How-To Geek

Are you frustrated by always having to change the font size before you create a document it Word?  Here’s how you can end that frustration and set your favorite default font size for once and for all!

A tasks list can be convenient but most times you can not include details for those tasks or have to have an online account to do so. If you want to keep your tasks list with you on your computer or laptop and be able to add plenty of details then you might want to look at toDoo.

Quality OCR software can often be very expensive, but you may have one already installed on your computer that you didn’t know about.  Here’s how you can use OneNote to OCR anything on your computer.

In a recent article, we introduced the Excel function called VLOOKUP and explained how it could be used to retrieve information from a database into a cell in a local worksheet.  In that article we mentioned that there were two uses for VLOOKUP, and only one of them dealt with querying databases.  In this article, the second and final in the VLOOKUP series, we examine this other, lesser known use for the VLOOKUP function.

Hiding worksheets can be a simple way to protect data in Excel, or just a way reduce the clutter of a some tabs. Here are a couple very easy ways to hide and unhide worksheets and workbooks in Excel 2007 / 2010.

The Format Painter in Excel makes it easy to copy the formatting of a cell and apply it to another. With just a few clicks you can reproduce formatting such as fonts, alignment, text size, border, and background color.

Have you tried out the Office 2010 beta, but want to go back to Office 2007?  Here’s a step-by-step tutorial on how to remove your Office 2010 beta and reinstall your Office 2007.

VLOOKUP is one of Excel’s most useful functions, and it’s also one of the least understood.  In this article, we demystify VLOOKUP by way of a real-life example.  We’ll create a usable Invoice Template for a fictitious company.

Microsoft Word is a great tool for formatting text, but what if you want to insert a chemistry formula or diagram?  Thanks to a new free add-in for Word, you can now insert high-quality chemistry formulas and diagrams directly from the Ribbon in Word.

Fonts can help your documents stand out and be easier to read, and Office 2010 helps you take your fonts even further with support for OpenType ligatures, stylistic sets, and more.  Here’s a quick look at these new font features in Office 2010.

PivotTables are one of the most powerful features of Microsoft Excel.  They allow large amounts of data to be analyzed and summarized in just a few mouse clicks. In this article, we explore PivotTables, understand what they are, and learn how to create and customize them.

Sometimes it can be difficult to center a picture in a document just by dragging it dragging it around. Today we show you how to center pictures, images, and other objects perfectly in Word and PowerPoint.

Sometimes we’ve entered data in a column in Excel, only to realize later that it would be better to have this data in a row, or vise-versa.  Here’s a simple trick to convert any row or set of rows into a column, or vise-versa, in Excel.

Some MS Office users were put off a bit by the Ribbon feature in 2007 for being cumbersome and confusing. Today we look at a cool new feature in Office 2010 that allows you to create your own custom tabs with specific commands for easier document creation.

A lot of business email servers only allow 5-10MB attachments, but today it’s not uncommon to need to send a much larger file to a friend or colleague.  Thanks to drop.io and their new Outlook plug-in, you can now send up to 100MB attachments for free.

We have all hurriedly sent an email, only to remember moments later that we forgot to attach the file we said we had attached to the email.  Forgotten Attachment Detector is a great, free add-in for Microsoft Outlook that can help you avoid this embarrassing scenario.

Since most of us sit in front of Outlook all day, wouldn’t it be nice to be able to consolidate social networking contacts into Outlook as well? Today we take a look at the newly announced LinkedIn for Outlook social connector, which brings those contacts to your inbox.

If you’re creating a large document with several pages you might want to add page numbers to keep them in order. Today we show you how to add page numbers on your documents in Word 2007 & 2010.

If you want to jazz up PowerPoint presentations one option is adding video. PowerPoint 2010 allows you to embed video from the Internet which opens a lot more creative possibilities for your presentations. 

If you are testing out the new Office 2010 Beta you’ve undoubtedly noticed the annoying Send a Smile feature. While it’s cool that they want our feedback, two smiley faces sitting in the taskbar just doesn’t seem right.

Sometimes you might need to print out data contained in an Excel Spreadsheet, but printing out the entire thing is a waste. Today we show you how to print out only specific areas of the document that you need.

If you are moving from Office 2003 to 2007 or 2010 Beta, get ready for a learning curve when it comes to The Ribbon. Instead of having the learning experience be frustrating, you can install a cool add-in called Ribbon Hero, a game that makes the learning process more fun.

Being able to share Access data with other applications is easier in Office 2010. Today we take a look at how easy it is to share data from an Access 2010 Database to to an Excel spreadsheet and more.

If you work in Outlook for much of the workday, you may find it annoying having to navigate from Mail View to Calendar, then Contacts…etc. Today we show you a cool quick tip that will allow you to open each feature in a new Window.

When you installed MS Office 2007 or 2010, and didn’t do a customized installation, you might find there are some apps in the suite you don’t need or use. Here we take a look at how to add or remove those applications on your computer.