Home - Kinetics Handy Hints

20/01/2010

Using Favourites when opening or saving documents

Often, we use some file directories more than others. We set up a subdirectory for a particular client, or a project, to help us organize our documents. And some of these folders get absolutely hammered as we use them over and over. But each time you go to access that directory, you have to remember to navigate all the way through your directory structures. It can get a bit boring and time consuming.

The answer is sitting right on the screen when we open documents, but often we glance right past it. To the left of the file dialogue is a ‘favorites’ group. These screen shots are from Windows7 and Office2010 but the same basic idea exists in Vista and XP and the concepts will work with those as well.

Screen Shot

In the screen above, I’ve set up favourites to our intranet document library, our client documents, admin files and sales files. As it happens, these examples are all on our SharePoint intranet which means I can even access them from home. I’ve also shortcuts to my hard drive, and to my home server – they can be anything that you open files from.

Adding in your favourites is easy. And once you have them, it’s a just a single ‘click’ to access your most-used file directories – no more tedious navigation!!

In this example, I am going to create a shortcut to my company planning folder – I’m busy doing next year’s budgets, business and marketing plans, and I’m using source files quite a lot at the moment, so a shortcut will be very useful.

First, I start to open a file as I usually would. I hit ‘file open’ then navigate to the directories that I use a lot. Once I’m there though, rather than simply opening the file I want, I take one moment to add the directory to my favourites. I simply ‘right-click’ on the word ‘favorites’ in the left hand of the dialogue box, and chose ‘Add current location to favorites’.

Screen Shot

That’s it. Finished! Next time I go to open or save a file, the directory is right there in my favorites and it is just a single click to jump straight to it.

Screen Shot

Posted at 9:10 p.m. by Andrew Hunt | Category: Microsoft Office Tips | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

12/01/2010

Screen Snips

How often have you needed to grab an image from a screen for a user manual, or a logo for a sales proposal or similar?

One of my favourite tools in Windows Vista and Windows 7 is the 'Snipping Tool'. It isn't the most obvious tool, it's not obvious on the start menu, so I've pinned it to my Windows7 task bar.

To find the Snipping tool, type in 'Snip'.

Once you've got the Snipping Tool on your screen, simply click the 'New' button - this will change the mouse icon to a crossbar, and whiten the screen. Drag the mouse, holding down the mousebutton to highlight the area you want to 'snip'.

Now, you've captured your image, and you can hit the Save button to save the image as a PNG, JPG, or GIF, or copy it to the clipboard, or email the image.

It's that easy. As you explore the Snipping Tool, you'll see there are also freeform clips available, along with pen, highlighter and erasers allowing you to mark-up the image.

I find this a really useful tool for doing documentation, or even for writing these hints!

We do caution you to respect the copyright of images you find on the internet. Just because you can copy it, doesn't mean you have the legal right to do so - but of course all our readers are careful of intellectual property!

Posted at 8:49 p.m. by Andrew Hunt | Category: Windows Vista | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

22/12/2009

Word Calculations

We know Excel is great at adding up numbers and so forth - but did you know that Word 2007 can too? Its one of the great secrets of Word!

Here's a simple trick to make your Word sales proposals and other documents easier. In your table of data, simply move to the cell where you want the total (or average, count or other summary data), then, on the 'layout' menu, on the right hand side, hit the Fx button.

This will pop up a simple dialogue, giving you a bunch of options. By default it will try and add the numbers above (or the left - it's pretty clever at guessing). There are format options, and a range of formulas you can choose.

We think this is pretty clever. if you change the data, you can recalculate simply by highlighting the cell and hitting F9. Some readers will realise that this works outside tables as well - but that's another story for another hint one day!

Posted at 2:08 p.m. by Andrew Hunt | Category: Microsoft Office Tips | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

26/11/2009

Google Wonder Wheel

When the Bing search engine was launched, we were delighted to discover the 'related searches' option listed.

Google has a similar trick, and it's presented very cleverly in their "Wonder Wheel".

Next time you search on Google, look for the '+Show Options' on the first line - as we've highlighted in the picture below. It'll put a menu on the left hand side of your screen. From this, choose "Wonder Wheel"

In this example. I searched "Auckland Zoo", then when the wheel gave me the option, I clicked on "Auckland attractions" - and I could keep on going until I found exactly what I wanted. It's very intuitive indeed.

Now, try the "Timeline" option - that's pretty cool as well! Competition is a great thing - the Google/Bing battle is producing some excellent innovations.

(And, you heard it here first - rumour is of a new Google look and feel - with a cleaner logo and these search options being more obvious)

Posted at 10:48 p.m. by Andrew Hunt | Category: Internet Tools | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

23/11/2009

Translating Foreign Languages

My eldest daughter has been learning French for a couple of years and is getting quite fluent. The problem is, she is under the misapprehension that I understand what she's saying.

At least for the written stuff, there is an answer. One I've used a few times and one I found in error just this morning.

Firstly, there is Google Translate - it can be found from the 'more' menu.

Once you have this on the screen, you can either key in text, or load up a web page URL and get the whole thing translated. I like the 'hover' feature that helps you see the original text.

But then, today, I stumbled on the Translator Accelerator in IE8. I realise it's been there for a while, and I've been slow to find it!

If you 'right click' on a web page, the translate accelerator is right there in the menu ..

Once you translate content, you have the same hover functionality, but a richer number of presentation options than Google offers. And like Google, its right there on the 'Bing' search menu as well.

Of course, the big question is 'which does the best job', and for that I simply can't comment. Maybe readers might be kind enough to tell us?

Posted at 11:48 a.m. by Andrew Hunt | Category: Internet Tools | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

27/10/2009

Displaying Graphs in WSS

One of my clients show me a brilliant mechanism for displaying graphs in WSS. (ie, MOSS isn't needed!!)

The elegance of the solution is breathtaking!

Simply take the spreadsheet with the graph, select the grpah then just save it as an HTML file in your SharePoint forms library somewhere. Choose the 'Publish' option and select 'Auto Republish'. Now, whenever the spreadsheet is saved, the HTML file will be updated. Automatically!!

The last step is simply to go to the webpage where you want to display the graph, and add a 'PageViewer' Webpart. Tell it to link to the HTML file you created above. That's it - done!

Now, whenever your spreadsheet is saved, the graph will be updated, and it will present on your webpage with the latest information. Stunningly simple!

Posted at 5:07 p.m. by Andrew Hunt | Category: Sharepoint Tips | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

24/09/2009

What's Del.Ico.Us?

One of the most common questions I get asked at the moment is to explain the little logos that appear on most news websites at the bottom of articles. Something like this :

What are other people looking at on the ‘net?

The other question we get asked is “Why does it seem that everyone else in the office know what’s cool?” How do they find it? Is there some secret place on the ‘net of neat new stuff where I can find out what’s happening?

The short answer is ‘Yes’. Except the secret places aren’t so secret!

So, what’s Digg This or Del.Ico.Us.? Or the other weird inscriptions?

First, take a step back. The web seems to be a goldrush for page-views. It’s all about numbers. How many ‘hits’ is my site getting? How many page-views? How many “followers” or how many “friends”? It’s all about how many people are listening to you and how much influence you have. Because that increases your commercial value as means of selling to others. Whether it’s your opinion that helps drive sales, or simple advertising numbers on your site, the value of your web presence is often a raw numbers game.

That’s why Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) has become such an important element, particularly in online web commerce sites and product marketing sites. If your customers can’t find you, then they aren’t going to buy from you. Many strategies exist for figuring who is your target market, and where do these people congregate online. We’re seeing an increasing move towards web-properties that act as traffic signs – those sites that people log into (as a destination (it’s something they’ll bookmark on their “favourites”) – for example the popular site Twitter is rich with links to various sites – subscribers ‘tweet’ about their web posting in the hope that Twitter readers will take a look and visit their web page.

It’s so much more powerful to have someone else recommend your site. And that’s why the web page owners beg for your recommendations but putting logos like this on their websites. They want you to click on them and ‘share’ (or recommend) their webpage. If enough people share their webpages, they hope others will follow, and drive traffic.

Keeping your own bookmarks.

Actually, one of the features of Delicous and Digg This is that they allow you to save your own bookmarks. If you go from computer to computer, you can share your bookmarks across them – and that’s got to useful. But it’s the traffic generation capabilities that drive tools like these.

Posted at 10:17 p.m. by Andrew Hunt | Category: Internet Tools | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

2/09/2009

Zoomin' in Word

Sometimes, your Word document is simply too big or small to see on the screen, a the right level of detail. The great news is that it's dead easy to zoom in and out so you can get the perfect presentation of your document.

Hiding at the bottom of the Word 2007 screen is the Status Bar.. you'll see a scale similar to the one shown to the left in this posting. Just grab the slider and move it left to shrink things, or right to expand them. Easy!

There are also a handful of icons there that let you view your document in a range of 'modes' such as internet, draft, page view, or my favourite - outline.

If the icons or the slide aren't there, just right-click on the bottom of the screen and make sure that the shortcuts, zoom and zoom slider are all ticked.

Posted at 8:16 p.m. by Andrew Hunt | Category: Microsoft Office Tips | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

25/07/2009

Choosing a Search Engine?

For years, Google has had the search market to itself.

Microsoft is fighting back with Bing (quote Kevin Turner, Microsoft COO - "let's make it a verb!")

Personally. I find Bing is smarter. I get more relevant hits faster. But now, you can decide for yourself. Try this little cracker of a website : Bing vs. Google

(Thanks to Chillisoft for finding and tweating this)

Posted at 10:28 a.m. by Andrew Hunt | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

Managing the Office 2007 Ribbon

Love it, or hate it, the 'ribbon' is part of Office 2007, and it's going to be part of Office 2010.

The main criticism of the Office ribbon is the amount of screen space the ribbon takes. But did you know you can hide it?

Personally, I like the ribbon. It makes it easier to find relevant functions, so I can make great documents faster. I don't have to navigate complex menus to find features - Office makes them easy to find. I especially like the context sensitive ribbon, where Office brings up options relevant to the item I've highlighted. For example, if I'm in a table, the ribbon shows me 'table' options. If I'm on a picture, I get 'picture' options, and so on.

But it does take up a fair amount of the screen, and especially on a small screen such as a Netbook, that can be costly. But minimising the ribbon is easy!

Simply double click on a menu item (I've used the highlighter in the screen shots to the right to show you where) and the ribbon disappears. Click again, and it reappears.

Couldn't be easier!