MICROSOFT WORKS

Word Processing Program-

1) File names: 1) Use 8 letters (or less) plus a 3 letter extension (for Microsoft Works 3.0 or older versions). Example: “letter1.wps”. The extension should tell you at a glance what type of file it is:

xxxxxxxx.wps = word processing doc.

yyyyyyyy.wks = spreadsheet file

zzzzzzzz.wdb = database file.

You could create your own file name system in Works. (It would be better, however, to know and use the default extensions to avoid confusion and problems with opening your files.)

2) Help Menu: When in doubt, pull down the Help menu. You can search for certain items by clicking on the Search button and typing in the item name, then clicking on Show Topics and Go to. You can also access the Help Menu by pressing F1or clicking on the ?button at the upper right hand corner of the screen (on the “Tool Bar”).

3) File Menu: Pull down the File menu by clicking on the File at the upper left hand corner of the screen.

4) Open/New: 1) Click on Create New File from the File Menu to create a new document, letter, etc. 2) Click on Open Existing File to open an existing document. (Insert a floppy drive and change the disk drive to A: or B: first if the document you want to work on is on a floppy diskette instead of your hard drive (usually the C:\ drive).)

5) Save/Save As: Click on Save As the first time you save your letter, document, etc., in order to give it a name. Click in the “File Name:” box in the upper left hand corner to move the flashing cursor there, and then type the file name you want. (Be sure you select the right directory or drive where you want the file to be saved before clicking on OK.) 

Click on Save the next time you save the document (after you’ve typed in more text). (You don’t need to use Save As for this because your document already has a file name.)

6) Close: Click on Close, when you are finished with your letter, document, etc. If your document has not yet been saved or you’ve typed in some more new text since the last time you saved it, the computer will ask you if you want to save it. Click on “No” if you don’t, “Yes” if you do (and then type in a file name for the document if it needs one).

7) Esc (on the keyboard): Whenever you get in trouble and want to back out of a menu or dialogue box, press Esc. The following keys can also be tried when you want to exit a program (any program) if you are stuck, but be sure you have saved your work to a safe place before using any of these commands (and never save a blank page over your document by deleting all of your text intentionally or accidentally and then saving it to the same file name):

8) Tab key: Note that the Tab key moves you to the right one tab stop. Shift-Tab will move you to the left one tab stop.

9) Wordwrap/Enter: You only need to press the Enter key when you want to start a new paragraph. The computer will automatically “word wrap” your typing when it gets to the end of the line. To see the Enters, or “Hard Returns,” click on View on the Tool Bar. Click on All ¶Characters. Click on the same command again to hide the Enter (¶), Tab (->), etc., symbols in the body of your document.

10) Selecting text: Click where you want to begin highlighting, and while holding down the left mouse button, drag the mouse to highlight the selected text. Let go of the mouse button when you have selected the desired area.

11) Scrolling: Click on the upper or lower arrow buttons on the right side of the screen to scroll the text area up or down respectively. Or click and drag on the sliding button which will be found somewhere between the two (upper and lower) buttons. Likewise, you can scroll the page horizontally using the left and right arrow buttons and the sliding button at the bottom of the screen. You can move from page to page by clicking on the Left and Right Triangle keys that surround the Page No. indication at the lower left hand corner of the screen.

12) Changing fonts: Drag over the text you want to change, as in Step #9 above, to highlight it. Click on the button with the down arrow on it next to the font name (for example, “Times New Roman”) window at the top of the screen. Scroll down the list of font names and click on one. Do the same for the font size right next to the font name window. (The font size is usually set to a default value of 10 or 12 points).

13) Bold, Underline, etc.: Select the text as in Step #9 above and click on one or more of the following buttons above the ruler:   B  I  U

14) Justification: Look to the right of the Bold, Italic and Underline buttons (See Step #12 above) for the L(eft), C(enter), and R(ight) buttons. Look closely on the face of the button to determine which type of justification it is. (They all have five tiny lines on them to represent lines of text and how they align to the margins.) For Full Justification, click on Format, then on Paragraph, then select the Indent and Alignment tab.

15) Moving text: Select the text you want to move and then go up to the Edit Menu and click on Cut. Move the flashing cursor to the place where you want to move the text to by clicking there with the I-beam cursor. Go back up to the Edit menu and click on Paste. (Alternatively, select the text and use Control-X for Cut or Control-C for Copy (which leaves a copy of the highlighted text in its original place), and then Control-V for Paste after you move the flashing cursor to where you want the text to go.)

16) Margins, Tabs: 

            1) TABS–Click on Format in the Menu Bar. On the pull-down menu, select Tabs. Type in the positions (in inches) and click the tab types (Left, Center, Right, or Decimal) that you want. Click on OK. Alternatively, click on the particular type of tab that you want, then click on OK. That particular type of tab marker will appear wherever you click on the lower half of the Ruler Bar.

            2) MARGINS–To move the Margins, click and drag the small black triangles on the left and right edges of the screen. The upper small half-triangle on the left margin moves only the first line of the new paragraph. (CAUTION: Be sure you highlight the entire paragraph, column, page, or document (whatever you want) before you move these margin markers!)The lower small half-triangle on the left moves the left margin for the rest of the paragraph.

17) Header, Footer, Page #: Click on View on the Menu Bar at the top of the screen. Click on Headers and Footers. Type in the text that you want in the Header or Footer in the appropriate window. (You can add page numbers to your document by typing &p in either the header or footer windows. Type &l, &c, or &r after the &p or other text you type in these windows to left-, center-, or right-justify the page number or text. (You can also use &f to have the file name of your document automatically printed in the header or footer.)

18) Print/Print Preview: To see your document on the screen before you print it out on the printer, go up to the File Menu and select Print Preview. To print the document to the Printer, select Print. Select the number of copies you want. Select the numbers of the pages you want printed out. Use the Tab key to jump from the “From” to the “To” boxes. If you want just page 1 to print out, type in “From1”“To1.”If you want all the pages to print out, leave “ALL” selected.

19) Page Setup: “Landscape” vs. “Portrait”–Landscape means the page will be turned on its side so that it is wider than it is high (i.e., 11” wide X 8½” high).Portrait means 11” high X 8½” wide (like the page you are now holding). The above assumes that you are printing on “Letter Size” paper.

20) Number of columns: Click on Format on the Menu Bar. Then click on Columns. Type in the number of columns you want on the page.

21) Envelopes/mailing labels: Click on Tools and then Envelopes and Labels. Type in the address and your return address (if needed). The envelope will appear in a new page before your letter (if there is a letter associated with the envelope). Select Page Setup under the File Menu to change the printing and page setup options.

22) Spell Check: Click on the button on the Tool Bar that has “A B C” above a (check mark). Select Ignore if the computer is asking you about a unusual word or name that is not found in its dictionary. Click on Change if you would like to change the spelling to the one the computer suggests and highlights in the box below, or click on another suggestion.

END-Word Processing Program

Spreadsheet Program-

1) File names: Use 8 letters (or less) plus a 3 letter extension for Microsoft Works 3.0 or earlier. You cannot use spaces and special characters like /\*and so on in Microsoft Works 3.0 or earlier. 

An example of a legal file name would be: “budget1.wks”

The extension (the 3 characters after the period in the file name) should tell you at a glance what type of file it is: 

“aaaaaaaa.wks” =Works spreadsheet

You could create your own extensions (like .ltr), but it would be better to know and use the default extensions your programs use in order to avoid confusion and difficulty in opening your files. 

You can type in as many letters as you want for the file name in Microsoft Works 4.0 or later. You can use spaces (but not special characters like /  \  *  and so on).

2) Help Menu: 1) When in doubt, pull down the Help menu or press the F1 key. Press the Search button. Type the first few characters of the topic you want help on, then select or search further for the topic highlighted. Then click on Show Topics. Select the topic you want, then click Go to. [To hide the Help window, click on Hide Help.]

3) File Menu: 1) Pull down the File menu by clicking on the File at the upper left hand corner of the screen.

4) Opening an Old File/Creating a New File: 1) Click on Create New File... from the File Menu and then (Create a new) Spreadsheet. 2) Click on Open Existing File... to open an existing spreadsheet. (Insert a floppy drive and change disk drives to A: or B: first if the spreadsheet you want to work on is on a floppy diskette instead of your hard drive (usually the C:\ drive).) Scroll and find the right file name and double-click on it to open it.

5) Save/Save As: Click on Save As the first time you save your spreadsheet in order to give it a name. Click in the “File Name” box in the upper left hand corner to move the flashing cursor there if it is not already there, and then type the file name you want. (Be sure to select the right drive and/or directory where you want to save this file, too.) 

Click on Save the next time you save the same document. (You don’t need to use Save As because your document already has a file name.)

6) Close: Click on Close, when you are finished with your spreadsheet. If your spreadsheet has not yet been saved, the computer will ask you if you want to save it. Click on “No” if you don’t, “Yes” if you do (and then type in a file name for the spreadsheet).

7) Column width: To change the column width, move the pointer to the line between the, for example, A and B in the header above the cells of the spreadsheet. The pointer will change from an arrow to a double arrow pointing left and right. Hold down the mouse button and drag left to make the whole A column narrower, or drag right to make the A column wider. Let go of the mouse button when you are satisfied with the column width.

8) Inserting column/row: Click on, say, the A column again. Move the pointer up to the Menu Bar and click on Edit. Then select Insert. Then click on Row/Column. Do this however many times you need for the number of columns you want to insert. Likewise, click on a row number (which is found along the left edge of the spreadsheet) and use Edit, Insert, and Row/Column to insert a new row.

9) Delete column/row: Click on a column or row to highlight it, but this time select Delete Row/Column under the Insert menu.

10) Cells, cell references: Cells are referred to by, first, the column, then the row in which they are found. So B5 is in the B column and #5 row. If you insert a new row above the #5 row, the formula or value in B5 will be pushed down into the B6 cell. If you have another cell, say C2,that uses a formula or value in B5, the formula will automatically be “updated” to reflect the change. (In other words, the formula will now contain B6, not B5.)

            If you do not want the formula to be updated, use the following “syntax” in your formula in C2: 

            $B$5 (the result of the formula in C2 will depend on whatever is in B5, and not B6).

11) Labeling headers/rows: Instead of using a cell name such as C1 or a range of cells such as C1: C16, you can name the cell or the whole range by clicking on Insert and then Range Name. (You could name the aforementioned cell or range “Amount,” for example.) You can then use this name instead of the cell name, like this: 

SalesTax = 0.07*Amount 

in a formula elsewhere in your spreadsheet.

12) Formulae: You insert a formula into a cell by first clicking on that cell to highlight it, then typing a =
 

13) Summing: To sum just a few cells, type the cell names separated by a + , like this:

= D1+D2+D3

For a much longer range of cells, you can type SUM after the  =  and then, in parentheses, type the range of cells you want to sum, separated by a colon, like this: 

= SUM(D1:D25)

14) Autosum: If you want to put the sum right under the above column of cells (i.e., in cell D26), you can do so by highlighting cell D26 and then clicking on the Autosum button in the Tool Bar (the Autosum button looks like this: S).

15) Multiplying, dividing, exponents: Substitute an  *  for the  +  for multiplication. Use a / instead of the  +  for dividing. For exponents, use ^ (Shift-6), like this:

            = X^2   (which would equal 25, for example, if X =5).

Use parentheses to separate different parts of your formula and to force the computer to calculate these different parts before other parts of your formula.

Example:

                        = (A1+A2)*(A3+A4)

would equal 21,  if A1 =1, A2 =2, A3 =3,  and A4 =4 (and not 11).

16) Fill down, Fill right: Click on a cell with a value or a formula and drag down however many cells you want to “Fill down” with the same value or formula. (Or do this horizontally with a row for “Fill right.”) If what you had in the first cell is a formula that refers or uses an adjacent cell, the formula in each subsequent cell will be modified for each cell in the series to use the right cell reference. For example, 

	A	B	C
1	1	1	=A1+B1
2	2	2	=A2+B2
3	3	3	=A3+B3
4	4	4	=A4+B4

                                                Filling down from cell C1

The resulting calculations will show the following sums in the C column:  2, 4, 6, 8.

You can also use the Fill Series command, which can type in the names of the months if you type in “January” and “February” in two adjacent cells and drag and highlight the remaining adjacent cells. (Experiment with this command to familiarize yourself with all that it can do.)

17) Moving text: Select the text you want to move and then go up to the Edit Menu and click on Cut.Move the flashing cursor to the cell where you want to move the text to by clicking there with the I-beam cursor. Go back up to the Edit menu and click on Paste.(Alternatively, select the text and use Control-X for Cut or Control-C for Copy (which leaves a copy of the highlighted text in its original place), and then Control-V for Paste after you move the flashing cursor to where you want the text to go.)

18) Justification: For Justification,click on Format, then on Alignment, then select the type of alignment you want: Left, Right, Center, Fill (or Full). You can also click on Center across Selection which will center the value or text across multiple columns (however many you click and drag across).

19) Print/Print preview: To see a document on the screen before you print it out on the printer, go up to the File Menu and select Print Preview. To print the document to the Printer, select Print. Type in the number of copies you want (or leave it on “1”). Select the numbers of the pages you want printed out. Use the Tab key to jump from the “From” (Page No.) to the “To”(Page No.) boxes. If you want all the pages to print out, leave“ALL”selected. (If you want just page 1 to print out, type in “1”in both the “From Page No.” to the “To Page No.” boxes.)

20) Page setup: “Landscape” vs. “Portrait”-Landscape means the page will be turned on its side so that it is wider than it is high (i.e., 11” wide X 8½” high).Portrait means 11” high X 8½” wide (like this page that you are holding). The above assumes that you are printing on “Letter Size” paper. (Generally, for spreadsheets with many columns, you will want to use “Landscape”)

21) Print area: To select a print area smaller than your whole spreadsheet, drag and highlight the whole range diagonally, then click on Format on the Tool Bar and then Set Print Area.

22) Page numbers: Go to View in the Menu Bar, select Headers and Footers. Note that the Footer window says “&p.”This means that the appropriate page number will print out on each page (in the center). If you want the page number to print on the bottom right corner or the bottom left corner, type a “&r”or a “&l”respectively, before the “&p” in the same window.[You can also have the file name of your spreadsheet automatically printed out on each page. (Use “&f”in the Header or Footer.)]If you want the page number to print in the Header instead, delete the “&p” in the Footer and add it to the Header.

23) Functions: Select the cell where you want to insert the function, then type = . Then select Insert on the Menu Bar. Select Function, then choose the function you want (SUM, AVG (Average), SINE, COSINE, etc.). Click on OK after you choose the right function you need. To complete the selection, press Enter.

END-Spreadsheet Program

Database Program–

1) File names: See Word Processing section above.

2) Help Menu: See Word Processing section above.

3) File Menu: See Word Processing section above.

4) Open/New: See Word Processing section above.

5) Close: See Word Processing section above.

6) Save/Save As: See Word Processing section above.

7) Records/Fields:You can consider a record to be like one 3” X 5” file card ofa database of, say, Employees. A field can be considered to be one variable on that card, such as a First Name or Last Name.

8) List View/Form View: 1) “List View” lists all of your records in the form of a table, and looks just like a spreadsheet. Every row is a different record (Employee). Each cell in that row is a different field (like First Name, Last Name, Age, Salary, etc.), with the different fields lined up in columns.

 2) “Form View” looks more like the face of a 3” X 5” file card with all the fields of a single record (Employee) visible on the face of the card. 

Select the List View by clicking on the button that looks like a miniature spreadsheet on the “Tool Bar” at the top of the screen. Select the Form View by clicking on the button that looks like a bunch of 3” X 5” file cards (next to the List View button). 

9) Field Names: 1) To add the Field Names to your form (in Form View), click on the form where you want that particular field to go in order to move the flashing cursor there. Then type the name of the field (like First Name), followed by a colon (:).A dialog box will pop up on the screen asking you to type a width for that particular field. Type in a number (representing the number of characters you want in that field) and then click on OK or press the Enter key. (You can also accept the default value of whatever the computer puts in the “Width” box.) Type a Row Height value in, also, if you want more than one line of data in that field. [You can also type titles or headings anywhere on the form by just clicking there and typing the title without the colon.] 

2) To add the Field Names to your table (in List View), click on the heading of that particular field to highlight that whole column. Then click on Edit at the top of the screen and then click on Field Name. Type the name of the field (like First Name) into the “Name” box on the dialogue box that pops up. (You can click and drag the short vertical lines between the Field Names at the top of the List View to make the Field widths wider or narrower.)

10) Moving the Fields around:In Form View, you can click directly on the Field Name (such as First Name:) and then drag it to a new position on the screen. If you don’t like what you did, you can click on Edit at the top of the screen and then click on Undo Move. It may be easier to line up the Field Names, if you select Snap to Grid under Format at the Menu Bar at the top of the screen.

11) Finding records:(Form View) Use the small buttons at the bottom left hand corner of the screen to move from record to record (not the scrolling buttons which move what's on the whole screen left or right!). The button with the left arrow moves back one record. The button with the right arrow moves forward one record. The other button withthe left arrow (and a short vertical line to the left of it) moves you all the way back to the first record in your database. The other button with the right arrow (and a short vertical line to the right of it) moves you to the last record (most likely the most recently entered record) in your database. Note the record number in between these arrow buttons; also note the number that looks like a fraction (for example: 18/18 ) on the bottom right hand corner of the screen. This number tells you that you are on record # 18 (the last record) and that there are a total of 18 records in your database.

Alternatively, use Control-Page Up and Control-Page Down to move from record to record.

12) Adding New Records:In Form View, click on the right arrow button with the short vertical line on it to take you to the last record. Add your data to the record by clicking just to the right of the Field Name (on the same line) to highlight the data entry area. Use the Tabkey to move to the next field down or to the right. (Use Shift-Tab to move back up your fields.) 

In List View, click on the very last row of the table and then type in your data. Tab to the next field over on the right. Use Shift-Tab to move to the column on the left. (Don’t forget to click on File and then Save every now and then (or click on the button on the Tool Bar that looks like a tiny floppy disk) to save your data to the hard disk drive.)

13) Inserting/Deleting a Record: You can also insert a new record in between two other records in the following way:In List View, click on the row where you want to insert the new record (above the row). Click on Insert on the Tool Bar, and then on Record. (To delete a record, click on the row and then click on Delete Record under the same Insert menu.)

14) Sorting Records: To sort your records alphabetically or numerically, click on Tools and then Sort Records in List View. A dialogue box will pop up on the screen. You can sort on up to 3 fields. Select them by clicking on the downward pointing arrow buttons next to each field box. Then select whether you want the records sorted A to Z, or 0-1-2-3-...9 (which is called “Ascending”)or Z to A, or 9-8-7...0 (which is called “Descending”).

15) Functions: You can add a function field to your database by selecting or creating a field (column) where you want the function to go (in List View, insert the function in the top cell of that column). Then type =to let the computer know that this is a function and not text or a number, and type the name of the function, such as SQRT (for Square root), just like in a spreadsheet.(See the Spreadsheet section of these Instruction Sheets for more information on using spreadsheet commands.)

16) Queries: To find records which match certain conditions, select Create New Query on the Tools menu pad. In the New Query dialogue box that pops up, choose a field in box A by clicking on the downward-pointing arrow and then selecting one of the Field Names that you have entered into the database. In Box B next to the above box, select how you want to compare the field (“is equal to,” “is less than,” etc.). In the box to the right, select the value to compare the field to. For example, in Box A, select, say, “Salary”(in a database of employees in a company).Then in box B, select “is greater than” and in box E,select“$30,000.”By clicking on the Apply Now button on the bottom, you would then see a list of Employees who make$30,001 or more. 

If you switch to Form View, you would see what looks like a fraction in the lower right hand corner of the screen. The top (or left) number is the number of records that match the condition(s) you've set. The bottom (or right) number is the total number of records in your database. To see the records that do not match the condition(s) you have set, select Switch Hidden Records from the View menu. To see all the records again, select Show All Records from the same menu. 

You can also create multiple conditions by clicking on And or Or and “chaining” your conditions together. For example, you could search for employees whose 

“Age”             “is greater than”             “50”

And

“Salary”            “is greater than”            “30,000.” 

Be sure to save and name your query if you think that you will want to use it again. (Go to Name Query under the Tools menu to do so.) 

Alternatively, you can search for the records that meet your search criteria in more than 3 fields by selecting the Query command from the View menu and typing in the search text or data into the appropriate fields. You will then see a list of the records that meet your criteria.

17) Reporting: To make a report on the selected records in your database (after using Query), select Create New Report under the Tools menu. Give your report a title in the Report Title box. Then select the fields that you want to have in your report by clicking on them individually and then clicking on the Add >> button, or clicking on the Add All >>button if you want all of your fields to print out (if you think that you will have room on the page. You may have to select “Landscape” (sideways) format in Page Setup for this). If you change your mind about a field, you can remove that field by clicking on that Field Name in the list on the right and then clicking on the Remove button. Click on the OK button when you are happy with the fields that you have selected.

18) Summaries (Statistics): The Report Statistics dialogue box will then pop up. Select Sum, Average, Count (number of records), etc., and the field that you want to sum, average, count, or whatever. Then select where you want the sum, average, count, or whatever to go in your report: under each column (in List View format), or together in rows.

19) Previewing your Report: Select Print Preview to see what your report will look like on the screen, before you print it out on paper. The rows in your report will look something like this:

Title                  For entire report (i.e., Main Report Heading)–appears once at the top of the page

Title                  Blank line in the Main Report Heading 

Headings          Field Names (First Name, Last Name, Salary, etc.)–appears once

Headings          Blank line(to separate data lines below from the Field Names) 

Record             The actual data for each field--a line will appear here for each record 

Summary          Blank line (to separate data lines from the summary lines)

Summary         Avg:

Summary          =Avg (Salary) 

which will give you the actual calculated average of all the salaries.

You can, of course, extensively modify the above. Experiment with doing so after you become familiar with the basic steps in creating a report.

20) Print: Click on the Print button to print out a copy of your report.

END-Database Program