This feature has been available in Office 2007 from the beginning but we never covered it yet, and it was something I overlooked. After playing around with it for a while however, I found that it is a good way to manage the multitude of emails I get everyday. Here we will go through colorizing contacts who are sending messages so they’re easier to spot. Also categorizing the subject matter into different color groups seems to help in keeping thing straight.

Color Code Senders

Open Outlook and click to highlight the message you want to color code.

Go to Tools and then Organize.

Ways to Organize Inbox opens up and you want to click Using Colors. Now you can select the color you want to associate with that contact. You can also choose a specific color for messages sent to only you, which comes in handy as a way to distinguish between group and personal messages.

Here is an example of what can be done with the colors. You might only want to create a couple of colors for the most important sender though, I went a bit overboard with this example.

Color Categories

Another helpful way to visually organize your messages is adding color categories to them. You can customize the which email subjects are related to each color category.

The message will have the category color bar across the top and you can Right-click the bar to change the color.

You can also Right-click on a message under the Categories section to change the category.

You can rename each category to whatever makes sense to you.

You might want to make a new category for different mails. Go to Actions \ Categorize and All Categories.

In the Color Categories screen click on New and give the category a name and color, you can also assign a keyboard shortcut to it as well.

Now you can sort through your email messages based on the type of category they are in.

If you want to be able to quickly glance at your email to get an idea of what is there, using color categories can be helpful. Hopefully this can get you started with organizing your emails so you know what the pointy-haired bosses want you to do more effectively.

Import Access Data

Open up a new workbook in Excel and click on the Data tab. Then under Get External Data click on From Access.

Browse to the location of the database you want to import.

If there are several tables you will need to select the one you want to get the data from.

Select how the data will appear in the workbook and choose the cell where you want it to start then click OK.

The table data will be place in Excel with the Design tab open so you can organize the look and feel for presenting the data.

If you want to get multiple tables into the Workbook, just repeat the above process and import it into new worksheets or different areas on the same worksheet.

This process saves a lot of time when going through large amounts of data versus sorting through a report. This should get you started with organizing items from the database however you need it.

About Lotus Symphony

IBM Lotus Symphony is an office productivity suite that includes apps for creating documents, presentations, and spreadsheets. It is completely free of charge and is built on OpenOffice.org technology and supports Open Document Format standards.  You can create the same great quality documents as you would with MS Office apps, use MS Office formatted documents, and it’s completely free. 

Lotus Symphony Document

This is their word processing app that would replace MS Word. It has all of the tools you would expect from a quality word processing application and make make professional looking documents. Notice there is a single interface with tabbed sections for each program and / or document.

There are plenty of templates for various types of documents to choose from and download.

It includes a decent library full of clip art you can use in your document creation, and they offer more you can download from the site.

Save documents in in Open or MS formats.

Lotus Symphony Spreadsheet

This is a replacement for MS Excel and lets you create new spreadsheets or use built in templates.

Lotus Symphony Presentation

Presentation is their version of MS PowerPoint where you can create shows from scratch or preconfigured presentations.

Web Browser

Also included is a basic but handy web browser that will open up in a new tab. This comes in handy when downloading additional items from their site and for doing quick research while working on documents.

Conclusion

If you need a basic office suite then Symphony is a good choice as it can handle most tasks. It doesn’t include an email client or database app like MS Access, but if you need that you can use OpenOffice.org Base which is a free database program. Let’s take a look at a few of the other features available, including using MS documents with the open format of Symphony.

The entire suite opens up all documents using tabbed sections to make navigation easier.

You can associate Symphony with open document formats.

It will open up MS formatted documents…(.doc, .docx, .xls, .pptx) but you may lose some quality. I had little problem with documents I tested out and opened between the programs.

If you are working with another person who has Microsoft Office 2007 remember they can save their documents in Open Document format as well.

You can easily save documents, spreadsheets, and presentations to PDF format.

There are a lot of extra plug-ins you can download for additional functionality for all three apps.

If you get stuck there is a help section that will guide you through basic tasks.

If you are a small business, student, or an individual with not a whole lot of extra money to spare, Lotus Symphony is a great way to get the professional office document results you need.

Download Lotus Symphony

Classic WordPad

WordPad has always come in very handy as a quick and easy to use text editor for documents. Rather than opening up a new Word session to make simple adjustments, WordPad can save a lot of time. In fact it is all some users need to create basic letters and and other simple documents.

WordPad 6.1 w/ Ribbon UI

The new WordPad in Windows 7 includes the nicely laid out Ribbon interface which has been a feature in Office 2007 and in the forthcoming 2010. If you are new to the Ribbon, it does take getting used to, but once you do, you’ll wonder how you did without it before.

To access commonly used commands easier, just Right-click the button and choose “Add to Quick Access Toolbar”.

What may be considered the coolest new feature, it includes the ability to read and write documents to Office Open XML format, which supports Open Office (.odt) and IBM Lotus Symphony suites.

Like in pervious versions you can insert a Paint drawing.

Paint

Of course we would be remiss if we didn’t show the new Ribbon UI included in the new version of Paint.

Easier to access options for editing projects.

The main menu offers more choices for saving, printing images etc.

It looks like the Ribbon is around to stay and it’s nice to get uniformity between Windows applications. Paint and WordPad may seem like forgotten accessories, but the new look and improvements might warrant a second look.

How about you? We are curious how many of you still use WordPad or Paint and what you think about the new interface. Just leave us a comment and let us know.

Overview

Microsoft Web Apps is a new service that will coincide with the launch of Office 2010. With Web Apps you can share, read, edit and create documents through your browser. This will allow easy collaboration with other friends and colleagues to get important project results much quicker. It’s similar to the way Zoho or Google Docs allows collaboration, but this will let you keep the exact look of the desktop document and lets you edit using the familiar Office tools.

Right now the files you work with come from your Live SkyDrive and from there you can manage rights and organize files.

You can access the documents and allow users to make comments on the documents as a project is collaborated on.

Scroll through to access the different documents available and also notice each document will have its own URL for sharing.

Create and edit new office documents directly on the Web Apps page.

Edit permissions and control who can access the documents and if they can read only or make edits to documents.

One thing to note is you’ll need to use Office 2007 format (.xlsx .pptx .docx) or higher. If you want to edit a document in an older format, the site will convert it for you.

Microsoft Word

As of this writing Word documents are read only with no editing capability, but notice any Word doc uploaded looks as good in the browser as it does on the desktop version.

If something isn’t available yet they let you know, in this instance there is no editing in Word yet.

Viewing a MS Word document in Google Chrome.

Excel

After opening a document, you can click on the edit button to start making changes. Here you can see functionality of Home tab on the Ribbon is available.

There is also limited functionality in the Insert tab as well for Hyperlinks and Tables.

Ability to create new Excel Workbooks.

A look at a brand new worksheet.

Editing an Excel document while in the Firefox browser.

Editing an Excel Worksheet in Google Chrome.

PowerPoint

There is currently a limited amount of functionality for PowerPoint as well.

It includes the Home, Insert, and View tabs with different editing features. Right now you won’t be able to make a lot of edits but can do some basic tweaking.

You can go into Slide Show view to view a presentation inside the browser.

Editing a PowerPoint Presentation in Firefox.

Creating a new Slide in a PowerPoint under Google Chrome.

Conclusion

Keep in mind that this is still a technical preview and does not yet act as a full fledged office suite. It does look promising, and should help productivity after everything is polished up. One thing that seems to be missing, and this might be due to early development, is the online docs do not automatically save while editing them. You can however, take a snapshot of the document at any time or go in and manually save it. As far as the different web browsers, I found that Internet Explorer and Firefox seemed to work fine, Google Chrome was somewhat buggy, and there is no love for Opera at all other than being able to download the files.

Try Office Web Apps Yourself

If you want to try out Office Live Apps out for yourself basically all you will need is a Windows Live account and some MS Office documents.

Join the Invite-Only Office Live Web Apps Preview Today  -via Lifehacker and Digital Inspiration

Note: Remember this is a prototype and under development and may not work perfectly with your system. 

Install Chart Advisor 

Because this is an Office Labs prototype you will need to participate in Usage Metrics and Auto Update. Continue through the installation wizard to complete the process.

After the installation is complete open Excel and you will see it under the Insert tab in the ribbon.

Using Chart Advisor

Here we will take a look at using Chart Advisor. Open up an Excel spreadsheet and select the data you want to to create a chart on. In this example we’re using monthly sales figures for tools and supplies. After you have highlighted the cells click on Chart Advisor under the Insert tab.

Give it an moment while Chart Advisor analyzes the data and recommends appropriate charts.

Hover over the different suggestions at the top to get a more detailed view of how it will look.

The amount of charts you have to choose from will be determined by the data cells you select. Also notice they are sorted by relevance.

Just hover the pointer over the percentage box on each suggestion to get a detailed formula of why it got its score.

You can filter data to further modify the charts.

You can further tweak the chart under Modify Chart and change data positions, exclude data, etc.

When done configuring the chart just click the Insert Chart button to place it into the spreadsheet.

If you are looking for a way to speed up how you create charts and graphs in your Excel presentations then you might want to check out this add-on.

Download Chart Advisor from Office Labs

When experiencing a hectic day at work, nothing is more annoying than receiving tons of email while you’re trying to get things done. Email Prioritizer is a handy plug in that will let you put a “Do Not Disturb” sign on your inbox by pausing new incoming messages.  It also lets you prioritize email through a 0-3 star rating system that you can customize. It requires Outlook 2007 running on an Exchange Server so is perfect for use at the office and not intended for home users.

Using Email Prioritizer

It will first install Visual Studio 2005 Tool for Office.

Then to continue you will have to agree to participate in Office Labs Metrics and Auto Update.

However, if you’re concerned about privacy, after it’s installed you can uncheck it in Options after installed.

To activate the Do Not Disturb feature just click on the button, you can select different times to leave it running from 10 minutes to 4 hours.  It will stop incoming mail for that time so you can concentrate on other work and not be distracted.  Messages that are flagged as Important will still be delivered however.

It allows you to sort through your email based on different priorities.

To set up new priorities click on Options and Edit priority rules.

Here you can customize priority rules for incoming mail.

Keep in mind that this is a prototype still in development and you will probably want to talk with your IT staff before installing. If you are tired of dealing with needless emails while trying to get real work done, the Email Prioritizer plug in might be exactly what you need.

Download Email Prioritizer

If you work on a team or when you are dealing with your customers you might want to make sure that you distribute your documents the right way so that the information in the document reaches the right audience and the confidentiality of the information is respected.

Word 2007 has a feature with which you can formally prepare your Word document for proper distribution to a group of people or even to any individuals with certain credibility factor.

Preparation

Launch Word 2007 and create the document the way you want.

Once you are happy with the document and are ready to distribute, pause for a moment before hitting the email application and follow these simple steps to get the document ready for distribution. Keep in mind that these steps are isolated and what that means is you can pick and choose the steps that you wanted to follow.

Click on the Office Button and click on the “Prepare” menu option. There are 7 different options you should be able to see. I’ll explain each of those options so you can pick and choose the right combination of options for your distribution requirements.

Document Properties

The first in the list is the “Properties’ option with which you can enter metadata information about the document.

You can enter the name of the document author, title, subject, keywords, category, status and comments.

Some of these can be viewed through the File >> Properties dialog.

Keep in mind that once you finalize the document you won’t be able to see these properties but until then you can associate properties with your document for others to get an idea of the document before opening it.

Inspect Document

The second option in the list is the “Inspect Document” option. As part of the preparation to distribute your document you can inspect the document for comments, revisions, revision marks, ink annotation. You can inspect for hidden metadata or any personal information that’s been saved with the document. You can inspect for any custom XML data that’s been stored with the document. You can also inspect for any information on headers, footers and for any watermarks. Finally, you can also inspect for any hidden texts in the document.

Choose the inspection options you wanted to make sure before you distribute the document and when you hit the “Inspect” button Word will inspect the document and will notify you of any items that it finds on its inspection.

The items that need your attention would be marked with an exclamation mark and you can choose to re-inspect if you want.

Encrypt Document

Third in the list is the “Encrypt Document” option. Choose this option if you want the document to be viewed only by certain people you trust. It allows you to encrypt the document with a password of your choice and the users have to enter this password to view the document.

Choose a password that you can distribute to the group. My advice is to not choose a password that you personally use but rather a password which no one can use it to trace back to your online accounts or any sensitive accounts that you use personally.

Confirm the password one more time. Passwords are case-sensitive and make sure to preserve/remember the password as there is no way to recover the password if you forget and there is no way to open the file if you forget the password.

Once encrypted you should be able to see that the menu option has a little background color to indicate that this document is encrypted.

When people on your distribution group try to open an encrypted document they’ll be prompted to enter a password.

Without a password they won’t be able to open the document at all.

Restrict Permission

Fourth on the list is the “Restrict Permission” option. You can use the “Restrict Permission” option to restrict what people can do with the document. If the document is sensitive then you can use “Restrict Permissions” to restrict them from editing, copying and printing the document.

Restrict Permission uses Windows Rights Management client to implement the restrictions.

You might be prompted to install the Windows Rights Management tool. Don’t worry, go ahead and install it, it is from the trusted source. Once installed you should be able to configure what people can do with the document.

Add a Digital Signature

Fifth in the list is the “Add a Digital Signature” option. Digital Signatures ensure the integrity of the document. Think of Digital Signatures as a paper signature but done electronically for convenience. When a document has digital signature it signifies the integrity and trust of the document. This would come in handy if you are distributing the document to a very large group of audience.

Click on the “Add a Digital Signature” option and Word will prompt you with the above dialog to search for Digital Signature providers on Office Marketplace.

On its Office Online Marketplace you should be able to find a Digital Signature provider that you can use to sign the document.

Run Compatibility Checker

Let’s skip the to the last option “Run Compatibility Checker” first. If you have used any features that are specific to Word 2007 and if you suspect your audience might be using older versions of Word then you might want to run the Compatibility Checker to make sure your document can be read by the entire audience.

Word 2007 will run a set of predefined compatibility checks and if it finds any compatibility issues it will list them on the above dialog, if not you are good to move to the final step before distributing the document.

Mark as Final

This should be the last step you wanted to follow before you distribute the document to the group. As the name indicates this action will mark the document as all set for distribution.

As this makes significant changes to the document you’ll be prompted to make sure you want to mark the document as final.

Once a document is marked as Final the document cannot be edited and will be cleaned of any proof readings, comments etc.

Finalized Documents get a new icon on the status bar that looks more of like a rubberstamp on a paper.

Getting a document prepared for distribution can help you avoid certain obvious mistakes that you make when you distribute a document to a large group of people. You don’t have to follow all the steps; rather you can pick and choose which one you want/prefer. Word 2007 is flexible enough to do what you ask it to do when preparing a document for distribution.

I hope you find this useful and I hope you make use of Word 2007’s capability to properly finalize a document before distribution. If you have any questions or comments please let me know in comments.

The installation is silent so there won’t be a typical install wizard but you will get a progress screen.

A few moments will pass before it is installed fully  and when it is you will see Registration Succeeded.  Just wait until you see it before opening any Office app.

Now when you open up an Office application just click on the OffiSync (Beta) tab to get the full list of features.

You can also access everything from hitting the Office Button and scrolling to OffiSync. 

To start using the features you will be prompted to sign into your Google account.

While you’re writing up a document you can search for information on the net with Google using the search bar.  A browser window opens up and from here you can easily clip and paste data into your document.

There is also an image search so you can insert cool and interesting images (sometimes cooler than Office Clip Art) into a document for affect.  Also notice you can narrow down image search results based on the type of license the image may have to help avoid logos that may have copy write protection.

After you make modifications to a document, send an email to the other collaborators.

When you email announcing a document to other collaborators they get the following message with a download link to OffiSync.

Click on the OffiSync icon in the Start menu to disconnect or verify you’re connected.

Remember this is still in beta so there are still a few kinks that need to be worked out.  One thing we noticed is that it can slow down MS Office startup time while it connects.  OffiSync works with MS Office 2003 and 2007 with Word, PowerPoint, and Excel. 

Download OffiSync Beta

With your Excel document open click on the cell where you want to create the hyperlink and under the Insert tab click on the Hyperlink button.

The Insert Hyperlink dialog box will pop up and here is where you want to add the text to display and browse to the location of the file you want to link to.

Now you will notice the text in that cell is displayed as a link.  If you hover the pointer over the link it will show the path to the file.

For this example we linked to another Excel document and it will be displayed with in the current opened worksheet.  To go back to the original document just close or minimize the linked one.

Basically you can create a hyperlink to anywhere such as a network location including a specific file, SharePoint page, or webpage.  Hopefully this how-to will get you started in creating informative Excel documents for others.