Some people simply love to annotate documents with Post-it notes. With WordPerfect 8, you can, too, but you'll save a tree and the notes can't fall off! You can easily create a text box that resembles a Post-it note and sits on top of your document text. First, make sure your mouse pointer is an arrow. Then, click and drag to create a box where you want the note created (you can place it over existing text). Release the mouse button, and WordPerfect will display a shortcut menu. From the shortcut menu, select Custom Box. Next, select Sticky Note Text from the Style Name list box and click OK. A yellow text box appears where you can type your message. When you've finished typing your note, click outside of the box. You can resize and move the note like any graphic box. To delete the note, click on its frame and press [Delete].

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If you've used Presentations 8, you're probably familiar with QuickLinks. A QuickLink is simply an object on a slide with an action or event attached to it. Did you know that you can place QuickLinks anywhere on a slide, then make them invisible? This feature gives your slides a clean, uncluttered look. To create an invisible QuickLink, click on the drawing tool you want (rectangle, circle, etc.) from the toolbar or select Insert, then select Shape. Next, draw the shape on the slide, then move and size the shape to fit the area where you want the QuickLink. Right-click on the object you just created, then select Object Properties. On the Fill tab, click the None button, then click OK. Now right-click on the object again and select QuickLink. Click the Action option, then select the desired action from the drop- down box. Click Invisible while playing or printing slides, then click OK. Now, when you run your slide show, this QuickLink will be invisible. To locate the invisible QuickLink, move the arrow cursor over the screen. When the cursor passes over the invisible QuickLink, the arrow cursor will become a hand cursor.

ZD Tips

If you think you'll be using the Spell Utility fairly often, why not add a button to your WP toolbar so you can start the program right from your WP window? To add the button, position your mouse pointer on top of your toolbar and right-click. Then, choose Edit. Click the Programs tab and then click the Add Program button. Navigate through your folders to find the Spell Utility's executable file (\Corel\Suite8\Programs\wtsptlen.exe) and highlight it. Now, click Open. The new button will be added to end of your current toolbar. To save the change, click OK in the Toolbar Editor dialog box. To start the Spell Utility, simply click the button on your toolbar.

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Have you ever found yourself in this situation? You originally installed the Corel WordPerfect suite on your computer with only a few programs, such as WordPerfect, Quattro Pro, and Presentations. Now, you want to customize your installation to include more of the suite. However, you can't run Setup, because it says you need to close a couple of files, the Desktop Application Director (DAD), and PerfectPrint.

Many of us don't know how to close all those files. We can figure out how to close PerfectPrint, but not DAD. Here's a solution: DAD gets lumped into the Win95 startup group on installation, so it'll be running behind the scenes, along with PerfectPrint. Look at your Win95 system tray and see if you have a DAD icon there. If you do, right-click the icon and choose Exit DAD.

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You're probably familiar with the use of watermarks to jazz up the appearance of your WordPerfect documents. However, what can you do when your watermark prints too dark, making the text over it difficult to read? The answer is easy--edit the watermark. To do this, select Insert, Watermark, and then click Edit in the Watermark dialog box. Now click Shading to display the Watermark Shading dialog box. From here, you can adjust the percentage of text or image shading to lighten the watermark image. Now click OK, and then Close to return to the document. You'll see the changes you made reflected in your watermark.

ZD Tips

You may know that you can easily make your Quattro Pro columns adjust to the width of your data by selecting the column and choosing Format/QuickFit. However, you can also do this by double-clicking on the line that separates the column headings. The column will automatically changed to be one character wider than your longest entry.

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Unless you have the gift of a quick eye, designing attractive visuals is the most time-consuming part of creating any kind of slide show. Sure, you can usethe safe white-type-on-a-navy-blue-background style for every slide, letting the words on the slide turn your clients' heads. Or, you can use one of Presentations' predesigned slide-show themes that you can alter to fit your needs. When you start Presentations, PerfectExpert's New Project dialog box will appear, from which you can select a predesigned slide show. In this dialog box, select [Corel Presentations 8]. When you do, you will see a listing of Presentations projects that you installed on your PC when you installed Corel WordPerfect Suite 8. Click on a slide show, choose Create, and alter the predesigned slide show until it suits your needs.

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If you need to copy several items from a document to paste into another file, there's no need to copy and paste repeatedly. You can copy and append text to the clipboard, instead of replacing what's already there. Then, you only need to paste once into your target document.

To append text to the clipboard contents, select the first block of text you need to copy and select Copy from the Edit menu. Then, select the next block of text and choose Append from the Edit menu. Append all the text you need, then simply paste into the destination document as you normally would.

Donna Jones

You can set up WordPerfect to automatically open the last document you were working on, instead of a blank document. To do this, open the Tools menu and select Settings. Double-click on the Environment icon, then click on the Interface tab. Next, select the Always option in the Save Workspace (Documents And Window Layout) panel and click OK. Finally, click the Close button on the Settings dialog box. From now on, simply exit from WordPerfect without closing your document first. The next time you start the program, your document will automatically open.

ZD Journals' Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

There are some typos that we'll probably never free ourselves from. That's why Corel enhanced QuickCorrect for WP8. Prior to WP8, the WP spell checker (and QuickCorrect) lacked the capability to suggest changes for multiple-word entries such as "so that" to replace the typo "sot hat" or "does not" to replace the inelegant but common "doe snot." (Both of these uncorrected examples are acceptable to the spell checker in WP7, as well as in WP 6.x.) In WP8, QuickCorrect includes these common examples and corrections.

There are two ways to work around this problem in 6.x and 7. You can add the entry to your spell checker's word list (where multiple words are permitted), or you can "trick" QuickCorrect into accepting the entry. First, type the misspelled phrase in a WP document, then select the text and copy it to the Clipboard. Open the QuickCorrect dialog box and paste the entry in the Replace text box. Enter the correction in the With text box and click Add Entry. The errant word pairs won't be replaced as you type, but they'll be corrected automatically when you run the spell check.

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When you first use a template in WordPerfect, personal information from the Address Book is automatically inserted. But what if you want to change that personal information for a new document or project? When you create your new document, select File, then select New, then click Options. Now select Personal Information. The Corel PerfectExpert dialog box appears and lists your current personal information. Click OK to display the Corel Address Book. Select your entry in the address book, then click Edit. Edit the information in your entry, then click OK to return to the address book. Click Select to return to the New dialog box, then click Close to return to the main editing window. The personal information included with your document now reflects the changes made.

ZD Tips

If you've ever needed to convert formula results to values, perhaps you've copied the cell and then performed a Paste Special operation. However, if you need to do this for only one cell, there's a much quicker way. First, select the cell you want to change and press [F2] to switch to Edit mode. Then, press [F9] to recalculate the formula. The result is returned directly into the cell you're editing. Finally, press [Enter].

Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite

If you've had to perform repetitive tasks in a WordPerfect document, chances are you've used macros to automate some of them. However, if you find that your computer is getting cluttered up with macros that may have served a one-time purpose, we'll fill you in on a feature you may not be aware of. You can record a QuickMacro that's stored in memory and is deleted when you exit WordPerfect.

There are a few things you need to keep in mind when you use a QuickMacro. You can only have one QuickMacro at a time, so if you record a new one the old QuickMacro is replaced. Also, once you record a QuickMacro, you can't edit it or save it with a template.

To record a QuickMacro, select Tools/Template Macro/Record... to display the Record Template Macro dialog box. Next, leaving all the text boxes blank, click the Record button. Now, simply record your macro as you normally would. To stop recording, simply click the Stop button, or select Tools/Template Macro/Record....

To play your QuickMacro, select Tools/Template Macro/Play.... When the Play Template Macro dialog box appears, click Play. To make it easier to play the QuickMacro, you may want to add the QuickMacro Play button to your toolbar.

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If you've ever needed to remind yourself what a formula does or to document some value of interest, there's a quick way to add a reminder to a cell. You can begin by selecting the cell that contains the value that you want to attach a comment to. Then, choose Insert/Comment from the menu bar. A comment text box will appear. You may now type your comment into the text box. Simply click outside the text box when your comment is complete. To locate a cell that contains a comment, look in the upper-right corner of the cell for a red triangle. To view the comment, simply move your mouse pointer over the cell.

ZD Tips

It can often be very difficult to debug a macro, especially since WordPerfect executes it so quickly. Why not slow things down so you can follow the macro as it performs each step?

To do so, open the macro and insert the following two lines directly after the "Application( ... )" command.

Display(On!)
Speed(1)

Finally, activate WordPerfect's Reveal Codes and run the macro. As you run the macro, WordPerfect will slowly display each of the steps in the macro so you can make sure everything's running the way you intended it to. If you're using a newer version of WordPerfect, you can replace the Speed(1) with the Step() command.

Once you locate and fix the bug, you can remove the two lines and then compile the macro.

ZD Tips

If you're a Quattro Pro power user, you may have trouble keeping track of cell addresses when you're working within a WordPerfect table. Although WordPerfect prominently displays the address in the lower-right corner of the Application Bar, most Quattro Pro users will instinctively look for row and column headings as a point of reference. Fortunately, you can activate similar headings for your WordPerfect tables. Simply click in a table cell to display the Tables Property Bar. Then, from the Table menu, choose Row/Col Indicators. These indicators also simplify selecting data within a WordPerfect table. Just click on a row number to select the entire row, or a column letter to select the column. If you want to quickly select the whole table, click the rectangle at the point where the row and column indicators intersect.

Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite

Here's a little-known but very useful Corel WordPerfect Suite tip. Suppose you're working in QP8 and you've just entered a value in a cell, but you forgot to type the last digit in the value. Simply highlight the cell and press [F2]. When you press [F2], Quattro Pro will place the cursor in the cell's edit bar. You'll see the cursor blinking to the right of the last character. Now, you can simply type the remaining digits in the value and press [Enter].

The Cobb Group's Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

If you're more of a programmer than an artist, adding shapes to your Paradox forms and reports can be a source of frustration. Your circles look like eggs, you agonize over creating squares with equal dimensions, and you can't draw a straight line to save your life. Fortunately, Paradox includes help for the artistically challenged. Simply select the drawing tool you want to use, press the [Shift] key, and click and drag to create your shape. Using the Ellipse tool creates a circle, the Box tool creates a square, and the Line tool creates perfect horizontal, vertical, and 45-degree-angle lines.

Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite

You've probably used QuickWords, the WordPerfect feature that converts abbreviations to full words or phrases. However, you may not be aware of QuickLinks, a similar feature that works with hyperlinks. Ordinarily, when you enter a Web address like www.zdjournals.com/cw7, WordPerfect formats the address as a hyperlink. However, you can use QuickLinks to insert a less obtrusive hyperlink that uses real words. This helps the hyperlink to integrate seamlessly with the rest of your text. To see how this works, select Tools/QuickWords from the menu bar. Then, click the QuickLinks tab. Enter the word you want to use as the hyperlink in the Link Word text box. Note that you can also enter two words separated by a space. Next, in the Location To Link To text box, enter the URL of the Web page you want to link to. Finally, click OK. Now, test out your QuickLink in a WordPerfect document. Type a sentence that includes the QuickLink word you added, but precede the word with the @ symbol. WordPerfect formats the word as a hyperlink when a space or hard return immediately follows it.

ZD Tips

If you're looking for a quick way to insert symbols into your WordPerfect document, you could display the Symbol dialog box and select the desired symbol. Or, to save some time, you can use simple key commands.

First, press [Ctrl] [W], which displays the Symbol dialog box, and then use the following keys to insert the respective character. Once you type the key combination, simply press [Enter] to insert the item. You'll find that most of the key commands are quite similar to their resulting symbol.

Symbol              Key combination
Cent                [c] [/]
Pound Sterling      [L] [-]
Yen                 [Y] [=]
Em Dash             [-] [-]
Paragraph           [P] [|]
Copyright           [c] [o]
Registered
  Trademark         [r] [o]
Trademark           [t] [m]
Service Mark        [s] [m]
1/4                 [/] [4]
1/2                 [/] [2]
Bullet              [*] [*]
Small Bullet        [*] [.]

ZD Tips

You can press [Ctrl]W to display a dialog box that lets you insert a special character from one of WordPerfect's built-in character sets. When you press [Ctrl]W, you'll see the Symbols dialog box, which displays Iconic Symbols as the default set of symbols. However, this isn't the only set of symbols you can use. WordPerfect offers you 14 sets, among them, ASCII characters, Multinational characters, Greek characters, Japanese characters, and Math/Scientific characters. To access these different sets of characters, you can click on the name of the set you want on the Set dropdown list in the upper-left corner of the Symbols dialog box.

One of the most helpful sets is the Typographic symbols, which contains common fractions, paragraph symbols, service-mark and trademark abbreviations, and symbols that correspond to the icons on most cassette-tape machines, as well as the treble and bass clef for musical notation.

When you see the symbol you want to insert into your document, simply double-click it. Once WordPerfect places the symbol in your document, you may size it and format it as you wish.

By the way, if you have too many programs open on your desktop, the Symbols dialog box will display only Arabic numerals and the letters of the Latin-based alphabet no matter which symbol set you select. If you see such characters when you open the Symbols dialog box, close some programs on your desktop. When you do, WordPerfect will be able to display the symbols you're looking for.

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Unfortunately, Corel doesn't make CorelFLOW 3 available in its WordPerfect Suite 8. CorelFLOW is on the Suite 7 CD under Bonus Applications. It's also available for purchase on the Corel Web site:

http://www3.digitalriver.com/commerce/sitemap.htm

(under Graphics and Desktop Publishing).

If you upgraded from Suite 7 to Suite 8 and aren't sure which version you installed last, try running setup from the Suite 7 CD. If setup lets you proceed past the Choose Setup screen, you last installed Suite 7, and you'll have no problem updating your setup. If you receive a Failure loading Installation Profile error, you'll know that Suite 8 was installed last. Assuming you're running off a workstation install, find the file c:\corel\office7\appman\profile\nam.ip. Rename this file (don't delete it) to the same directory. (You can rename the file Nam8.ip). Now you can install CorelFLOW 3. Suite 7 will create a new Nam.ip file. When the installation is complete, change the name of Nam.ip to Nam7.ip (because Suite 7 created it) and restore Nam8.ip to Nam.ip.

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Many of us very often don't use the Page Setup command in QuattroPro7. However, when we need to create a header or a footer, adjust printer margins, or choose a paper type for our spreadsheets, we have trouble finding the appropriate settings. If you've ever encountered this difficulty, choose the Print... command from the File menu. When the Print dialog box appears, you'll see a Page Setup button among the buttons on the right side of the dialog box. Choose the Page Setup button and you'll be able to make all the page-setup adjustments you want.

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You may find that you want to control whether certain pages of a WordPerfect document have an odd or even page number. For example, if your document is broken up into chapters, you may always want to begin a new chapter on an odd-numbered page. You can make sure a page always begins on an odd or even page, regardless of changes you later make, by selecting the page and choosing Format/Page/Force Page. Then, choose the Current Page Odd or Current Page Even option and click OK.

ZD Journals' Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

Last week, we showed you how to close the Desktop Application Director (DAD) and PerfectPrint when you need to run an additional Setup procedure in Corel WordPerfect Suite 8. Well, there are a couple of additional ways to close those programs.

If you see no icons in your Win95 system tray, press [Ctrl][Alt][Del] once to open the Close Program dialog box. Find the DAD item. (Actually, the executable file is Quick.exe.) Then, click End Task. If you need to close PerfectPrint, choose Pfppop7 in the Close Program dialog box.

If these steps fail, reboot your PC and suppress the startup group. You do this by waiting until Win95 is most of the way through loading (at the "blue sky" Win95 splash screen), then pressing and holding the [Shift] key until Windows is running. Now, DAD won't load. (Don't press the [Shift] key before that splash screen appears. Otherwise, you may boot into safe mode).

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Unlike with WordPerfect and Quattro Pro, where becoming proficient with keystrokes is an asset to your productivity, most of the work performed in Presentations is best accomplished with the mouse. (It's difficult to imagine altering the color of a clip art image using only the keyboard.) To get the most from your mouse in Presentations, don't forget Presentations' QuickMenus. QuickMenus are small, pop-up menus containing context-specific functions. You access a QuickMenu by placing your mouse pointer over an object and right-clicking. The QuickMenu shows functions relevant to that object. For example, if you right-click on the background of a slide in a slide show, the QuickMenu displays about a dozen options, from printing the slide to choosing a different format from the master gallery. Right-click on a text box to edit the font, change the justification, or insert a symbol. Your toolbars and property bars are invaluable tools, but the QuickMenus are just as easy to access and require fewer mouse movements around the screen.

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There may be certain pages in your printed WordPerfect document that you'd rather didn't display a header. For example, you probably wouldn't want to include a header on your title page or table of contents. To suppress your header from appearing on a particular page, simply position your cursor on that page, then choose Format | Page | Suppress. The Suppress dialog box will then display, giving you the option to suppress the header, footer, watermark, and/or page numbering from the page. Make your selections here, then click OK to put them into effect.

Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite

When you create a hyperlink in WordPerfect to another document or to a place within the same document, you may think it's difficult to edit the link. You may wonder how you can highlight the text of a link without activating the link. Well, it's not difficult at all. Right-click your mouse on the link and choose Reveal Codes from the QuickMenu pop-up menu that will appear on your screen. When you do this, you will see the Reveal Codes box across the bottom of your screen. You can edit any text in this box in the usual way. Be careful, though, that you don't delete the hypertext codes.

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It's easy to cut or copy text from an unopened document and paste it into your current document. From your current document, select File/Open, click once on the file from which you want to cut or copy text, and click on the Preview icon on the toolbar. When you do, a preview window will appear in the right half of the Open File dialog box. You'll see a reduced version of the text of your unopened document. Simply highlight the text you want to cut or copy, press [Ctrl]X or [Ctrl]C, close the preview window, dismiss the Open File dialog box, and paste your text where you want it in your current document.

Lynda Kuit, British Columbia Public School

Many of us include document summaries with our documents to provide a general overview of the documents' contents. But what if you're required to number your documents, and you'd like to include that information in your document summary? There's a way to do just that. Select File/Properties, then click Setup. You should see the document Summary Setup dialog box. In the Select fields list, place a check next to Document number, then click OK twice. Now your summaries will include the document number.

If you'd like to print this summary information, the process is simple. Select File/Print, click the Document summary option, then click Print. That's all there is to it!

ZD Tips

Even if you don't work in an environment where you need to share information with other users, you should get into the habit of including the file name and path in the header or footer of your documents. There's probably no more frustrating productivity killer than searching your hard drive for a file whose name you were sure was committed to memory.

Quattro Pro
To include the file name and path in the footer of your Quattro Pro documents, select File/Page Setup..., then click on the Header/Footer tab. Check Create in the Footer panel and type #F in the text box. Click OK to close the dialog box.

WordPerfect
If you don't already have a footer set up, choose Insert then Header/Footer. Click Footer A then Create. Finally, click Insert/Other.../Path and Filename.

Of course, you could always type the name into the header or footer yourself, but if you use the methods described above the programs will automatically update your document if there are changes to the file name or the location it's stored in.

The Cobb Group's Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

As a follow up to our tip on hyphenation, you should be aware that you can also insert a soft hyphen (a hyphen which doesn't show or print unless the line actually breaks at that point) for just one word, without hyphenating the entire document. To insert the soft hyphen code, press [Ctrl][Shift][-]where you want the hyphen to appear.

Thomas J. Cloud

Did you know that the default thesaurus dictionary in WordPerfect only includes synonyms and antonyms? Have you ever wanted more thesaurus options? Well, you can install a larger dictionary file when performing a custom installation. The larger file enhances the thesaurus's search feature by including synonyms, antonyms, word definitions, and sub- and super-categories. To install the larger dictionary, you must perform a Custom installation of Corel WordPerfect Suite 8. Then:

1. Select Accessories, then click on components.<BR> 2. Select Corel Writing Tools, then click on components.<BR> 3. Select English Writing Tools, then click on components.<BR> 4. Select Option Files and click on components.<BR> 5. Select Additional Thesaurus Definitions.<BR> 6. Mark the files WTCB80EN.DLL and WT80EN.CBD.<BR>

ZD Tips

Any of you that are jealous of sports announcers' ability to scribble all over instant replays on the video screen, can live vicariously through your next Presentations slide show. You may not realize it, but you can do the same thing on your slides by using your mouse. Simply click and hold the left mouse button, and the pointer becomes a drawing tool that you can use to emphasize key parts of the slide. If you've set your slide show's Display Sequence to Manually (Using Mouse Click Or Spacebar), make sure you don't accidentally click and release the mouse button - you may mistakenly switch to the next slide. Also, you'll need to wait until any slide animations have finished before using this feature.

ZD Journal

Do you often write in a conversational style? We do, and one of the main elements in our writing style is contractions. Contractions can help your writing sound more conversational, but they can also throw WordPerfect's Grammatik function for a loop. However, if you don't want Grammatik to analyze every contraction you use and proclaim it to be an error, there are a couple of quick fixes. The first option is to click Options in the Grammatik window, then select Checking Styles. From the Checking Styles dialog box, you can select a less formal style (such as Fiction). The second option is, when Grammatik highlights a contraction, click Turn Off on the Grammatik tab. Just be careful with this option, because you don't want Grammatik to ignore everything - just the contractions.

ZD Tips

Most QP8 users create their macros as they need them and keep them in the notebook they created the macro for. However, if you love QP8 macros enough to create them whenever you need them, you can benefit from keeping them together. Instead of realizing that you've already made a macro you can use again, then searching for the notebook you stored the macro in, why not designate one notebook as the repository for all your macros? When you do, you can call it your macro library and format it as such. You begin by simply choosing the Format/ Notebook. . . command. When the Active Notebook dialog box appears, choose the Macro Library tab and click the Yes option. When you close the dialog box, you can save your macro library under a specific name. The possibilities for further organization of your macros in the library are many. For starters, you can keep your macros on one sheet or separate them to different nameable pages.

The Cobb Group's Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

We thought you might like to be reminded of some shortcuts you may have forgotten:

[Ctrl]H: turns on the Outline feature

[Shift][Ctrl]H: opens Print History dialog box

[Ctrl]W: opens Insert Symbol dialog box

[Ctrl]K: Toggles the case of the highlighted text to all caps and back.

Steven Meyers

When you open the Symbols dialog box, you can type certain characters in the Number text box. Then, when you press the Insert and Close button to close the dialog box, WP8 will insert the following character in your document.

  Type   WP8 Inserts
   n~        ñ
   c,        ç
   ss        ß
a’     á
   !!        ¡
   ??        ¿
   AE        Æ
   ae        æ

Steven Meyers

When you open the Symbols dialog box, you can type certain characters in the Number text box. Then, when you press the Insert and Close button to close the dialog box, WP8 will insert the following character in your document.

Type  WP8 Inserts
 /2       ½
 /4       ¼
4,25      ¾
 co       ©
 ro       ®
 tm       ™
 Y=       ¥
 L-       £

Steven Meyers

Do you ever want to launch a program, but you don't want to stop using WordPerfect to access the Start menu? Well, if you know the name of the program file and the folder where it resides, you can create a button or a menu item that will launch your program. To create the button, right-click on the menu where you want the new button to reside, then select Settings. On the Toolbars tab of the Customize Settings dialog box, click Edit. Now select the Programs tab and click Add Program. Navigate to the folder containing the program, then double-click on the appropriate program file, then click OK in the Toolbar Editor dialog box. Your new button now appears on the toolbar, and clicking it starts the program. To create a menu item for a program, simply right-click on the menu bar, then follow the same steps you would to create a button.

ZD Tips

Word Perfect's table feature is better than tabs when lining up lists of numbers with decimal points. Using a table to create such a list provides you with several built-in formatting options.

Once you've created your table, choose Table | Format to open the Properties For Table Format dialog box. In the Table tab, under Align Contents In Cells, choose Decimal Align for the Horizontal option, then click OK. (WP7 users should locate the Alignment section of the Table tab and choose Decimal Align for the Justification option.) This will line up your figures accordingly.

You can add additional formatting to your list by choosing Table | Numeric Format. When the dialog box opens, access the Table tab and choose the format that suits your needs. Options here include accounting, currency, and many others. Once you've selected a numeric format, click OK to put it in place.

Finally, if you'd rather not show the table grid in your finished document, you can choose to hide it. Select Table | Borders/Fill and when the dialog box opens, select the Table tab.(WP7 users should choose Table | Lines/Fill and then select the Table tab.) In the Default Cell Lines section, choose None for the Line setting, then click OK to apply your changes.

Jeannette Hurdle-Furst

If you've ever used WordPerfect to create lists of prices or numbers that include decimal points, you may have been frustrated trying to get all the items in your list to align by the decimal point. You probably had to put several tabs and leading spaces in front of items to get them to line up correctly. You could just forget about aligning everything and simply use tabs to left justify the list, but this can be difficult to read. Fortunately, WordPerfect has a feature included to solve this problem.

First, select the line you want to start your list. Next, select Format/Line/Tab Set... then select Decimal from the Tab Type pop-up list. Double-click in the Tab Position text box and enter the position, in inches, where you want the decimal point to be. Keep in mind that by default this position is relative to your left border, so if you enter 3 inches, and you have a 1 inch margin, the decimal point will be placed at 4 inches. Finally, click OK to close the Tab Set dialog box.

Now you can press [Tab] to move the cursor to the decimal tab and enter your numbers. Each item will line up by the decimal point.

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Sometimes you'll come across a word that just doesn't look quite right on the screen or printout because it looks like there are extra spaces between some of the letters. However, when you check the word in your document, you find that everything is fine. This can be caused by the way certain letters look next to each other. For example, type the word AVIARY, using a Times New Roman font at a 52 point size. You'll notice that the A and V look too far apart, as do the R and Y. You can fix the appearance by changing the kerning (the space between the letters). To do this, place your insertion point between two of the problem letters. Then, choose Format/Typesetting/Manual Kerning. Select the Units Of Measure you want to use, and then use the arrows in the Add/Remove Space text box (Amount in WP7) to adjust the spacing between the letters.

ZD Tips

If you've been using WordPerfect for a while you may not need all of the toolbars and menus displayed. After some time you may find they just get in the way of what you're doing and you'd rather see more of your document. You probably know you can hide individual toolbars by right-clicking them and removing the check next to the toolbar name. And you can hide a Property Bar by right-clicking on it and selecting Hide Property Bar. But you may not know you can hide everything--even the WordPerfect menu.

To maximize your document viewing area select View/Hide Bars. You may be prompted with a dialog box containing instructions on how to restore the bars later. If so, just click OK and you can edit your document without any bars or menu. If you decide you need to restore your bar settings, press [Alt]V and select Hide Bars. You can also toggle whether or not your bars and menu are hidden by pressing [Alt][Shift][F5].

ZD Journal's Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

Use these following techniques as alternatives to clicking and dragging to select text:

* Double-click on a word to select the word.

* Click in the left margin next to a sentence to select that sentence.

* Click three times in a sentence to select the sentence.

* Double-click in the left margin to select an entire paragraph of text.

* Click four times in a sentence to select the entire paragraph.

* Click in a sentence, then right-click in the left margin to display the shortcut menu. You can then choose to select the current sentence, paragraph, page or entire document.

ZD Journal's Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

When you're cleaning up your notebook pages and you find yourself moving cell blocks, don't forget that QP8 lets you move a cell and/or a cell block with a mere click and drag of the mouse. To do so, highlight the cell or cell block you want to move. Next, place your mouse pointer against one of the outside boundaries of the cell or cell block. Your mouse pointer will change to a four-sided arrow. When you see that image, click the left mouse button and drag your cell or cell block whenever you want to place it. Then, release your mouse button.

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When you're using QP information in a WP document, you have two methods for inserting the information: You can link it or import it. Linked data is dynamic, meaning that you can update it directly from the source, the QP notebook. Imported data, on the other hand, is static. You can update it only by retyping the text in the WP document or by pasting the data from the notebook.

There are advantages to each method. The advantage of linking is your ability to update the data quickly in your WP file. The advantage of importing is formatting. The process of updating links tends to overwrite any extra formatting you've applied to the linked data, especially to data linked as a table.For example, if you formatted the table's border lines to double in WP, the next time you update your links the original notebook format will overwrite your table revisions. This drawback is something you'll want to keep in mind when you decide which method you'll use to insert your QP data into your WP document.

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Here's an easy way to left-justify, center-justify, and right- justify text, all on the same line. If you try highlighting a section of the text and changing the justification, all the text on that line moves to the new justification. Instead, highlight the desired text, then select Format/Line from the menu bar, then choose Center or Flush Right. Only the highlighted text changes to the new justification. Using this method, you can leave some text left-justified, move some text to the center of the page, and have even more text right-justified. Formatting the justification of your WordPerfect documents has never been easier.

ZD Tips

A few weeks back, we told you how to prevent a paragraph from being split between two pages in Word Perfect. ZDtips subscriber Donald Dunn wrote in with a quicker and easier method that works for both WP7 and WP8. Just select the paragraph, right-click on it and choose Block Protect from the shortcut menu.

Donald Dunn

If you use Corel Presentations to create your organization charts, you know that the most common use for an organization chart is to show the flow of responsibilities throughout the members of an organization. But don't forget that an organization chart is basically a flow chart and that there are other uses for such a chart. For example, if you're a project manager, you can create a flow chart to show the various tasks in your latest projects and the people assigned to do that work. Or you can draw up a quick flow chart to show a new employee how an invoice is routed through accounting for payment. An organization chart is a great way to help you organize your data flow and your staff's efforts.

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One format that works well for planning the layout of your Web site is the flow chart (sometimes called a tree diagram). When you use a flow chart, you can map out the relationship of all the pages on your Web site, deciding which are the major-topic pages and which are the sub-topic pages. CorelFLOW 3 can help you create a quick and easy flow chart so you can decide what pages you should link together and in what order you should link them. In CorelFLOW 3, creating a flow chart is as simple as dragging and dropping shapes on a page and connecting them with lines. In no time, you can plan all the links on your entire Web site with no page overlooked and no dead-end links.

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You can prevent a paragraph from getting split between two pages in WordPerfect. First, select the paragraph. From the Format menu, choose Keep Text Together. Finally, in the Block Protect section, select Keep Selected Text Together On Same Page and click OK.

ZD Journals' Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

You can print a file listing for a directory using WordPerfect. This is something you can't even do with Windows Explorer, without using a special utility. Simply select Open from the File menu to display the Open File dialog box. If you don't have any menu headings in this dialog box, click the Toggle Menu On/Off icon that's located on the right-hand side of the dialog box. Then, choose Print File List from the File menu. Pick any special printing options you want and click OK.

Donna Jones

We recently showed you how to include the full path and filename for your Quattro Pro worksheets in the footer or header by using special characters. Here are some more useful codes you can incorporate into your worksheets.

Code    Description                                 Example
----------------------------------------------------------------
#D      Current date in long format                 07/08/98
#ds     Current date in Short Date Format           08-Jul
#Ds     Current date in Long Date format            08-Jul-98
#T      Current time in long format                 4:16:57 PM
#ts     Current time in Short Time format           04:16 PM
#Ts     Current time in Long Time format            04:16:57 PM
#p      Current page number                         1
#P      Total number of pages in the document       1
#f      Filename without path                       Notebook1.wb3

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If you want to perform a sort on a range of cells, you can do so easily using the [Alt][F9] key combination. You can highlight the entire range of cells that contain data or you may highlight a cell in a range of contiguous cells and press [Alt][F9]. When you do, the Data Sort dialog box will appear with your entire cell range listed in the Cells text bar. From there, you can enter the criteria for your sort.

The Cobb Group's Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

If you use Quattro Pro regularly, then you know how often you have to adjust your worksheet's column widths to the width of your data. Here's a tip to make resizing your columns easier. Once you've entered all your data into a column, double-click on the line separating this column from the column immediately to the right. The column width will automatically expand or shrink to accommodate the longest data entry in that column.

ZD Tips

If you ever need to change part of a formula so that the cell references are absolute instead of relative, you've probably edited it and manually typed in the required dollar signs. However, there's a much easier way. Simply edit the formula and place your insertion point on the cell reference. Then, press the [F4] key to cycle through the various cell reference formats you can use:

$A:$A$1
$A:A$1
$A:$A1
$A:A1
$A$1
A$1
$A1
A1

ZD Journal

Here's a quick way to make a weekly listing of column headings in adjacent columns. Enter the first date of the series in a cell (we'll say A1). In the cell next to it, enter the formula =A1+7 and format the cell as a date. Then, position the mouse pointer on the lower-right corner of the second cell until the pointer turns into crosshairs. Finally, click and drag to the right to produce your row of headings.

Donna Varner

You may know that in Windows95 you can use WordPerfect to open a file that doesn't have a WordPerfect extension (if any extension at all) by selecting the icon, pressing [Shift], right-clicking on the file icon, and selecting Open With... from the shortcut menu. The only problem is that once you select Open With... you need to scroll through all the programs registered on your computer to get to WordPerfect. There's a much quicker way to open these files: Add WordPerfect to your Windows95 Send To menu.

To set up Windows95 to do this, right-click on the Start button and choose Explore. You'll see the contents of your Start Menu folder. You should see a folder for WordPerfect in the Start Menu folder. Double-click on the folder to open it. Next, in the right-hand pane of Explorer, right-click on the icon for WordPerfect and drag it to the \Windows\SendTo folder in the left-hand pane. You'll be prompted with a menu when you release the mouse button. Select Create Shortcut(s) Here. As an alternative to dragging the icon, you can right-click it and select Copy, then right-click the \Windows\SendTo folder and select Paste. When you've finished, close Explorer.

Now, you can quickly open files with WordPerfect. Simply right-click on a file's icon, select Send To from the shortcut menu, and choose WordPerfect to open the file.

Donald Dunn, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada

As experienced Presentations users, we sometimes get so familiar with Presentations and our own templates that we forget Corel provides us with a full range of preformatted slide shows that we can use as templates for the slide shows we create. However, whenever you feel stumped for a design idea for your slide show or you just want to see another kind of visual idea than the ones you come up with, try one of the Presentations preformatted slide-show templates.

When you launch Presentations 8, you'll see the New dialog box. In that box, Corel presents you with over 20 preformatted slide shows that you can alter to suit your slide-show needs. Try one and inject some new ideas in your next presentation.

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Whenever you use the Insert/Shape command to insert a shape into a WordPerfect document, WP8 automatically attaches the shape to the entire page rather than to the paragraph where you're placing the shape. If you delete or edit any text above the shape, it won't move with the paragraph. However, if you change the attachment setting in the Box Position dialog box, you can move the paragraph and shape together. To do this, right-click on the shape and choose the Position command. Select the Paragraph option in the Attach Box To dropdown list. Now, you can delete or edit text above the shape and the shape will move with the paragraph you attached the shape to.

The Cobb Group's Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite journal

The Spell Utility is not installed during a "typical" installation of WP8 Suite. You can install it as a custom installation direct from the Suite 8 CD-ROM.

The Spell Utility is a separate application that runs outside of WordPerfect. The program's executable file is named wtsptlen.exe and is located in the \CorelSuite8\Programs folder. Click on the Start button from your Windows 95/NT taskbar and choose Run. In the Open text box, type X:\Corel\Suite8\Programs\wtsptlen.exe where X is the letter of the drive in which your installation of WP resides. Click OK to start the program.

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If you routinely work with the same set of Quattro Pro files, use a saved workspace for quick access to them. When you open a saved workspace, Quattro Pro opens all the files grouped in it. To create a workspace, first open all the Quattro Pro notebooks you want to include in it. Then, select File/Workspace/Save. When the Save Workspace dialog box appears, enter a name in the File Name text box and click Save. Quattro Pro creates a WBS file with the name you specified. At this point you can close all your files. To open them back up as a group, simply select File/Workspace/Restore and then locate and double-click on the WBS file.

ZD Tips

It seems that all of us develop our own keyboard shortcuts for our work in Corel WordPerfect 8. And, if you've worked around a lot of WP8 users, you'll notice that all of us seem to know different shortcuts. Here are a couple of our favorite [Alt]+function-key shortcuts.

[Alt][F1] opens the Spell Check dialog box.
[Alt][F3] displays the Reveal Codes window. Pressing [Alt][F3] again closes the window.
[Alt][F4] opens the Save As dialog box.
[Alt][F7] right aligns your insertion-point marker. Pressing [Alt][F7] again inserts a dot leader from the left margin of the line to that marker.
[Alt][F10] opens the Play Macro dialog box.

As we indicated, these are some of our favorite [Alt]+function-key combinations. We use these shortcuts repeatedly.

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Most people will agree that the advent of the Graphical User Interface (GUI) has greatly increased productivity in most applications. However, a toolbar button isn't helpful to you if you don't know what function it represents. Most buttons display a QuickTip if you hover the mouse pointer over them. However, if you want to get right to work, you don't want to waste time checking each button with a trial and error process. Fortunately, you don't have to. WordPerfect allows you to change the buttons on the Property Bar and toolbars to display text with the buttons or text only. To do this, right-click on the bar you want to edit and choose Settings (Preferences in WP7). Then, click the Options button. Make the selection you want in the Button Appearance panel (just Appearance in WP7) and click OK. Finally, click Close.

ZD Tips

If you ever create WordPerfect documents based on data in a Quattro Pro workbook, you may be wondering if there's an easier way to transfer that data to WP other than typing everything twice or using a copy-paste technique. Well, there is. Simply create a dynamic link in WP to a cell or range of cells in your QP workbook, which will quickly update itself in WP whenever you change the values in the QP workbook. To link QP data to a WP document, simply paste the QP information into your WP document using WP's Paste Special... command. In the Paste Special dialog box, choose the Paste Link option and click OK. Now, your QP information will appear in your WP document as linked information and will change whenever you update that information in your QP workbook.

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Use the following function key combinations to speed up creating WordPerfect tables.

[F12]                Create Table
[Shift][F12]         Properties for Table Borders/Fill
[Alt][F12]           Properties for Table Numeric Format
[Ctrl][F12]          Properties for Table Format
[Ctrl][Shift][F12]   Table QuickFill
[Alt][Shift][F12]    Calculate Table

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If your business involves long lists of client names, or fields with special terminology, such as science, medicine, and law, Spell Check may often flag uncommon names and terms as being misspelled. Yes, you can simply add these words to you default user word list. But creating a separate user word list not only keeps your Spell Checker organized for you, it also lets you share these word lists with your colleagues. And if you often divide your time between your office PC and your laptop, you can copy the new word lists from one to the other without having to overwrite your default user word list and risk losing other entries you've made to that word list.

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The Spell Utility was introduced in WP7 and carried over to WP8 to handle certain functions that Spell Check doesn't, such as creating your own customized word lists. If you're wondering why you would want to create a new user word list, here's some food for thought.

The benefit of the Spell Utility comes from its ability to convert a regular WP document into a user word list. You can create your own word lists right in WP, save the file, and then convert it to a format readable by the Spell Checker. Simply create your list of words in WP by separating each term with a hard return. You don't even have to worry about sorting them in alphabetical order; that will be handled automatically. Then, save the document. Now we're ready to use to the Spell Utility.

When you open the Spell Utility, click on the Convert tab. Under Conversion Type, choose WP8 Document to WP8 User Word List. In the Source File Name text box, type the name of the document you created containing your terms. You might want to name your document C:\Myfiles\medical words.wpd. In the Destination File Name text box, enter the full path and filename of what will be your new user word list after it's been converted. Make sure you give the file a .uwl filename extension. Then, you can place your new user word list in the C:\Windows\Personal\Corel User Files folder (where the default word list is stored) and call it medical.uwl. Then, click Convert. Now, you can add your new user word list to your Spell Check chain.

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Among the many commands on the File menu, these three are perhaps the most used: Save As. . . , Open. . . , and Print. . . . Don't forget that you can easily access these commands by using a single function-key shortcut for each of them. Pressing [F3] will open the Save As dialog box, pressing [F4] will open the Open Files dialog box, and pressing [F5] will open the Print dialog box.

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Most of you have probably noticed WordPerfect's SmartQuotes feature. When you type single quotation marks (') or double quotation marks ("), WordPerfect converts the characters to curly quotation marks. However, you probably didn't know that you can change what type of curly quotation marks are used. To see the different types that are available, select Tools/QuickCorrect from the menu bar. Next, click on the SmartQuotes tab. At this point, you can select the format of your SmartQuotes by selecting characters from the Open and Close dropdown lists for both double and single quotation marks. When you've made your selections and ensured that the appropriate check boxes are selected, click OK.

ZD Journal

What many users may not realize is that WordPerfect installs several fully scalable and printable True Type fonts containing these characters into the Windows operating system. That makes all of these characters also accessible to any other Windows applications, either through the Character Map utility program or directly from the application's font menu. All are listed conveniently toward the bottom the font list starting with the letters WP.

The WP Greek fonts duplicate what is available through the standard Symbol and Wingdings fonts, but WordPerfect gives them to you in Roman, San Serif and Courier type styles. Other character sets are totally unique, notably the entire Hebrew, Cyrillic, Arabic and Japanese alphabets, the phonetic and multinational and extended mathematical character sets. One of the most useful fonts included is Typographic, which includes such items as real quotation marks, various styles of bullets, Em and En dashes, a full set of fractions (including quarters and eighths), and international currency symbols, as well as copyright and trademark symbols.

Remember, just because these fonts originally came from WordPerfect doesn't mean that you're limited to using them only in that program.

Yaakov Kornreich, YK Services

When editing a chart in Presentations, there are a couple of ways to select all of the chart elements. You can click once on the chart to select it, then choose Edit/Edit Chart to put the chart into Edit mode. An even easier way is to just double-click on one of the main elements.

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There may be times when your document would look better with hyphenated words instead of lettering WorfPerfect wrap text. For example, if you're submitting a report that contains a lot of extremely long words, word wrapping may produce bad breaks from one line to the next. However, you don't want to manually enter a hyphen because if you later reformat the document the word may able to fit on one line - with your hyphen in the middle of it. Instead, let WordPerfect automatically insert hyphens where it's appropriate. Simply select Tools/Language/Hyphenation. Then, select the Turn Hyphenation On check box and click OK. WordPerfect will prompt you if it comes across words it doesn't know how to hyphenate. Just click within the displayed word where the hyphen should go and then click Insert Hyphen. If the word shouldn't be hyphenated, click Ignore Word to wrap the word to the next line.

ZD Journal

WordPerfect has always been unique for providing built in support for 13 additional character sets above and beyond standard ASCII characters. Most users know that they can be accessed within the program within an easy to use point and click display activated by the [Ctrl]W keyboard shortcut command, as well as a menu selection (Insert/Symbol...).

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If you have a particular WordPerfect SpeedFormat style that you often use, consider making it the default style for any table you create. To do this, select Insert/Table. Then, click the SpeedFormat button. Select the style you like from the Available Styles list box and click the Use As Default button. When WordPerfect prompts you to confirm your selection, click Yes. Finally, click Close twice. From now on, each table you create will automatically apply the style you selected.

ZD Journal

If you have a section of text in your document that you don't want to print, but you also don't want to delete permanently, this tip will work great.

Simply select the block of text you don't want printed, then convert the text to a comment. To create a comment from your highlighted block of text, select Insert/Comment/Create. Now when you print the document, the comment text won't be printed.

To return the comment text to your document, click on the comment marker to display the comment text. Then, select Insert/Comment/Convert To Text. WordPerfect removes the comment and reinserts the text in its original location in the document.

ZD Tips

Most of you probably know that you can use the mouse to easily move text in WordPerfect. All you do is select the section you want to move, then click in the center of the block and drag it to the new location. However, you can also change the way WordPerfect handles the text you're dragging. For example, if you want to copy a block of text, instead of moving it, hold the [Ctrl] key while you drag the text. For even more features, select your text and use the right mouse button to drag it. When you release the mouse button a shortcut menu appears with the following options:

- Move Here
- Copy Here
- Move Here Without Font/Attributes
- Copy Here Without Font/Attributes

The shortcut menu also displays a Cancel selection. Choose Cancel or press [Esc] if you decide to abort the procedure.

Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite

Word Perfect Tips subscriber Tony Lenton sends us this tip for creating watermarks in Word Perfect without using dialog boxes. Simply import your graphic onto the page, then size and position it to suit your preference. Next, with the graphic still selected, right-click on it and choose Image Tools | Brightness. When the Image Tools dialog box displays, click the Brightness button and then select the faintest butterfly image from the pop-up palette. Word Perfect will decrease the brightness of your graphic accordingly. Then, close the Image Tools dialog box.

Next you'll need to adjust the wrap settings so the image appears behind any text you add to the document. Right-click on your image once again and in WP8, choose Wrap and when the Wrap Text dialog box opens, choose Behind Text then click OK. WP 7 users should choose No Wrap (Through) when the Wrap Text dialog box opens.

That's it! Now your watermark is in place and you're ready to add text to your document.

Tony Lenton

If you've spent any time working with Quattro Pro, you've probably taken advantage of at least a few of the hundreds of built in functions this program provides. If you've been wondering whether QP offers a particular function, you'll be happy to know that the Help file provides you with handy lists for searching. Just access the topic @Function Reference, found in QP's Help Topics Contents list. Here you'll find an alphabetic list of all QP's functions, as well as a list of the functions by category. Selecting a function from either list will bring up more detailed information about that function.

Inside Corel WordPerfect Suite