Word 2016 For Professionals For Dummies

Dan Gookin

• Publisher: For Dummies
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781119286042
• eBook ISBN: 9781119286059
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Computer Science
• Subtopic: Desktop Applications
• Index: Computer Science

The most comprehensive guide to Microsoft Word 2016

If you're a professional who uses Word, but aren't aware of its many features or get confused about how they work best, Word 2016 For Professionals For Dummies answers all your burning questions about the world's number-one word processing software. Offering in-depth coverage of topics you won't find in Word 2016 For Dummies, this guide focuses on the professional's needs, giving you all you need to know not only do your job well, but to do it even better.

As Microsoft continues to hone Word with each new release, new features are added beyond basic word processing. From using Word to create blog posts to importing data from Excel to expertly flowing text around objects, it covers the gamut of Word's more advanced capabilities—including those you probably don't know exist. Whether you're looking to use Word to build a master document, collaborate and share, publish an ebook, or anything in between, the thorough, step-by-step guidance in Word 2016 For Professionals For Dummies makes it easier.

• Discover neat Word editing tips and tricks to create complex documents
• Share documents and collaborate with others
• Format text, paragraphs, and pages like never before
• Add Excel charts and graphics to Word documents
• Create an ebook

Essential reading for the Word power user who wants to be more productive and efficient at work, this handy guide gives you the boost to take your skills to the next level.

Part 1

Fancy Formatting and Froufrou

IN THIS PART …

Discover how to best use fonts.

Find out how to lay out a paragraph.

Learn how to organize text with tabs and lists.

Work with tables and information in a grid.

Customize columns of text in a document.

Get to know about page formatting.

Apply informative headers and footers to a document.

Use styles to quickly format text.

Get familiar with templates, and start creating documents quickly.

Chapter 1

Font Fun

IN THIS CHAPTER

Understanding fonts

Using typefaces appropriately

Accessing text formatting commands

Setting text scale and spacing

Raising or lowering text

Exploring oddball text effects

Working with hidden text

Replacing text formatting

When graphical computer operating systems appeared in the 1980s, users found themselves infectiously attracted to fonts. People played with text formatting, spicing up documents in frivolous and crude ways. It was fun, but odious: Documents looked like someone had hired a color-blind man to paint a house.

The adoration for fonts hasn’t diminished over time, but people today have a bit more respect for a document’s text. In a professional environment, you want to choose a font that’s appropriate, tasteful, and consistent with a good layout and design. You can hire a graphic artist, but while you remain cheap, you can rely upon Word’s various typeface tools to assist you.

A Knowledge of Fonts

I blame the Macintosh. A menu on the first MacPaint and MacWrite programs was called Font. It listed a variety of what are more properly termed typefaces. That’s what the typesetters call them. A font is a combination of typeface, size, style, and other attributes. But never mind; the term font has stuck.

• A typesetter is someone who puts type on the page. The process once involved block letters, hot lead, and meticulous craftsmanship. Today, typesetters are considered layout artists. They follow the guidelines set by a graphic designer to create a page of text or, in the digital realm, a web page.
• A graphic designer is someone who chooses elements that look good on a page. This list includes typefaces, margins, graphics, and other design elements. The designer and layout artist are often the same person.
• Though typeface is the preferred term, I use both typeface and font throughout this book. These days, both terms are interchangeable, though technically not the same.

Describing text

You might remember when you learned to write and your teacher handed out ruled paper. You copied letters and words and used the rules (lines) as a guide. Those rules weren’t arbitrarily drawn on the page. They come from the history of printed text, where everything has a name and a purpose, as illustrated in Figure 1-1.

FIGURE 1-1: Text essentials.

Here are descriptions of the text measurements shown in Figure 1-1:

• Baseline: Text is written on the baseline.
• Cap height: Capital letters extend from the baseline to the cap height.
• X-height: Most lowercase letters rise to the x-height, which is named after the lowercase letter x and not anything mysterious.
• Ascender: Taller lowercase letters extend to the ascender height, such as the t shown in Figure 1-1.
• Descender: Lowercase letters that dip below the baseline drop to the descender.

The purpose of these lines is consistency. Though letters have different shapes and sizes, these rules help the reader absorb the text. When letters disobey the rules, the text becomes more difficult to read.

Text is also measured from side to side. The yardstick that’s used is the width of the big M. That measurement is called an em. In digital typefaces, the em square is a box used for designing typefaces.

Half of an em is an en, which is also the width of the letter N. That measurement isn’t as precise as the em, because, in many typefaces, the en isn’t exactly half the width of an em.

Two ems make an M&M, which is delicious and often eaten in great numbers.

• Grade-school lined paper features the baseline, x-height, and cap height lines. As you progress through school and even into the workplace, only the baseline remains as a guide, though the other lines still exist in the world of fonts.
• In many fonts, the cap height and ascender are at the same position.
• The x-height can be set high, as shown in Figure 1-1, but often it marks the midpoint between the baseline and cap height. Its location depends on the typeface design.
• Font width varies depending on the font’s design, whether the font is heavily weighted, and whether the font is proportionally spaced or monospaced. See the next section for details on these terms.
• A dash equal in width to the M character is called an em dash. A space equal in width to the M character is an em space.
• The en dash is equal in width to the letter N. An en space is a space of the same width.
• A hyphen is a character, shorter than the en...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• Part 1: Fancy Formatting and Froufrou
• Part 2: Go Graphical
• Part 3: Word at Work
• Part 4: Word for Writers
• Part 5: Document Automation
• Part 6: Beyond Word Processing
• Part 7: The Part of Tens
• About the Author
• Connect with Dummies
• End User License Agreement