Adding Commands in Shortcut Menu in Words

Right-click menus

Are you a fan of the shortcut menus that appear when you alternate mouse click? Alternate-clicking on different items provides great shortcuts to accomplishing frequently used tasks. Microsoft places frequently used commands on these menus but you can set them up to access the commands that you use the most by following these steps:

Alternate-click on any toolbar button. Select Customize from the menu that is displayed. Select the Toolbars tab. Scroll to the bottom of the list and select the Shortcut Menus toolbar. The Shortcut Menus toolbar will appear within your workspace. Select the Commands tab. Locate a command that you want to add to a shortcut menu. When you find a command that you use often (and does not already appear when you alternate click), click and drag it onto one of three positions on the Shortcut Menus toolbar. 

The Text position contains all of the shortcut menus when you alternate click on text. If you choose to add your command to the Text position, a submenu will display and you can select which shortcut menu you need. For example, to add something to the shortcut menu that appears when you alternate click on a misspelled word, select Text and then select Spelling. 

Additions to the Table position on the Shortcut Menus make this command accessible when you alternate click on a table. 

The Drawing position makes the command accessible when you alternate click on a drawing object. 

Close the Customize dialog box and alternate click to see your result.

Selecting Text using Mouse and Shift Key.

You already know that you can use the mouse to select text by holding down the left mouse button and dragging the mouse to make a selection. There is an even quicker way to select text using the mouse, however. This is done in the following manner:

Position the insertion point where you want the selection to begin. 

Move the mouse cursor so it points to where you want the selection to end. 

Hold down the Shift key as you click once on the left mouse button. 

Removing Style from the Document:

This is where a macro comes in handy. It can quickly search through a document to see if a particular style is used anywhere. If it isn't, then the style can be easily deleted. The following macro,

DeleteUnusedStyles,  does just that.

'************************************************************************************
Sub DeleteUnusedStyles()
  Dim oStyle As Style

  For Each oStyle In ActiveDocument.Styles
  'Only check out non-built-in styles
  If oStyle.BuiltIn = False Then
  With ActiveDocument.Content.Find
  .ClearFormatting
  .Style = oStyle.NameLocal
  .Execute FindText:="", Format:=True
  If .Found = False Then oStyle.Delete
  End With
  End If
  Next oStyle

End Sub

'**********************************************************************************

Note that the macro ignores a style if it is a built-in style.

This is because deleting a built-in style doesn't really delete it, but only resets that style to its original, default condition. In fact, Word doesn't allow built-in styles to be deleted from a document. Even if the built-in style is no longer used, but was once used in the document, it will still show up in the styles drop-down list. If this bothers you, there are additional steps you can take to "delete" the listing of these built-in styles. These steps can be rather involved, and are best described in Knowledge Base article KB193536:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;193536

Pasting Text from Internet in Microsoft Word

Ever try to copy and paste text from the internet into MS Word only to paste all the formatting along with it? Most pages are tables without the grid lines showing. If you copy something from an internet page and try to paste it in MS Word, the default paste is to paste formatting and all. You'll save tons of time removing the formatting.

Try clicking on

  * Edit
  * Paste Special
  * Choose unformatted text.

If you do happen to have a document that you need to just remove all the formatting and start from scratch:

  * Select the text you want to remove formatting from
  * Click the style tool dropdown arrow on the formatting tool bar
  * Clear formatting

Pasting Text from Internet in Microsoft Word

Ever try to copy and paste text from the internet into MS Word only to paste all the formatting along with it? Most pages are tables without the grid lines showing. If you copy something from an internet page and try to paste it in MS Word, the default paste is to paste formatting and all. You'll save tons of time removing the formatting.

Try clicking on

  * Edit
  * Paste Special
  * Choose unformatted text.

If you do happen to have a document that you need to just remove all the formatting and start from scratch:

  * Select the text you want to remove formatting from
  * Click the style tool dropdown arrow on the formatting tool bar
  * Clear formatting