the slide show.

You can play your nascent presentation using the slides you created in the exercise. Here’s how to do it:

1. Click on the thumbnail of your first slide.
2. Click on the Slide Show button.
3. Click your left mouse button to advance to each slide.
4. Press the Escape (Esc) key on your keyboard when the slide show ends.

There you have it. You’ve just played your first, very basic, slide show!

If you’d like to learn more about PowerPoint or the other Microsoft Office programs, I teach remotely all over the world. There’s only a 15-minute minimum. For more information please click here.

1. Format the paragraph the way you want it to look.
2. Right click on the paragraph.
3. In the menu that appears move your mouse to where it says “Styles”.
4. Click on “Save Selection as a New Quick Style” in the next menu.
5. In the box that pops up type a name for your style next to where it says “Name”.
6. Click on the “Modify” button at the bottom of the box. Another box should appear.
7. If you want to save your style for other documents, put a dot next to “New documents based on this template” at the bottom of the box.
8. Click OK to get out of the box.