Washington Trainers' Forum

Updated
7-21-2010

PAST MEETINGS

THURSDAY, JULY 30, 1999

NOTES FROM MEETING:

Check out www.learningauction.com. It’s a new web site done by the Masie Center. It’s basically other trainers who have posted stuff they want to sell and you can auction on it. If you have something you want to sell, post it up there (it’s free)!

Lori reviewed the few legal features that are in Word.

• Automatic numbering: no changes
• Styles: the styles list is back in alphabetical order! Also they moved the location of the styles gallery. No longer on the Format Menu or any other menu for that matter. Now under "themes".
• Section Formatting: added 2-page section formatting for booklets.
• Footnotes/Endnotes: no changes and no fixes for straying footnotes. However, we found by playing at the meeting that if you open a Word 97 document with footnote problems into Word 2000, then go to TOOLS/OPTIONS/compatibility tab and change the compatibility to Word 2000, the footnotes get fixed. Unfortunately, when you SAVE AS and save that document back to Word 97, the footnote problem is back.
• Table of Contents: Dialog box has been rearranged for no apparent reason. Also the entire text line in the TOC is now a hyperlink instead of only the page number.
• Table of Authorities: Dialog box was rearranged, but no changes in the feature.
• Cross-references: no changes
• Tables: Seem to be a lot of changes for the good. Probably due to web-based technology. You can now drag a table (like a graphic) to a new location any where in your document. The cell resizing handles are larger and easier to use. You can nest tables within tables. The table menu has been modified to include more stuff on it. You no longer have to worry about having a row or column selected before you go into the table menu because most everything is there by default. Also the right-click menu has more options on it. There are more cell alignment and autofit options. You can now add diagonal borders within a cell. You can draw horizontal lines within the cells. The is also something called Table Properties that lets you manipulate the overall table better.
• AutoText: no changes

• Automatic Numbering
• headers and Footers
• Footnotes
• Cross-references
• AutoText

Word 2000 is the same file format as Word 97. There is also a feature in Word 2000 under TOOLS/OPTIONS/SAVE that lets you disable all the new features not supported by Word 97. This would be great during the early stages of a rollout while you still have a mixed environment. Then when everyone is using Word 2000, turn all the features back on.

Lori also found that compatibilities issues with Word 6/95 still remain.

• You can customize your help screens and even have hyperlinks to intranet sites in it.
• True roaming profiles: templates, autocorrect, and custom dictionary will follow the user
• Many features in the classroom are "install on demand". You can initially install a very small footprint of Word on the desktop and as someone begins to use features not installed, it will install them on demand. Of course, it will ask for the installation CD.

• Click & Type: the ability to click anywhere on the screen (particularly in an area where there is no text or even hard returns) and type text. It seems to set tabs for you, but discourages the use of styles. Don’t think trainer’s will really like this feature. Especially if you’ve taught the use of styles.
• Smart cut and paste recognized 2 spaces after a period now.
• Synonyms feature is on the right click menu.
• AutoCorrect is better
• Collect & Paste: lets you cut or copy up to 12 separate items.
• Font drop down on the formatting toolbar now previews what the fonts look like.
• Help is different. You had to be there to see it!

• Recently used commands on menus. Each menu when you click on it initially shows you the features you’ve used the most. If you then hover of that menu long enough, all the "less used" options pop up. Yes, you can turn this feature off.
• Single document interface. This means that if you open 5 documents in Word, each separate document will be listed on your Alt+tab menu. Each document acts like a separate copy of Word running. Annoying because your alt+tab menu and your taskbar will fill up more quickly.
• There are dialog boxes with no enhancements in features that were rearranged for no apparent reason.
• Page Layout View was renamed to Print Layout View. Geniuses at work at Microsoft!
• Get the web out of my word processor! This was the last line of Lori’s presentation. Microsoft seems to have placed a lot of web-features in Word 2000. Some may be great while others only get the way of what law firms need to do.

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