For best results: this site requires that cookies be enabled for proper operation - see Legal Page for more info

Starting December 1, 2006 Techsinfo.be will no longer be available please update your links to http://techinfo.e2uhosting.net Thank you

Select Any of These

MS PUBLISHER 2000

LAST UPDATED: 22 May 2006 02:55:16 +0200

ONLY IN 2000--FIRST IN A SERIES ONLY IN 2000--THE NEXT IN A CONTINUING SERIES

PUT THAT EMBOSS ON THE WEB PUBLISHER 2000 GETS PERSONAL

AM I OPENING THE RIGHT PUBLICATION BRIDGING THE SCREEN-TO-PAPER COLOR GAP

HASTY WORKERS NEED NOT APPLY TEXT STRETCHING IS A STRETCH FOR THE WEB

THATS SOMETHING ELSE TIGHTEN THAT TEXT WRAP! TIMELY PUBLICATION

USE YOUR PAGES AS TEMPLATES WHAT HAVE YOU GOT WORDART MADNESS

ZOOMING--BE SPECIFIC TWO QUESTIONS AND THE FIRST OF TWO ANSWERS

SET YOUR DEFAULT PICTURE FOLDER (PUBLISHER 2000 ONLY) SEE SPACE FOR THE FIRST TIME

PUT THE WHOLE CLIP GALLERY ON YOUR HARD DISK--PARTS 1 TO 2

PAGINATION PRESTIDIGITATION KNOW WHERE YOU ARE CHECKING DIMENSIONS

SEE THE WHOLE MENU, ALL THE TIME QUICK WAY TO STRETCH TEXT MAKE THE QUICK THE DEAD

ONLY IN 2000--FIRST IN A SERIES

Every so often in the upcoming weeks, we'll tell you about a few of the things you can do in Publisher 2000 that you can't do in previous versions. And we'll start today with this wonder: You can drag pictures from Publisher 2000's Clip Gallery directly into your publication! Just choose Insert, Picture, Clip Art; in the Clip Gallery dialog box, find your picture and drag it to the desired location on your page.

Stay tuned for more things you can do only in the latest version.

ONLY IN 2000--THE NEXT IN A CONTINUING SERIES

Here's a long-awaited feature (judging by your e-mails) that finally found its way into Publisher: Version 2000 lets you FLIP ANY TYPE OF GRAPHIC without first having to import it into Microsoft Draw!

If you have Publisher 2000, try it: Select any picture, then click the Flip Horizontal or Flip Vertical button on the Formatting toolbar. Presto!

PUT THAT EMBOSS ON THE WEB

Last time, we told you how to create an embossed or engraved effect using Publisher's new Emboss and Engrave text formats. If since then you've tried using the technique to add a special title to a Web page, you probably didn't get the desired result; instead, you probably got a bit of plain text in a rather large frame.

The problem is that you need to tell Publisher to turn the text title into a graphic--otherwise, Publisher turns it into HTML text. So click the Rectangle tool and draw a rectangle that JUST encloses your text title. Click the Fill Color tool and choose White or no color. Select the image again, click the Line tool, and choose None. Then click Send To Back (or press Shift-F6). When you preview your Web page, the embossed or engraved will appear just as it does in your publication.

PUBLISHER 2000 GETS PERSONAL

Last time, we told you about Publisher 2000's personalized menus, which show only the most commonly used commands plus those you've used most recently. We also told you how to dismiss the personalization if you want to see all commands at all times.

Well, here's something we've just discovered: Publisher 2000's toolbars are personalized in just the same way! If THIS is a little too personal for you, you have two options:

To display all the buttons on a toolbar, double-click the gray bar at the left end of the toolbar. To add a specific button to the toolbar, click the More Buttons button at the far right of the bar, then click the button you want to add.

AM I OPENING THE RIGHT PUBLICATION?

In Publisher 98, there's no doubt: When you choose the Open command on the File menu, the Publisher Catalog appears, and in its right pane you see a preview of the selected publication file. However, in Publisher 2000 you have to request this helpful preview: Choose File, Open, click the Views button, and choose Preview. THEN you can see the selected file previewed in the Catalog's right pane. Note that Publisher 2000's previews are larger than Publisher 98's, but also a lot grainier.

BRIDGING THE SCREEN-TO-PAPER COLOR GAP

Hey, Publisher 2000 user--got a little spare time? If so, we recommend printing out your Color Schemes so that the next time you need one for a publication, you know how the colors will look on paper (as opposed to on the screen). Choose Format, Color Scheme, and click the Print Color Scheme button. Publisher prints two pages: one showing the main colors in each color scheme, and one showing the Basic Colors available when you click the More Colors option for any scheme. This is worth doing even if you have a black-and-white printer--you can see how each color will print in gray shades.

HASTY WORKERS NEED NOT APPLY

Too many times, when describing a formatting procedure in one of Publisher's dialog boxes, we tell you to click OK--without pointing out that in many cases you can see the results of your changes right in the document by clicking Apply instead. Apply applies the formatting to your objects or text BEFORE you close the dialog box so you can check it out and change whatever you don't like. (Note that you may have to move the dialog box to SEE the affected objects.) So if you like to see changes before you make them, get into the habit of clicking Apply BEFORE you click OK.

TEXT STRETCHING IS A STRETCH FOR THE WEB

Publisher's character scaling capability--which we've documented in previous tips--is a great way to create new font looks of your own by making characters wider or slimmer. The feature has only one potential drawback: While you can use it to format text in your Web page, the results won't show up on the Web. That's because HTML, the language of the Web, doesn't know how to stretch or compress characters.

If you really want the look of scaled text--for headlines or text titles--on your Web page, layer the frame containing the scaled text over another empty text frame, a rectangle, or some other object. When Publisher saves the Web site in HTML, it converts the scaled text to a scaled text GRAPHIC, preserving the look you created.

THAT'S SOMETHING ELSE

Ever look at a Publisher publication and wish it were a Word document? Probably not--but some day you may need to make this transformation. If you have Publisher 2000, you can make that wish come true: Choose File, Save As; set Save As Type to one of the several types listed, then click Save. In most cases, you'll see a warning explaining that you'll save the text of the document, but not the graphics--a shortcoming for which we have no workaround.

TIGHTEN THAT TEXT WRAP!

You've inserted a picture in your publication. You've clicked the Wrap Text To Picture button so that the text wraps around the shape of the picture, rather than around the rectangular picture frame. So far, so good--except that now you'd like that text to wrap even more tightly around the picture.

You COULD click the Edit Irregular Wrap button, then move the individual wrap points closer to the edge of the picture. But we've found a better way: Click the Wrap Text To Picture button (and click Yes in the dialog box that follows) two or three more times. Each time you do this--up to five or six times--you tighten the text wrap boundary more.

TIMELY PUBLICATION

Maybe you consider most of the publications you create to be timeless. We're happy for you, but sometimes you must date a publication. When these rare instances occur, first place your cursor within a text frame at the location you want the date to appear; then choose Insert, Date And Time, and double-click the date style of your choice. Now the publication is frozen in time forever.

USE YOUR PAGES AS TEMPLATES

Ready to add a new page to your publication? Before you go stampeding to the Ctrl-N key, may we suggest that if the next page will resemble a previous page, you should just insert a COPY of the original page? It could save you some work.

To see what we mean, choose Insert, Page. Under Options, select Duplicate All Objects On Page. Then, in the text box to the right, specify the page and click OK. Publisher inserts a copy of the specified page; you can remove what you don't need and just refill the various text frames with the new information. It's a lot easier than re-creating and repositioning stuff you've already placed on a previous page.

CORRECTION In a recent two-part tip--PUBLISHER ACROBATICS, 1) told you that the Adobe Acrobat Reader program, available free from Adobe's Web site, lets you read and create PDF files, and 2) provided explicit instructions for using the program to create a PDF file from a Publisher publication.

Well, maybe we dipped a wee too deeply into our keg of green beer, because our tip was wrong: Acrobat Reader lets you read and print existing PDF files, but does NOT let you create your own. Unfortunately, the only way to CREATE PDF files from your Publisher publications is to purchase the full version of Adobe Acrobat, which lists for $249.00 (ouch!) but which we spotted for sale at Egghead.com for $189.00 (still ouch, but not as much). We apologize for the mistake.

WHAT HAVE YOU GOT?

When you're working with multiple objects layered on a Publisher page, it sometimes becomes difficult to know what you're about to select. Our advice: Hover over the object for an extra second or two before clicking. When you do, Publisher displays a little note telling you what you're pointing to--such as Text Frame or Oval. That way you can't make a mistake.

WORDART MADNESS

While we're on the never-ending topic of WordArt, we'll throw in this handy tidbit: You're not limited to the text sizes in WordArt's Size box. If you have a specific size in mind, just type it into the box and press Enter; WordArt resizes the type accordingly.

It's nice to have precision control, isn't it?

ZOOMING--BE SPECIFIC

By now, we're pretty sure you all know Publisher gives you several options for zooming in on, and out from, your document--10 percent, 33 percent, and so forth. But did you know that in Publisher 2000, you can enter your own percentage--and zoom to precisely the level you want, between 10 and 400 percent?

It's true: Just type whatever percentage suits your fancy in the Zoom box (on the Standard toolbar), and press Enter. You're at exactly the percentage you typed.

This feature is NOT available in Publisher 98.

TWO QUESTIONS AND THE FIRST OF TWO ANSWERS

"Can I change the default font size to 12 in Publisher 2000? I've researched it extensively and can't find a way." "Is there a way to 'permanently' change the default margins in Microsoft Publisher for a new (blank) publication to something other than 1 inch? I prefer .5-inch margins and would rather not change the margins each time I create a new publication."

"Is there a way to change Publisher's default New Publication template?" The answer is no. While previous versions of Publisher allowed you to do this, Publisher 98 and 2000 do not.

However, you CAN create a document template of your own that contains these and other defaults. We'll show you how to create and use such a template next time.

SET YOUR DEFAULT PICTURE FOLDER (PUBLISHER 2000 ONLY)

Tired of choosing the Insert Picture command, and then ending up in a folder that doesn't contain any of your picture files? Then reset your default picture folder to one that actually has pictures. Choose Tools, Options and click the General tab. Under File Types, select Pictures. Click Modify, specify the desired directory, and click OK twice. If you use lots of pictures, this minor adjustment could save you hours over the course of your Publisher career.

SEE SPACE FOR THE FIRST TIME

How often does it happen that you THINK you see an extra space between two words--but then you try to delete the space, and wind up deleting a letter instead? Avoid this and other space-related problems by setting Publisher to display your spaces on the screen. Press Ctrl-Shift-Y, and Publisher displays your spaces as little dots between words. It also displays tabs (arrows), paragraph returns (those backward "P" shapes), and other marks.

If you want to return to seeing no spacing marks between words, press the same keys again and the option toggles off.

In Publisher 2000, press the Show Special Characters button to accomplish the above task. If the screen gets too cluttered, just press the keystroke shortcut or click the button again, and the marks disappear as fast as they appeared.

PUT THE WHOLE CLIP GALLERY ON YOUR HARD DISK--PART 1 OF 2

Tired of getting a prompt that tells you to insert a CD every time you choose a picture from Publisher's Clip Gallery? Well, you could eliminate the messages FOREVER by installing the Clip Gallery pictures on your very own hard disk. Of course, you have to have the room for all those pictures--you could have 17,600 of them, depending on the version of Publisher or Office you own. So before we tell you how to INSTALL the pictures, we'll help you decide if you can or should.

First, see how much space you have left on your hard disk: Click Start and choose Programs, Windows Explorer. In the left Explorer pane, find your hard disk icon, right-click it, and choose Properties. Check the Free Space number, and write it down. Then click OK.

If you bought Publisher as part of the Microsoft Office Small Business or Professional Editions, you'll need about 270MB of disk space--a little more than 1/4 of a gigabyte--to install your Clip Gallery Pictures. If you purchased Publisher as part of Microsoft Office Premium Edition, you'll need 490MB of disk space, or a little less than half a gigabyte. Our advice is that if you have about four times the required space free and really want your pictures installed, go ahead; otherwise, you'll probably want to stick with leaving them on the CD.

Next time: How to install the pictures.

PUT THE WHOLE CLIP GALLERY ON YOUR HARD DISK--PART 2 OF 2

Assuming you followed our instructions from last time and have decided to install your Clip Gallery pictures on your hard disk, here's how to do it:

Have your Office CDs handy. Close all open programs, including Publisher. Click Start and choose Settings, Control Panel. In the Control Panel window, double-click Add/Remove Programs. In the list within the dialog box, select Microsoft Office 2000 Disc 2 Installation; then click the Add/Remove button.

In the dialog box that appears, click Add Or Remove Features. Click the plus sign (+) next to Office Tools, and then the plus sign next to Clip Gallery. Click the Clip Files icon, and from the shortcut menu choose Run All From My Computer. Click Update Now, and then follow the screen prompts to let the Setup program install the pictures on your hard disk.

PAGINATION PRESTIDIGITATION

"I've created an eight-page newsletter in Publisher 2000, and want to change the order of the pages--for instance, I want to move page eight to page four. Is there a way to do this?"

There is, but it's probably not the way for which you're hoping. You can't simply shift pages around by moving the page indicators at the bottom of the Publisher 2000 screen. Instead, you have to do some fancy cutting and pasting, as follows:

1. Save your publication. 2. Move to one of the pages--in Marion's example, page eight--and choose Edit, Select All. Then choose Edit, Cut. 3. Move to the other page--in this example, page four. Choose Edit, Select All; using the mouse, drag everything on the page to the scratch area (the space beside the page). 4. Click in the now-blank page and choose Edit, Paste. 5. Using the mouse, draw a box around all the objects in the scratch area to select them; then choose Edit, Cut. 6. Move back to the page on which you started--in this case, page eight--click in the blank page, and choose Edit, Paste.

You've switched your pages. We wish it were easier.

KNOW WHERE YOU ARE

In Publisher, the BACKGROUND layer is where you place elements you want to appear on every page of your publication: logos, watermarks, page numbers, background designs, and so forth. The FOREGROUND is where you place everything else.

So how do you tell which layer you're working in?

Just look on the status bar--the lower frame of the Publisher window. In Publisher 2000, you know you're in the foreground layer when the dog-eared page indicators appear in the status bar; you're in the background layer when you see only a single page indicator containing the letter "R" (sorry, we don't know what that stands for).

In Publisher 98, you know you're in the foreground layer when you see the page indicator-selector with the page number in it; you're in the background layer when the dog-eared background page symbol replaces the page indicator-selector.

And remember, Ctrl-M toggles you between the background and foreground layers.

CHECKING DIMENSIONS

Need to know the exact size of an object? In any version of Publisher, it's as simple as selecting the object and reading its dimensions in the Object Size indicator, located on the status bar in the lower-left corner of the Publisher display.

If you're using Publisher 2000, you can also display the new Measurements toolbar, which tells you the size, location, and all kinds of other things about any selected object--and lets you change many of those items, too. To display the Measurements toolbar, choose View, Toolbars, Measurements.

SEE THE WHOLE MENU, ALL THE TIME

If you use Publisher 2000--or any of the Microsoft Office 2000 products--you've no doubt noticed that the program's menus don't display EVERY command when you first click them. The menus display only the most frequently used commands; the others you display by clicking the double down-pointing arrow at the bottom of the menu.

Of course, you can also go back to the old-fashioned, show-it-all menus any time--choose Tools, Options; in the General tab, turn off Menus Show Recently Used Commands First, then click OK.

QUICK WAY TO STRETCH TEXT

If you've got Publisher 2000, you have at your disposal the fastest way yet to stretch a given line of text--such as a headline or title--to span a particular text frame. (If you DON'T have Publisher 2000, this is one of many good reasons to upgrade.)

Draw a text frame as wide as you want your headline or title to be. Press Ctrl-E to center your cursor, then type the text (remember, this effect looks best with a single line of text). Next, choose View, Toolbars, Measurements to display the Measurements toolbar (a Publisher 2000 exclusive). Select the text--just the text, and NOT any space that might follow it; then, on the Measurements toolbar, use the little up-arrow nest to the Tracking box--the one with the triple A next to it--to add space between the characters until they span the text frame.

Note that you can't expand the spacing more than 600 percent. If you reach this maximum and your text still doesn't span the frame, try increasing the text size slightly.

IF YOU HAVEN'T USED IT, PUBLISHER DIDN'T LOSE IT

Publisher 2000 users: You may not have noticed that Publisher 2000 doesn't list EVERY command on its menus; instead, it lists just the most commonly used ones. How can you get your hands--or more important, your mouse--back on the others?

Just point to the double arrow at the bottom of the menu, and Publisher expands the menu to display every command available in it. Even better, once you use one of the hidden commands, Publisher "unhides" it--that means it will be there next time you select the menu, without your having to click the double arrow. Fairly cool, no?

SHOW ME ALL MY OPTIONS, THANK YOU

Last time, we talked about Publisher 2000's fairly cool way of hiding certain infrequently used menu commands until you need them. Well, not EVERYONE will think this is fairly cool; some of you--the complete novices who want to learn all the commands, or the experts who are in the habit of using them all--might find these efficient menus needlessly secretive. So turn them back into regular, full-disclosure menus: Choose Tools, Options; click the General tab, deselect Menus Show Recently Used Commands First, and click OK. From now on when you click any menu, you'll see everything it has to offer.

MAKE THE QUICK THE DEAD

You Publisher 2000 users have probably noticed the Quick Publication wizard, which appears every time you create a new publication and stays onscreen until you click the Hide Wizard button. If you're clicking the Hide Wizard button every single time you start the program, maybe you should make sure it doesn't appear again: Choose Tools, Options; in the User Assistance tab, turn off Use Quick Publication Wizard For Blank Publications and click OK.

OPEN BAR

Are you a persnickety typographer? Do you spend half your life in Publisher's Character Spacing and Line Spacing dialog boxes, making sure your text looks just right? If you have Publisher 2000, good news: You can save yourself some time by putting all those commands on a toolbar!

Choose View, Toolbars, Measurements. The Measurements toolbar appears, giving you instant access to size, position, rotation, character scaling, tracking, kerning, and line spacing controls. Heck, the size, position, and rotation controls are great to have around even if you don't care a whit about type.

AUTOBULLET

If you've got Publisher 2000, you may never have to touch the Bullets button again. How can we make such a blanket statement? We can make it because Publisher will automatically create a bulleted list if you type a bulletlike character before the first item.

Try it yourself: Type a hyphen (or an asterisk, or a plus sign, or a period), followed by a space, then by the text you want to bullet. Press Enter. Publisher 2000 turns the character into a bullet, and starts the next paragraph with a bullet, too.

And yes, it works with numbering, too: Precede any paragraph with a number or letter, followed by a separator (a period or close parenthesis), then a space, and Publisher starts a numbered list when you press Enter. Guess that Numbering button is obsolete, too.

NO AUTOBULLET

Last time, we told you how Publisher 2000 will automatically create bulleted or numbered lists as you type. Most folks consider this a convenience. But if you're not like most folks--no need to apologize--you can turn this feature off. Then Publisher will create bulleted or numbered lists only when you tell it to. Choose Tools, AutoCorrect. Click the AutoFormat As You Type tab, turn off Automatic Bulleted Lists and Automatic Numbered Lists, and click OK.

PUBLISHER 2000 GETS PERSONAL

Last month, we told you about Publisher 2000's personalized menus, which show only the most commonly used commands plus those you've used most recently. We also told you how to dismiss the personalization if you want to see all commands at all times.

Well, here's something we've just discovered: Publisher 2000's toolbars are personalized in just the same way! If THIS is a little too personal for you, you have two options:

AM I OPENING THE RIGHT PUBLICATION?

CLEAN HOUSE FROM YOUR DIALOG BOX

Want to delete a few publications you no longer need? Instead of winding your way through the Windows folder or Explorer windows, do your deleting in Publisher's Save As dialog box--which takes you directly to your Publisher files! Choose File, then Save As (NOTE: IN PUBLISHER 2000, YOU CAN ALSO CHOOSE FILE, THEN OPEN). Select the file or files you want to delete, right-click, and choose Delete from the shortcut menu. Away they go. As you may have guessed from your brief glance at the shortcut menu, you can also use this dialog box to rename your Publisher files (although you can only rename them one at a time).

TWO QUESTIONS AND THE FIRST OF TWO ANSWERS

"Is there a way to change Publisher's default New Publication template?" The answer is no. While previous versions of Publisher allowed you to do this, Publisher 98 and 2000 do not.

However, you CAN create a document template of your own that contains these and other defaults. We'll show you how to create and use such a template next time.

SET YOUR DEFAULT PICTURE FOLDER (PUBLISHER 2000 ONLY)

KNOW WHERE YOU ARE

So how do you tell which layer you're working in?

And remember, Ctrl-M toggles you between the background and foreground layers.

DRAFT ME A ONE-PAGER

Next time you need a high-impact, one-page, one-sided document, we heartily recommend Publisher 2000's Quick Publication Wizard. Just click the New icon; a blank page appears with the Quick Publication Wizard alongside it. Work your way through the options in the top box--Design, Color Scheme, Layout, Personal Information--and when you're done you'll have a pretty good-looking page. Use it for your next memo, fax cover sheet, note, report cover, whatever.

SOMETHING TO SIGN ON

Happily, Publisher 2000 added a formatting command that lets you create a dotted or dashed line on the page. But what about those of you still using Publisher 98--how can YOU make a dotted line?

Click the Rectangle tool and draw a rectangle as wide as the line you want to draw. Choose Format, Line/Border Style, More Styles. Click the BorderArt tab, and from the styles choose Basic--Black Dots and click OK. Finally, drag the bottom border of the rectangle up to the top border. You have your dotted line.

SEE THE WHOLE MENU, ALL THE TIME

Of course, you can also go back to the old-fashioned, show-it-all menus any time--choose Tools, Options; in the General tab, turn off Menus Show Recently Used Commands First, then click OK.

QUICK WAY TO STRETCH TEXT

Note that you can't expand the spacing more than 600 percent. If you reach this maximum and your text still doesn't span the frame, try increasing the text size slightly.

Questions?

Just Check out some of our sponsors

Shop at BestPrices.Com!