Researching while working in document

This is another case of Open Office being a little more friendly than Microsoft Office. In both programs, you can check on word meaning or get a thesaurus. In both programs you can also do web searching of any phrases that are in your document. In Microsoft Office, you can use Encarta or MSN to do your research. Click on the toolbar in Microsoft Office and click on the Reference Tools. It will probably be set to scrapbook. The Reference Tool looks like a set of books. You can then choose your highlighted phrase to either use the dictionary, thesaurus or Encarta or MSN. In Open Office, go to View > Toolbar. Locate Hyperlink bar and put a check beside it. A new toolbar will now appear. Whenever you highlight a word, it will appear in the new toolbar. On the extreme right, you will see a glove and magnifying glass with a dropdown option. click on your favorite search engine and that will open up. If you want to add new sites for Open Office, go to Tool>Options>Internet>Search. Click on New button to add your favorite sites.

Sending your document as email

You have to have a non web mail account to do this, but many mail programs can be configured as a pop account so you can use your mail program, Outlook Express or Mail.
If you do have this type of mail program, you can easily send your work right from the program. In Open Office, you would go to File>Send>Document as email. In Microsoft, you go to File>Send To> Mail as attachment.
I find this much easier than trying to later find the exact document I was working on. Quick and easy.

Making Number Lines for Math Worksheets

I was helping a teacher make math pages for her class math assessments this summer. I was trying to draw lines using word and was successful with it, but found it difficult to get the lines exact! I was talking to my daughter who uses Excel all the time and she assured me, I was going about it in a more difficult way than I needed to.

Open Excel.

You want to select a group of cells. I did this by highlighting all the columns from A to Z. When they were selected, they will be a different color, put your mouse on the line between any two columns. You can drag that column line until it is about 3. When you release the mouse, you will see that all of the columns that you selected are now exactly the same size.

Open the Toolbar that is drawing. Go to View, select Toolbars and then select Drawing. You can make a line with arrows on both end. Put in your gridlines and even change a tool to make lines a different color.

This is a new use for me using Excel. I made this graphic by removing the gridlines before I went and printed the picture.

I will say that I should have known this before I struggled with the drawing. Having the gridlines really does make a difference in being able to be exact about the number line.

Just for Fun - Total Nonsense

I have been doing a lot of reading about Open Office and Microsoft and did discover that Open Office has a hidden Easter Egg in the Calc program. If in a spreadsheet cell you type, =GAME("StarWars")

And then hit enter - it will open an old fashioned space invaders game, in German. However, everyone knows how to play this game.

If you open a Microsoft Word document and type in =rand() and then hit enter, it will type a very famous line of typing for you. This might be interesting if you had a bet with someone about typing speed.

I know, nothing useful, but still enertaining.

Powerpoint /Open Office Templates

I have been continuing my research on presentation tools in Powerpoint or Open Office. I haven't found any other real differences between the two of them except for the links within the document. I did find a nice site that has a lot of different templates. A lot of the templates are in .ppt format (Powerpoint) or .odp format (Open Office Impress). I really recommend that if you are looking for a place to start - Presentation Helper for Open Office or use any of these powerpoint templates, which will open in either Microsoft Office or Open Office. I really recommend that you spend some time looking at the entire site.