Do you ever find that when putting together a PowerPoint presentation that you have too much text to fit into a slide?

Well now in PowerPoint you can make it so that PowerPoint splits the text up into two different slides. All you have to do is position the cursor before the text you want to split up and then follow these instructions

Click on the Text Box on the slide and notice the AutoFit Options box appears in the lower left hand corner of the text box. Click on the down Triangle to open the options. 

Click on the Split Slide option and PowerPoint 2007 will create a new slide with all of the information forward of the cursor. PowerPoint will give the new slide the same title as the original slide.

Are you interested in more tips? Then head to our Microsoft PowerPoint Tips page.

Maybe you’d like to learn more about Microsoft PowerPoint? Then book yourself on one of our Microsoft PowerPoint Training Courses.

In this, the next in our backup articles we will tell you how you go about backing up your documents and other files on the Microsoft Windows Vista Operating System.

As we have highlighted in our previous articles, backing up your data can avoid a major headache if something happens to your machine and you lose all the data contained on that machine. So here is how you go about backing up your files on Microsoft Windows Vista.

Go to the Start Menu and click the Control Panel and select System and Maintenance. On the System and Maintenance menu, select Backup and Restore Centre.

Then select the Backup files from the Backup and Restore Centre menu and then follow the on-screen instructions to complete the backup.

When you are inputting text into a table cell, Microsoft Word automatically adjusts the size of cells to meet the amount of text being put into them. However, this could lead to messy looking empty space in what would otherwise be a neat table. To remedy this, you can set a limit on the height of the cells themselves. Here is how you do it:

1. Select the entire table and then on the ribbon, select the layout tab and click on the Select button before choosing ‘Select Table’.
2. Right click on the selected table and select Table Properties from the menu which will in turn bring up the Table Properties dialog box.
3. Ensure that the Row tab is selected and in the Specify Height box, input how big you want each row to be – 1 inch = 6 lines of size 12 text.
4. In the Row Height is drop down list, select Exactly and then click ok.

With this tip it is easy to ensure your tables stay nice and neat for presentation purposes and for easy reading of the contained information.

If you are interested in reading more Microsoft Word Tips, then visit our Microsoft Word Tips page.

If you would like to learn more about Microsoft Word, then you ought to visit our Microsoft Word Training Courses page.

That’s right, Microsoft have said that its Office for Mac 2011 for use on its main rival Apple’s Mac computers will be released at some point in October this year. There will be 2 different versions released, Office for Mac Home & Student 2011 and Office for Mac Home & Business 2011.

The Home and Student pack will include Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel and Messenger. If you choose the Home and Business version then you will get Outlook included also. Also, if you choose to buy the current version from stores before 2011 is released, then you will be entitled to a free upgrade once 2011 is released.

Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 offers better compatibility between PCs and Macs which is an extremely important feature because whilst you create documents on your Mac, the person you are writing the document for may not have access to a Mac, but to a Windows based PC instead upon which the document could behave differently than it does on a Mac.

Also included in this new version of Microsoft Office for Mac is the ribbon interface from Microsoft Office 2007 with similar features but with the feel of a Mac.

If you don’t have a Mac but are interested in Training Courses for the different elements of Microsoft Office, then you should take a look at our Training Courses and book yourself on one which takes your interest.

Have you ever found yourself with an Excel database which has duplicate data and you have had to go through the entire database cell by cell to try and get rid of the duplicated data. Well here is an Excel Tip to help you out in the future to remove this duplicate data quickly and easily.

Follow these steps to remove your duplicate data:

Click on any cell in the database and then go to the ribbon at the top and select the Data tab.

Select the remove duplicates options which will in turn select the entire database and bring up the Remove Duplicates dialog box.

You will also see in this dialog box that all of the column headings are selected. From here you have two choices to choose from. You can either:

Remove only the records that match another record exactly in the database or Remove records which have duplicate data in only one or more columns.

To remove the records which match another exactly, leave all the column headings selected and then click ok.

If you just want to remove the records that have duplicate data in one or more columns, remove the check marks from the columns which you don’t want to include in your comparison and then click ok.

Remember: if something goes wrong, use Ctrl+Z on the keyboard to undo your actions.

Are you interested in more Excel Tips? Then visit our Microsoft Excel Tips Page

Want to learn more about Excel? Then book yourself on one of our Microsoft Excel Training Courses.

In our last article, we discussed the benefits of backing up the files contained on your computer. However sometimes you may be too busy to carry out the backup manually so now I’ll tell you how to schedule backups so that they run automatically.

To begin with, follow the first four steps in the article: BACK UP! How a few minutes now could save you HOURS later and then continue with these steps:

1. On the ‘Completing the Backup’ page, click the ‘Advanced’ button and then select the normal backup and click ‘Next’.
2. Click next again to take you to the ‘Backup Options’ screen and select ‘Replace the existing backups’ before clicking ‘Next’.
3. Select Later on the ‘When to backup’ page and in the job name box, type Backup and then select Set Schedule.
4. In the Schedule box that appears, choose weekly and a start time of your choice. Then pick the day and how often you want to carry out the backup.
5. Go to the Settings tab and ensure that if you have set the computer to backup at a time when you know you will be in bed that you select the ‘Wake the computer to run this task’ and then click Ok.
6. A dialogue box will then appear asking you to input and confirm your password. Once you have done this, click Ok again.
7. You will then be taken back to the wizard and the When to backup page. Click next and you will get another box asking for your password and for you to confirm the password. Input your password and then click ok.
8. In the dialogue box that appears, click ok and then finish which will complete the wizard.

And that is how you schedule your backups if you’re too busy to do them manually.

Remember, it is worth spending the few minutes it takes to set this up because it just might save you hours later on.

So you have a database of information in Microsoft Access, however when it comes to queries it can perform poorly. The 3 tips listed below will help you better optimise your database and improve query performance.

1. Regular Compaction of Database.

When you compact your database, the records contained in that database are reorganised next to one another, getting rid of any empty space in-between them. This in turn makes the retrieval of data and query results faster.

2. Limit the number of fields returned by a query.

Limiting the number of fields a query returns drastically affects the performance by making it faster and also uses fewer resources.

3. Give the search engine less evaluations to carry out.

You can do this by using Between instead of => and <=. By using Between, you are only asking the search engine to carry out one evaluation rather than two.

Want more tips for Microsoft Access? Visit our Access Hints and Tips page.

Are you interested in learning more about Microsoft Access? Then you should book yourself on one of our Microsoft Access Training Courses.

Would you like to earn more, have better job satisfaction and stand out in a crowd when applying for jobs in the IT Sector or any job involving a computer? Then you need to take the Microsoft Office Specialist exam.

Choose your Grade level: Specialist, Expert or Master

So you want to become a specialist?

To become a specialist, simply pass one of the following exams:

• Microsoft Word
• Microsoft Excel
• Microsoft PowerPoint
• Microsoft Access
• Microsoft Outlook

Or perhaps you consider yourself an Expert?

To be classed as an Expert, you’ll focus entirely on either Microsoft Word or Microsoft Excel.

Or maybe Master sounds more like you?

To be classed as a Master, you will have to pass the following exams:

• Microsoft Word
• Microsoft Excel
• Microsoft PowerPoint

And then pass either Microsoft Access or Microsoft Outlook

Benefits of being Microsoft Office Certified

Being Microsoft Office Certified can be a huge advantage when applying for jobs as it helps boost your skills and when potential employers see the Microsoft Office Certified logo upon your CV it can set you apart from the competitors competing with you for the same job.

There is also the impact it could have on your pay packet and your job satisfaction with research suggesting that people with Microsoft Certification show more competence, have better productivity and are more highly regarded by their employers, co-workers and clients.

Of course if these exams don’t really appeal to you or you just want to learn more about any of the programs in the Microsoft Office range, book yourself on one of our great value Training Courses.

We’ll inform you more on these developments in future articles.

Here is a Microsoft Project tip for all your Project Managers out there who use Microsoft Project to handle their schedules. Are you tired of inputting the same tasks every week? Do these tasks take place at the same time each week?

If so, there is a solution to save you time. It is called Recurring Tasks which does exactly as the name suggests, set a task to be repeated at a set point in time which you input.

For example, if you hold a meeting every Monday at 10am, you can insert this as a recurring task to save inputting it every week. To set up a recurring task, follow these few simple steps:

1. Click Insert and select Recurring Task and wait for the dialogue box to show up.

2. Fill in each of the sections:

• Task Name
• Duration
• Recurrence Pattern
• Start Date

3. Click Ok.

And there you have it; you have set up a recurring task on your Project database.

Want more tips? Visit our Microsoft Project Tips page.

Interested in learning more about Microsoft Project? Then book yourself on one of our Microsoft Project Training Courses.