StudentEmpowered

Moving (Moved) to a New Blog!

It has been a couple of months since I graduated from college – a time where I traded homework with reports, school presentations with presentations over LiveMeeting and another bunch of school stuff for work stuff. The past few months have been fun so far – I am really learning a lot of new things related to my role and every day I am finding more ways on how Microsoft Office can help me do things faster and smarter.

StudentEmpowered was established to foster student to student conversations regarding student productivity. This is where I shared my ideas on how things can be done much easier for students. Now that I have graduated from college – I feel that this is the time to write about real-world productivity, productivity not just for students – but for everyone in general.

Dear Readers, I invite you now to advance and continue our conversation with My Office Notes – a blog where we can talk about productivity in the real-world. Please follow and watch out for more Ideas, Tips, and Tricks on My Office Notes (www.myofficenotes.com)

Thanks!

ClipArt Tip: Include ‘Web Collections’ when searching for ClipArt

I am one of the people who get excited whenever Microsoft releases a new version of Office. Aside from anticipating the new features and functionalities, I am for one anticipates the additions to the ClipArt gallery.

Well if you notice recently, there are little or no additions to the ClipArt gallery and I am sure, since you are using Microsoft Office for x number of years now I bet that you are already tired of seeing images like this:

Well if you have an always-on connection to the internet, you can include Web Collections when you search for ClipArt. To do this, you go to the Insert tab of the Ribbon, Click ClipArt and on the ClipArt task pane under the "Search in:" pull down menu check 'Web Collections'.

With this, you will gain access to hundreds (or maybe thousands) of ClipArt, images available online or even have access to high quality photographs such as this:

This is all for now and have a great time doing nice presentations and documents.

Working on your academic paper, you may want to turn on Grammar and Style Checking.

I know it is that time of the semester again. We are busy working on the different requirements that each subject dictates to us students and I know that you may now be working on a term paper. Would your paper sound academic if it would contain the following concatenations:

1.       Can’t for Cannot

2.       Would’ve for Would have,

3.       Should’ve for Should have

Just as I learned from my English class, it is not formal to have concatenations on a term paper. In addition, would you like to avoid using first-person, since in academic papers you should be using something like “the researcher” rather than “I”?

Aside from correcting our mistakes in grammar, Microsoft Word can also check the style of our writing. By default, Microsoft Word only checks the grammar in our documents. To have Microsoft Word check your style you have to do the following (Word 2007)

1.       Click on the Office Button, then go to Word Options

2.       Click Proofing

3.       In the writing style change “Grammar only” to “Grammar and Style”

4.       Should you wish to customize what Microsoft Word checks, you may click “Settings” and check / uncheck the different options.

5.       Click “Ok” and Microsoft Word should start checking your style.

Tip:

I know that some of you do not believe that they committed a mistake with their grammar when Microsoft places a green wavy underline on the word/s and phrases. Do you know that you can get some sort of explanation by right clicking on the green wavy line and clicking on the “About this Sentence” menu item?

Let us say we have the following sentence, which we thought is right:

If we performed about this sentence on “are” we’ll get something like this:

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to Everyone

Hello Everyone,

I want to personally greet everyone who is reading the StudentEmpowered Blog and have attended my talks on the Microsoft Office System for the past couple of months a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. It has been a great 2007 and I hope that we will be able to continue to be productive in the coming year, 2008.

Let Microsoft Office Word 2007 do some math!

Somewhere in the later part of May, I have written a post entitled "OneNote 2007 Tip: the Calculator". It's really a great feature since you don't have to pull that calculator out of your bag whenever you need to compute for something arithmetic while you are taking down notes in class.

Now we all know that Microsoft Office Word 2007 has this great equation editor that allows us to create equations in our documents easier compared to the old equation editor. However as what we always say during talks and demos, it will not solve math problems for you. Well apparently this has changed thanks to the new Add-in for Microsoft Word 2007: Microsoft Math.

What can the new add-in do?

While it cannot do integration and differentiation from your Calculus class, it can do some really good things like plotting graphs in 2-D and 3D, solving inequalities or equations, calculate a numerical result and simplifying algebraic expressions.

How do I use it?

Once installed, when working with equations you will see a Math button on the Design tab of the equation tools contextual toolbar. Depending on the equation that you have selected you will have commands such as:

• Solve for x / y
• Plot both sides in 2D/3D
• Calculate
• And More

Some commands need Microsoft Math installed on your PC.

Where can I get it?

If you are using genuine Microsoft Office, you can get it from: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=030fae9c-704f-48ca-971d-56241aefc764&DisplayLang=en

A Late Welcome to the Second Semester!

Hello Guys!

I'm back and welcome to the Second Semester of StudentEmpowered, where we will be having more discussions about Microsoft Office inside the classroom. I just started my second semester almost two weeks ago and this semester I really have an interesting set of subjects such as Literature, Philippine Society and Culture, Basic Economics, Software Engineering, Accounting, Emerging Technologies and Ultimate Frisbee and hopefully from these set of interesting subjects I will be able to share something interesting to you from inside the classroom.

During my semester break, I did a lot of interesting things too, the Philippine Windows Users Group held an event in Cagayan de Oro called GearUp (this is for IT Professionals), in this event I discussed Microsoft Unified Communications and how it empowers the Information Worker along with Microsoft Windows Vista and the Microsoft Office System.

If you are interested, we are inviting you to join the PHIWUG Technical Video Festival which is ongoing right now. This is a contest in which you get to share your knowledge about various Microsoft software through making some sort of video presentation. Contest mechanics are at: http://www.phiwug.org/phiwug/techvideo/

If you have topic suggestions for StudentEmpowered, don't hesitate to e-mail: blog@chesterinteractive.com

Cheers!

Chester

Don’t Copy and Paste: Combine!

Normally when group mates pass documents around (through e-mail, key drive) and when they make their own revisions, one of the major problems would be combining all these revised similar documents into one document. Normally what would you do is to open them all and start comparing them by switching windows, and copy revisions to the working document to a point that you don't know what to do anymore.

Microsoft Office Word 2007 has this command called "Combine", you will find this under the Review tab of the ribbon under Compare.

What happens when you combine?

1. Microsoft Office Word will ask you for the two documents you wish to combine. (e.g. Thesis (Original).docx and Thesis (Revised by Chester Coronel).docx)
2. Microsoft Office Word will ask you on which document will it base the formatting for the combined document.
3. There will be four panels on your screen; on your left is a summary of all the changes made given the source documents. On your center is the combined document and on your right are the original and revised documents.

What to do next after combining?

You will notice that some items have been underlined and colured this is a change that has been detected between the two documents. Review the combine document and either accept or reject the changes that have been made.

I will be posting a screen cast of this feature so that you will better appreciate how this one works in real life. J

Unsubscribe from a Newsletter in One Click

I was browsing my e-mail inbox using Windows Live Hotmail. I clicked on a message that came from an e-group and interestingly this came out: 

Windows Live Hotmail now allows you to unsubscribe from a newsletter by just clicking the unsubscribe link provided. You don't have to go through the lengthy process of unsubscribing, just click and Windows Live Hotmail will do it for you. However, I noticed that before this message appeared, I need to mark the sender as safe.

Adding the Analysis ToolPak in Microsoft Office Excel 2007

One day, I got an e-mail from one of the readers of StudentEmpowered. He was looking on ways on how to do ANOVA in Excel 2007 since he just migrated from Excel 2003. Wondering what ANOVA is, I later found out that it was a part of the Analysis Toolpak.

So how do you add / enable the Analysis Toolpak?

1. Click the Office Button then Click Excel Options
2. Click Add-Ins
3. Beside manage you will see a drop down menu, select Excel Add-ins and click Go
4. On the Add-Ins window, check Analysis ToolPak and click ok. (as well as the other add-ins you want to enable)
5. To access the Analysis ToolPak go to the Data tab of the Ribbon and click Data Analysis

To supplement this blog article, I posted a video in Soapbox demonstrating the steps above.

Demo: Adding the Analysis ToolPak in Excel 2007

Office 2003 Menu Key Sequences in the Microsoft Office Fluent UI

I know a lot of you have memorized some of the menu key sequences in Office 2003. You use those key sequences to navigate the Office 2003 User Interface. Some of these are ALT, E, C for Copy, ALT, E, P for Paste and etc. Now that you are using a 2007 Microsoft Office System edition, I'm sure that you will miss using those key sequences since the Microsoft Office Fluent UI (which is in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and in some parts of Outlook) doesn't have a menu that is similar to those of the previous version.

However do you know that the Microsoft Office Fluent User Interface still supports many of these of these key sequences? Here are some few examples:

To know if you are typing a Microsoft Office 2003 menu key sequence, you will be presented with a tooltip on the ribbon just as like what is presented below:

Learn New Key Sequences    

In the Microsoft Office Fluent UI, it's so easy to learn new key sequences in the new User Interface. This feature is called KeyTips, once you press the ALT key on your keyboard, letters will appear that will help you navigate the ribbon with your keyboard.

Going Beyond Mail Merge: Note Cards

Do you know that the Mail Merge feature can do many more things aside from just filling up the recipient information for us in letters, faxes and any other form of written communication.

During the first semester of the previous school year when I attended my Research Writing class we were introduced by my teacher to note cards. Note Cards are index cards where you place a quotation from your source, the paraphrase of that direct quotation, your notes and comments and some other details about the source. You use those Note Cards to aid creating and organizing your ideas for your research paper.

So how do we use the Mail Merge feature to help us create Note Cards?

Step 1: Create Data Source using Microsoft Office Excel 2007

Fill each cell of the first row of your worksheet with the headers that you will be needing for your note card, examples are the Source #,Topic / Idea, Direct Quotations, Paraphrases, Notes and Comments. After that the succeeding rows with information about your sources.

Once you are done, save your work and close Microsoft Office Excel.

Step 2: Use Mail Merge and Layout your Note Card

Now, open Microsoft Office Word 2007 and click the Mailings tab then click Start Mail Merge then select Document. Click Select Recipients then select Use Existing List. Look for the Microsoft Excel Worksheet that you have created earlier. You will be asked to select a table, so select table wherein your data is contained.

At this point your Excel Worksheet is now "linked" to your working document in Microsoft Office Word 2007. Now, resize your document to the dimensions of your index card, afterwards insert the fields from your Excel Worksheet by clicking the Insert Merge Field command which is located on the Mailings tab of the Ribbon. From there you will be shown a list of fields from your Excel Worksheet. Insert them and layout them on your document.

After that you can now preview the results of your mail merge and finally save or print them to individual index cards.

Now you know how to create Note Cards using Mail Merge. If you want to share something that you have created with Mail Merge don't hesitate to e-mail blog <at> chesterinteractive <dot> com and who knows your solution might be featured in this blog.

Filtering in Microsoft Office Excel 2007

This semester, I have two subjects wherein there's a need to use Microsoft Office Excel extensively, one is Computational Finance and the other is Statistics and Probability. Last week we were given an exercise in my Computational Finance class wherein it involves lots of numbers and analysis. For me it involved lots of filtering.

In the previous version of Microsoft Office Excel, filtering is just limited to selecting a specific value, arranging them either ascending or descending, and custom filters. But now there are lots of things that you can do with filtering in Microsoft Office Excel 2007.

One of the first things you will notice when you work with filters is that there is a checkbox beside each of the value present in the column. Instead of just selecting a single value at a time just as what it would do in the previous version, you can now select several values at a time. You don't need to use custom filters just to get the numbers you want.

In the illustration above, you may notice the options "Filter by Color" and "Sort by Color", now you can actually filter depending on the background color of the cell, the font color, by the cell icon if you have applied Icon Sets from Conditional Formatting. You can use this functionality if for example you might want to highlight the cell with the values you want with green, so later on you can filter by color in which you only want to see cells in the column that has a background color of green.

See how easier it is to filter using Microsoft Excel 2007. If you have any questions regarding the 2007 Microsoft Office System I invite you to come over to Glorietta in the Windows Vista Digital House wherein you can visit Work Passion. There I as well as the other Microsoft Juniors will be able to answer your questions about the new features of Microsoft Office System. I will be there today in the morning until 3:00 PM. Also you will be able to catch the Digital House Presentation and you will realize how Windows Vista and 2007 Microsoft Office System can help improve your lifestyle.

See you there!

The Office-ful Semester

For me and as well as most of you guys out there, the first semester has began! I'm sure most of you are now busy buying school supplies, doing advanced reading and other stuff related to school. I've been in school for almost a week now and here's how I place Microsoft Office into action inside the classroom.

Microsoft Office OneNote is probably the application that I always use inside the classroom. I'm very happy that my teachers are much more open to the idea of taking down notes onto a notebook computer. I organized my subjects into three section groups, namely Monday - Thursday, Tuesday - Friday and Wednesday. With this I could only see the subjects that I need to work-on during the specific day groups. I also use task flags so that I can track any of the assignments / projects that I will need to submit within the semester. Once I get home I synchronize my OneNote Notebook to my Desktop PC so that I could review my notes and annotate them if required.

Microsoft Office Outlook - I should say that I'm an Outlook addict, I use it to send and receive e-mail through my Windows Live Hotmail account using the Microsoft Office Outlook Connector Beta. I use it to plan out my schedules for the whole semester and for a specific day. Maybe you students should try using Outlook.

Microsoft Office Word - I use it mainly on my papers / projects for the semester. With all the new and exciting features in the latest version such as the galleries and live preview, I can focus more on the content instead of thinking about how will I design the document itself. Aside from that I use it to finalize the blog entries that I have created in Microsoft Office OneNote.

Microsoft Office Excel currently I have two subjects wherein I could utilize Microsoft Office Excel to help me get through problems, one is an elective entitled Computational Finance for IT and another one is my core subject entitled Statistics and Probability. So you will be expecting some posts here in my blog on how did I use Excel in both of these subjects soon.

Microsoft Office PowerPoint I should say that I love doing class presentations and class reports. I would always volunteer if the teacher asks. I always use Microsoft Office PowerPoint to create the most impressive slides that I use for my class presentations. Actually as the time of writing, I was preparing for a presentation about Computer Aided Software Engineering for my Systems Analysis and Design class.

Microsoft Office Visio as I have said during the last paragraph, I am currently enrolled in a System Analysis and Design Class. I will be using Microsoft Visio to create diagrams / drawings such as ER Diagrams, DFD Diagram and etc. that I will be needing to be able to design our group project.

So here it is, this is how I use Microsoft Office inside the classroom. Expect more posts as I get through the days of this first semester. Please share your own stories about Microsoft Office inside the classroom, don't hesitate to click the e-mail link above and share your story.

Attaching Files and Printing to your OneNote Notebook

Classes has just started for me last Wednesday and currently I'm using Microsoft Office OneNote to take down my notes in class. I'm very happy since my teachers this semester are very open to the idea of taking down notes using a notebook computer.

I remember the time when I was still in my elementary days wherein my teachers will ask us to either staple or glue the handouts that they are giving to our respective notebooks. At that time "Attaching" handouts to our notebooks is a way to save time so that we will have more time to discuss the lesson rather than copy the notes from the blackboard.

Now in college, some of my teachers give their handouts / readings as downloadable files from the class e-group on the internet. So now how will you make them part of your notes?

Attach the file to OneNote

There are actually two ways to attach a file to OneNote one is to drag the file from a folder / desktop to the page in OneNote and the other way is that to go to insert files. After you have inserted the file you will see the file's icon on your page as what would it look like on the desktop / folder just as what have been illustrated below:

Do you know that once you inserted a file in OneNote, it actually becomes a part of your notebook? So everywhere you go, the files that you attached with your notebook stays with your notebook even if the file is not physically present on the computer itself

Print to OneNote

Another way to include handouts on your OneNote notebook is to print it to OneNote. All you need to do is to either open the file, go to print and select the "Print to OneNote" printer or if you want to do it within OneNote you will have to go to Insert then select Files as Printouts.

Once you have selected the file it will be printed to the "Print to OneNote" printer and will be inserted to the current section you are in.

So this is all for now for Attatching Files and Printing to your OneNote Notebook. I will discuss more about OneNote as I get through the first semester. Also, don't forget the Windows Vista, 2007 Microsoft Office and Windows Live Bootcamp for Students and Teachers on July 14. Register now at www.phiwug.org/bootcamp.

Microsoft Office Outlook Connector (Beta)

I've been waiting so long for this; finally I can use my Windows Live Hotmail account with Microsoft Office Outlook, thanks to the new Microsoft Office Outlook Connector (Beta).

The Microsoft Outlook Connector (Beta) is actually add-in to Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 / 2007 that enables Windows Live Hotmail users to use Microsoft Outlook as their mail client. Aside from synchronizing e-mails, the add-in also synchronizes contacts contained in your Windows Live Hotmail account and if you are a paid Windows Live Hotmail Subscriber you can also synchronize the calendar on your Windows Live Hotmail account.

Working with Two Computers? Not a Problem

I, for example works on two different computers. My problem with POP3 is that I can't get the same content of my inbox unless I transfer my personal folder files between computers (not recommended). The nice thing about Microsoft Office Outlook Connector (Beta) is that what you do on another computer will be synchronized onto your other computer keeping both of your computer's inbox in sync.

Try it!

Download Microsoft Office Outlook Connector (Beta) from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=7aad7e6a-931e-438a-950c-5e9ea66322d4&DisplayLang=en