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Alpha Geek: Make Microsoft Word less annoying

lifehacker.com — Microsoft Word can drive you nuts. It piles on features few people need, plagues you with annoying auto-corrections and just generally acts like a pain in the ass. No more. It's time to take back the word processor, to put Word in its place and make it your ally instead of your adversary. Follow these tips and you'll be a much happier writer.

Who dugg this? Made popular Mar 19, 2007

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  • Yashar, on 10/12/2007, -3/+37Funny how they try to make MS Word annoying by enabling every single toolbar. There's only 2 rows by default.
  • andy2na, on 10/12/2007, -0/+27Word and the other Office programs need one thing:

    T
    A
    B
    S

    i friggen hate having 8 windows open when doing a research paper of somesort
  • coldphoenix, on 10/12/2007, -6/+23Awkward new interface? That's only because its new. But its actually rather intuitive, and a whole hell of a lot easier to find stuff. They even finally managed to place "Headers and Footers" under Insert where it always should have been.
  • MioTheGreat, on 10/12/2007, -10/+26Toolbars? What toolbars? I see no toolbars.....

    I love Office 2007.
  • Anpheus, on 10/12/2007, -5/+21That awkward new interface is pretty nice, and I no longer have to dig through enabling toolbars until they are stacked 5 rows tall to get to all the functions I use.

    Same applies for Excel.
  • coldphoenix, on 10/12/2007, -5/+18What the hell is wrong with Word? Its the best thing to ever come out of MS.
  • P373Y, on 10/12/2007, -4/+14Take out Alpha Geek:
  • Mootabolife, on 10/12/2007, -6/+14I love how Word is the stronghold for Microsoft. You can badmouth everything else, but Word has a place in our hearts.
  • fatdog789, on 10/12/2007, -4/+12I find lifehacker and it's daily frontpage on digg to be far more annoying than MS Office ever was.
  • P373Y, on 10/12/2007, -3/+10Do you people READ the comments b4 submitting
  • mazza558, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8The most annoying feature of Word (2003) has got to be the Picture Box, where MS tells you where you can and cannot insert your picture. It's completely unnecessary. Does Word 2007 have this as well?
  • strabes, on 10/12/2007, -3/+9@30trip: Funny, I use OOo to type all of my papers and take all my notes at my university, and my profs can't seem to tell the difference.
  • kelbear, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6I use Open Office also (hell it's open right now), but I use it because it gets the job done and it's free. Not because it's better than MS Office(though I do prefer OO over MSO in how it handles a few specific things).

    Overall, MS Office is more powerful and more complete, it's the value you get for the money. Open office is FREE though, so I'll take whatever I can get. At work, I use MSO, at home and on this laptop, it's OO.
  • Burmask, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8What can I do to make your title less annoying?
  • NYG1988, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7What the hell? If you don't like Word 2007, don't upgrade. It's not like it is mandatory. You can even preview it before you buy it, so there are no excuses to complain about the new interface.

    Anyways, I use OpenOffice. I don't think it is any better than Word, but I like to support open-source software and you should too.
  • quiksliver, on 10/12/2007, -5/+10way to take a molehill and turn it into a mountain...


    seriously if you have problems with word kill yourself.
  • NX910a, on 10/12/2007, -28/+33I love Microsoft Word
  • 0x0000ff, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8word
  • secleinteer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5This tutorial isn't for Word 2007, it's for Word 2003. And yes, Word 2007 (and Excel and PowerPoint as well) was designed very well.
  • Neiby, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6While I agree with you, I have heard from several people that I trust that Office 2007 is way ahead of OpenOffice.org when it comes to usability. From what I hear, the ribbon is extremely cool once you get used to it. I saw a brief demo and I was very impressed.

    However, since I run PCLinuxOS, I won't get to play with it much at home unless it will install under Wine or Crossover Office. It certainly does look cool, though.
  • motters, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Better still, dump Microsoft Word and use a different word processor.
  • Sinorm, on 10/12/2007, -5/+9The new user interface in Office 2007 is incredible. Yes, it takes a little time to get used to it, but after using it, I can't go back. Easy and intuitive access to all the important functions.
  • umbriago, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6Word is only bothersome if you're an incredible idiot. And 2007 is fairly awesome; it makes Open Office look backwards all of a sudden. Sorry.
  • coldphoenix, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5And quite a classy website at that.
  • daven1986, on 10/12/2007, -13/+17seriously, open office is ***** compared to MS office.
  • 81v3d07g0d, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I totally agree, though it take some getting used to the new office suite is great. It makes you wish that more parts of windows and computers in general were designed with interfaces like the ribbon.
  • giveer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3This isn't a comment either way, but I've just read through the comments and I think this is the very first thread on Digg that I've come across that is largely "pro" for the microsoft point and quite negative to the open source side. Just found that interesting.

    I'm gonna go bang a melon.
  • Depthfunction, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Excellent. I hate how Word automatically turns a URL like www.digg.com into a hyperlink. I don't need hyperlinks in documents that I'm going to print out! Pieces of paper are not connected to the Internet!!
  • lacronicus, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7openoffice is not the answer to everything. if it was, id still have it. as it is, its rather obvious that i had gotten it for free. MS didnt spend a number of years doing nothing. they were making it better for money, something no open software can match. office 2007 is the perfect example. having tried both openoffice and office07, i would pay the money in an instant. if you think openoffice is better than MS office, try 07, youll be surprised.
  • scabbers, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Word! If you don't like the new version of something, keep the one you have! It's not rocket science.
  • mikedoth, on 10/12/2007, -6/+9"Alpha Geek: Make Microsoft Word less annoying"

    Switch to Open Office.
  • MioTheGreat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3......yet.
  • Lane, on 10/12/2007, -7/+9who uses that old thing?
  • jexdawg, on 10/12/2007, -3/+5I use OpenOffice because running word through wine does not appeal to me. As a linux fanboy, I still must say I like word better.
  • jazzyjayx, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4I swear, Office is the best thing MS has going right now. You don't hear many people with (legitimate) complaints against it.

    Also, for myself (and probably millions of other office workers), Outlook is by FAR the most used app I have. By a lot.
  • P373Y, on 10/12/2007, -3/+5its word 2000 for me
  • osbjmg, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Yea, use VI ;)
  • jazzyjayx, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I've heard it said that Pages is better compared to MS Publisher.

    It seems that MS Word is a word processor with some added Publishing capabilities, while Pages is a desktop publisher with added word-processing capabilities.
  • NiX0n, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Why would I want to run Microsoft Office on Linux?

    use vi
  • u8myfoood, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4I love MS word but I hate how it always auto changes my last name (Cai) to CIA!
    DAMN YOU MICROSOFT!
  • bedouin, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I already implement half of these tips as it is (Word 2004 on Mac), but the option to *not* select an entire word when highlighting was very informative. That annoys the hell out of me.
  • mancat, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Oddly enough, the first "annoying" thing that I found while reading the article was the fact that the author doesn't have ClearType enabled. Hurts my brain to look at those fonts in the screenshots.
  • cawpin, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3Yeah, I was thinking this "review" was about 1 release too late. The new interface of Office 2007 is great. They concentrated this release on usability instead of new features. They did a great job.
  • Zippo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Word is great and all... but damn, it's a ***** bitch to work with when you're trying to do design. Yes, I know full-well design is the last thing Word is meant for, but tell that to some companies... ugh.
  • EnsErmac, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The one I really don't understand is turning smart quotes off. As a typophile I can say, prime marks are NOT quotes. Don't listen to that tip. Smart quotes are for intelligent people.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Apple what?
  • Phil246, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1If you dont like it, dont use it.
    Fixed

    Did this really warrant a submission?
  • fastsix, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Here's a shortened version of the article.

    -----------------------
    Make Microsoft Word Less Annoying

    To make Microsoft Word less annoying, RTFM* and learn how to use it.

    -----------------------
    * actually use the help file as Word doesn't really come with a manual any more.
  • elebrio, on 10/12/2007, -4/+5Word and Excel are the two greatest programs of all time. No other programs have done more to increase business productivity.
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