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ABC ~ All
'Bout Computers
The Online Web-azine for Computer
Enthusiasts
-- brought to you by
contents page for this issue
Some Great Tips
~ with a little help from my friends
Here's a collection of great tips
I've received from readers and Fleet members this month. If you
have tips of your own, please go to my
Contact Linda
page and send them to me. I'd be happy to share them here, for ABC
readers!
Excel Add-ins
-
In an
MS
Excel group I belong to, Chad Volkert posted a link
to download an add-in he made for Excel that gives you a toolbar to
quickly open any of your frequently used workbooks. I'm using it now
and it's pretty darn handy. Here's what he has to say about it:
"The product is freeware and open
source so people can learn from it, add to it and change it as they
desire. Excel is more of a hobby for me than anything else, and my
projects usually focus on things that will make my work easier. The
concept for Quick Links came from the Favorites Links in IE and has
evolved over time - usually based on comments and complaints from
users.
"As an educational note for your
readers - one of the biggest personal breakthroughs Iaccomplished in
this project was creating variable VBA code - i.e. allowing a macro
to dynamically re-write the relationships of toolbar buttons. This
is done in the AddButtonMod and is accomplished by writing the
button name and file path to the Excel sheet that is part of the
add-in. Each button, then, just launches a search that finds the
corresponding line in the table and opens the related file. There
are countless uses for this flexible coding in VBA and I'm sure
others can come up with many more uses."
Download
the Quick Links Toolbar here.
-
Then, in my own
MSO group, ABC Fleet member
Ray
Blake mentioned some free Excel add-ins he has created:
examples include add-ins to show/hide worksheets, create multiple
new sheets, and lots more. And, for any of you that don't know
how to install or uninstall add-ins in Excel, Ray includes
instructions on his add-ins page.
Learn more
about Ray's Add-Ins here.
Quickly Switching Views
in FrontPage
This one came from our own Fleet
member,
Tina
Clarke:
"Mix and Match your Views in
FrontPage 2003
"In FrontPage 2003 any changes
you make in 'Code View' won't apply themselves to 'Design View' til
you click the 'Design View' button and vice a versa. However a much
quicker way is to press F5.
"Switching from 'Page View' to
another View can be done by pressing Control + Page Up or Control +
Page Dn.
"If you want to work with HTML
tags in 'Design View' just press Control + / and again to turn it
off."
Another Way To Customize
the Places Bar in Office 2000
A while back, I wrote an ABC tip to
customize the Places Bar in Office and I included a link to
Microsoft's Add-in for Office 2000 (not necessary in the later versions,
thus my tip). Reader CausticCompliance sent me a link for
an alternative to MS's add-in. She says:
"Hi Linda. I just thought I would
let you know about a little app I found through
Tek-Tips
forums the other day concerning Microsoft Office (2000). This little
app does some really neat stuff for the Office Places Bar in Office
2000 (the app says all the way through 2K3). It is a little easier
to install and use than the COM Add-in from MS. It's called OPiE
Office Places Editor and it works well and what I also like is
it is free. Thought you and my fellow "computer-tutor" visitors
would like to know. Hope all is well and please keep up the great
work. Thanks! CausticCompliance"
Learn more about it here. Click on the Downloads button
when you get there.
Getting Rid of Parasites!
Sick of all the scumware and adware that is constantly
attacking your computer? Fleet member
Mike
Baynes found this site. He says:
"One of the members of
CHAD asked about this page. It looks very good.
It will make a good reference page.
The Parasite Fight
http://aumha.org/a/parasite.php
Finding, Removing & Protecting Yourself From Scumware
We are in the middle of a parasite epidemic! You
need to know what is out there, how to identify it on your computer
and remove it, and how to protect yourself against more in the
future."
Free Vector Graphics Program from
Microsoft
Are you into Vector Graphics but can't afford Adobe
Illustrator? Steven, a fellow member of Tina Clarke's
FrontPage yahoo group, found this little treasure. Though
the Microsoft webpage says it's only available to previous owners of
Expression, that's not the case. Anyone can download it for free
(for now, anyway). It is NOT just a demo copy and it does NOT have
an expiration date on it, so grab it now while you can. Who knows how
long this offer will last! Here's what Steven says:
"I forget who it was, but someone was asking about a
free graphics program the other day and here is a very nice free
vector graphics program from Microsoft called Creature House
Expression. It's good stuff and, low and behold, Microsoft is giving
it away right now ...You will need high speed to get it and a .net
passport (57mb file I
think). Anyone can have fun with this one ... happy webbing!
:)
Love, Steven"
AND ... lo and behold, my pal and
fellow Eclectic Academy instructor, Sara
Froelich, whipped up a great article for you, which explains how
Expression works, along with links to some free tutorials, as well as
full online classes that will turn you into an Expression expert in no
time.
Learn more and download it here. It's available for both
Windows and Macs. |
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