Microsoft Word for Windows, version 6, has just come out, and WOW is it ever loaded with bells and whistles! The list of new features in the press release available on America Online tells less than a tenth of the story. You have got to see this terrific new product to believe all the tricks it does.
I have been using WinWord (as we Word lovers affectionately call it), version 2, for about a year. I figured it did everything I could possibly want a word processor to do, so I initially had no interest in upgrading to the new version 6, when I heard it was coming out. But I must admit that the ads listing the new features caught my eye. You see, it is my attitude that a computer is not primarily a tool to get a job done, but is rather a toy to allow me to have fun while doing a job. In my strange way of looking at things, it doesn't matter whether I need the new features of a new version of some program. What matters is whether I could have even more fun, if I had those new features. So after reading the ads, I started calling my local Egghead store every two days, to ask whether they had the new Word upgrade in stock yet. When they finally said yes, I rushed over, plunked down my $90 upgrade fee, and zipped home with my exciting new shrink-wrapped plaything.
After a simple installation, I cranked up my new version of WinWord. The first surprise was that the opening screen has been modernized and colorized. Now I was really getting excited! (Yes, I guess my life is so boring that a colorized and modernized opening word processor screen is enough to thrill me.) My second surprise was that the icons at the top of the screen (such as the open file folder, the disk, the scissors, the printer, etc.) are also now in color. And when my mouse-arrow paused briefly over one of those icons, a little yellow text box appeared, telling me what that icon was for. This can be quite handy, even for an experienced Word user, because WinWord 6 includes dozens of new icons, not only the old ones you are already familiar with. And speaking of icons, you can arrange the icons in any order you prefer, and place several additional strips of icons anyplace you like on the screen, horizontally or vertically. There are even icons to automatically start up and switch you to Excel, Access, and several other programs.
You have probably read the ads, saying that Word 6 will instantly and automatically correct your typing errors. But you've got to see it in action to believe it. I often type "teh" when I mean "the," but no more. The moment I mistype "teh," Word instantly changes it to "the." (Yes, you can undo the change with a quick mouse-click, if you really wanted to type teh for some strange reason.) Another one of my common typos, is to accidentally capitalize the first two letters of a sentence, by holding down the shift key too long, when I only mean to capitalize the first letter. Word magically corrects that error too. (And yes, you can give a click on the Undo button to undo Word's correction, if you really want the first two letters capitalized, such as when you are starting a sentence like "MI is the abbreviation for Michigan.") You can even teach Word your own common misspellings and typographical errors. For example, I sometimes reverse the letters when I am typing my son's name, so that I may type "Micheal" instead of "Michael." So I taught Word to automatically change "Micheal" to "Michael," and now I can never make that mistake again.
Depending on what program you are using to read this article, you may or may not be able to tell that all the quotation marks in the above paragraph are "curly quotes" (real quotes shaped liked the numbers 66 and 99), instead of those ordinary-looking little straight-line quotes you usually get from a word processor. Word 6 automatically puts the correctly-shaped opening and closing quotation marks in place, with no effort at all from the writer. This is a perfect example of a new feature that I certainly did not "need," but that makes using my word processor a little bit more fun. Another such "fun" feature is optional instant "dropped" enlarged capital letters to start out a paragraph (like the big "O" at the start of the first word in every fairy tale that begins "Once upon a time...")
A feature that really does have practical use, is Multi-level Undo. Believe it or not, this means that WinWord remembers your last one hundred actions, and can list them all at a click of the Undo-List icon. You can then pick any one of those actions, and undo it, even though you have done up to 99 other actions on your document, since you made the error you are trying to undo. And there's also a Redo button, so you can, in effect, undo any undo!
Did you ever use the Glossary feature of Word 2? Me neither. But it's been renamed "AutoText," greatly simplified, and given its own icon on the tool bar. Now it's so handy, that you'll suddenly find you can't get along without it. AutoText automatically replaces any abbreviation you make up, with any long text you define. For example, you can tell AutoText to type your full name and address, whenever you type just your initials and click the AutoText icon.
Word now has "Wizards" like the Wizards I have found so helpful in Microsoft's Windows database program, Access. The new Word Wizards will automatically write your business letters, make a calendar, print a fancy award certificate, design a brochure, set up a fax cover sheet, or lay out a memo, report, or resume. The new AutoFormat feature combines styles and templates to make your documents both beautiful and impressive. The Table Wizard sets up a table of any size, and ads shading, colors, and highlights effortlessly. Then there's improved ease of bullets, numbering, outlines, headings and captions. They even found a way to improve the spellchecker: when you add a few words and have to recheck the same document you already checked, it remembers which words you told it to "ignore" on the first spellcheck, and it doesn't ask you about those same words again, like the old version of Word used to do.
Your right mouse button is finally good for something. You can select some text and click the right mouse button, to get a small menu, right beside the text, listing the things you can do with your selection (cut, copy, paste, font, paragraph layout, bullets and numbering). And speaking of selecting text, Word knows that you usually want to select whole words, not parts of words, so it automatically starts your selection at the beginning of a whole word, and ends it at the end of a whole word, even if you accidentally missed a couple of letters with your sweep of the mouse.
Finding and/or replacing text has been simplified. Finding a specific page, section or line with the F5 function key GoTo command is easier than before. And finding that missing file that you can't remember the name of is a lot easier with the new layout of the Find File box. Page layout, WordArt, columns, customizing, and outlines have all been improved. You can drag and drop directly to/from Excel. Mail Merge has been greatly facilitated, and you can even merge names and addresses from your Access or Excel files without separately opening or going into those other programs. Plus there are more surprises, too numerous to list here.
Are there any downsides to the new version of Word? Well, it takes a few seconds longer to load the program and slightly longer to save a file. And a "typical" installation requires 15 megabytes of hard disk space, while a "complete" installation gobbles up an astounding 24 megs. But what's a little space, when it brings this much happiness?
So what's my favorite new feature of Word for Windows 6.0? That easy. It's the "Tip Of The Day." Every time you start up Word, you get a dialog box in the center of your screen with a tip. Each tip teaches you a feature of Word. It may be a new feature of version 6, or an old feature from the previous version. Sometimes it is a feature you already knew about. But often it is a trick or command or shortcut that will surprise you. Very frequently, I find it is a tip I can put to use immediately, in the very session of Word that I was just starting. If you are like 99.99% of Word users, you will never read the manual from cover to cover. So "Tip Of The Day" will be a way to learn all these neat tricks, painlessly, one at a time. My tip of the day for you? Get WinWord 6!
