Office challenge: Where’s the Save All command in Office 2007?

This past week, I listened to a group of new Office 2007 users complain. They hate 2007,  at least for now. However, I heard a new complaint when one of them asked where the Save All command was. It was the first time I’d noticed that the command isn’t readily available in 2007 applications. In earlier versions, the Save All command is available on the File menu if you press the [Shift] key when you click the File menu.

My first thought was to check the Office button–would holding down the [Shift] key force it to display the Save All command? No, it won’t. Fortunately, I was able to quickly reinstate the Save All command for them. How did I do it?

This challenge has a second part. Excel doesn’t have a Save All command, so the solution you use in Word 2007 won’t work in Excel 2007. How would you provide Excel 2007 with a Save All command?

Last week we asked…

How to you disable all animation in a PowerPoint presentation. The solution to this one is simple, if you know where to look:

1. From the Slide Show menu, choose Set Up Show. In PowerPoint 2007, click the Slide Show tab. Then, click Set Up Slide Show in the Set Up group.
2. In the Show Options section, check the Show Without Animation option.
3. Click OK.  

That’s all there is to it! If you’re not familiar with the presentation options, you might not realize you can enable and disable all animation by flipping a switch. Dhyler99 was the first to respond correctly.

Pptcrafter made an excellent point: If you turn off animation, some slides might not work at all. So, disabling animation might render some unexpected results. Furthermore, if the audience asks you to disable the animation, Pptcrafter’s most likely right–you need to rethink your animation applications. On the other hand, I can think of a few reasons you might want to turn off animation in an otherwise effective presentation. For instance, you might want a few colleagues to proof the content. In that case, the animation would be distracting. Also consider that the presentation you prepare for a company-wide quarterly meeting might have a few fun bells and whistles that a small group of managers and directors just don’t need. There are a number of reasons you might want to temporarily disable the animation–the trick is simply knowing that you can.

If you can’t find an favorite command or option in Office 2007, start a thread. Perhaps we can help you find it.

Get instant sums using Excel’s Status bar

Have you ever been sitting in a meeting and had someone really important demand a total or deficit that you just don’t have in your sheet? It’s uncomfortable. Everyone stares at you while you enter the appropriate function. It doesn’t take that long, but it makes you feel (and perhaps even look) incompetent, even though you’re not.

If you’re lucky, you can just select the first blank cell adjacent to a single column or row and click AutoSum. That’s not so bad, but what if someone wants a subset evaluated? Maybe they want to know the first and second quarter sales for both the north and south regions. It’s still easy but requires a bit more finger work — and when you’re under a lot of stress, you make mistakes.

The next time you need to quickly evaluate values, use the Status bar. You can sum or average a range of values without entering a thing. You can just as easily determine the minimum or maximum value in a range. You can even count the number of entries in a range, all without entering a single function or formula.

Simply select the values in question and view the right side of the Status bar. For instance, to quickly discern the sales for the north and south region for the first two quarters in the following sheet, you’d select B2:C3. When you do, the status bar displays

Sum= $  1,415.00

just to the left of the NUM indicator.

Notice that the Status bar identifies the resulting value as the sum of the selected range. That’s because you can right-click the Status bar and choose from a list of operations.

Using this handy feature, you have the answer with just a few clicks. Nobody has to wait, and you look in control, in the know, and efficient!

Four handy Excel keyboard shortcuts

Formatting cells takes just a few clicks — it couldn’t get much simpler than choosing Cells from the Format menu and clicking the appropriate setting. However, you can also format a cell or range from the keyboard. For quick formatting tasks without a menu or mouse, use the following keyboard shortcuts:

• Date: [Ctrl] + #
• Number: [Ctrl] + !
• Time: [Ctrl] + :
• General: [Ctrl] + ~

You can test these shortcuts quickly enough by entering a value and toggling through the different formats. First, enter the value 123 into any cell. Then, with that cell still selected, press [Ctrl]+# (but don’t press Enter). Excel expresses the value 123 as the date 2-May-00.

Next, press [Ctrl]+! and Excel formats the cell contents as a number, defaulting to two decimal places. Press [Ctrl]+: and Excel formats 123 as a time value.

These keyboard shortcuts aren’t huge time-savers, but if you prefer using the keyboard, they’re certainly handy.

Sega Ultimate Genesis Collection bringing official Genesis emulation to iPhone, pain to your wallet

After packaging and re-marketing to us our childhood over Nintendo’s Wii Virtual Console and in a multitude of other forms, Sega is putting another platform to good use in its eternal quest to make us poor: the iPhone. Due for the App Store next month, the upcoming Sega Ultimate Genesis Collection will bring together some of Sega’s existing, disparate releases for the iPhone under one roof and add a bunch more, allowing users to buy Sega Genesis games directly from the app. The first one’s free, of course (Space Harrier II), but after that you’ll be paying a decent amount for your emulation fix: Sonic is $6, Golden Axe is $5, and Ecco the Dolphin and Shining Force go for $3. The variety will undoubtedly grow over time, but we would hope that at some point Sega will offer some sort of discounted megabundle, since you can currently get 49 notable Sega titles for around $20 in the form of Sonic’s Ultimate Genesis Collection for the Xbox 360 and PS3. Basically: we’re not sure if this is all supposed to make us worse or better about jailbreaking.

Sega Ultimate Genesis Collection bringing official Genesis emulation to iPhone, pain to your wallet originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 15:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HTC Bravo gettin’ overexposed in the wild?

As breathtakingly bad as the picture is, what we’re looking at here could very well be the first shot of HTC’s upcoming Bravo in the wild — the industrial design lines up nicely with what we’ve seen in the company’s leaked roadmap, anyway, and that funky little optical pad in the center perfectly matches the component that you can clearly see on the Legend render. It’s said to be “near identical” to the Nexus One — which makes sense considering that we thought the Nexus One was the Bravo for a while — so the big draws here would have to be the removal of the trackball (we’re not complaining) and the Sense UI covering up Android 2.1′s default look. If 3 Sweden knew what it was talking about, this thing could be on shelves this quarter… so watch your back, MOTOROI.

HTC Bravo gettin’ overexposed in the wild? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 14:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Motorola launching 20-30 Android phones in 2010

Some interesting tidbits came out of Motorola’s DEXT launch in Singapore today — CNET Asia had a chance to sit down with Moto’s Asia Pacific VP Spiro Nikolakopoulos, who said that the company would launch between 20 to 30 Android phones globally in 2010. Spiro also said that not every phone would make it to every market, so we’re guessing the true number will be more like 10 if you count regional variants like the CLIQ and the DEXT as one model. Just by our count, Moto’s already pretty close: off the tops of our heads we’ve heard of the Shadow, the Devour, the Backflip, the Ruth, and several others destined for China — rather impressive for a company that was on the brink of collapse just a short while ago. No wonder it’s reconsidering that spinoff, eh?

[Thanks, Hiro]

Motorola launching 20-30 Android phones in 2010 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 13:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sony Ericsson Vivaz is official: 8.1 megapixels’ worth of Symbian

We get the impression that Sony Ericsson didn’t intend for this release to go out quite yet, but for what it’s worth, we’ve now got official word that the rumored Kurara is the real deal — and it’ll be known as “Vivaz.” Yes, Vivaz. Okay, now that you’ve had a moment to recover, let’s take a look at the specs: S60 5th Edition (we’re surprised they don’t refer to it as a Symbian build in the release, but whatevs), 8.1 megapixel autofocus cam with image stabilization, face detection, and 720p video capture, FM radio, AGPS, WiFi, TV-out at VGA resolution, and a 3.2-inch WVGA (or 640 x 360… the PR lists both) display. It’ll be available in four colors — Moon Silver, Cosmic Black, Galaxy Blue, and Venus Ruby — when it launches this quarter in both North American and global 3G variants with quadband EDGE. If you can get over the name, you love Symbian, and the Satio isn’t for you, this might be your new objet d’envy for the first few months of the year. Follow the break for a hip-looking Sony Ericsson dude showing off the goods.

Update: And it appears Burson-Marsteller has pulled the release, so yep — it wasn’t supposed to go out yet. Enjoy!

Continue reading Sony Ericsson Vivaz is official: 8.1 megapixels’ worth of Symbian

Sony Ericsson Vivaz is official: 8.1 megapixels’ worth of Symbian originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 12:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The DIY $10 prepaid cellphone remote car starter

Wish you could start your car via your cell phone, but don’t feel like ponying up the $40k for a Chevrolet Volt or $499 (plus $29 a year) for an aftermarket system from Viper? This hack from a guy named Dave will set you back considerably less, relying on a cheap prepaid cellphone that has had its vibration motor surgically removed, replaced by a couple of leads triggering the car’s starter. Now, whenever the phone receives a call it starts up the car — a somewhat dodgy proposition if a telemarketer ever gets hold of your number, but an interesting solution nonetheless. Dave is also excited about the prospect of setting on timers and alarms on the handset to auto-start the car at regular intervals, while we’re excited about the total cost of the project: $71.03. Why, that’s barely enough to cover the gas our big blue Excursion burns while warming up in the morning.

The DIY $10 prepaid cellphone remote car starter originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 09:47:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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US Cellular launches national unlimited plan for $70

US Cellular’s sounding like it wants to play with the big boys on news that it’ll be charging a full $69.99 for its just-introduced unlimited individual plan — the exact same that AT&T and Verizon are charging now that they’ve just slashed pricing. It’s pretty interesting to see one of the smaller regional carriers dare to suggest that it can charge the same as the two typically regarded as the States’ “premium” networks — but then again, US Cellular’s got a battery swap program, so there’s your value-add right there. Along with the individual deal, there’s also a new family unlimited plan for $119.99; in both cases, you’ll need to tack on text and data packages separately.

US Cellular launches national unlimited plan for $70 originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 08:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Verizon patents system for location-aware classifieds

It’s not often that we genuinely like what these big corporations are doing, so you’d better pay close attention here. We’ve caught wind of a Verizon patent covering the logistics of setting up and running a GPS-based classifieds service, which matches potential buyers and sellers of goods on the basis of their stated interests and location. Thus, next time you’re driving by the home of a carpenter, for example, you might be alerted of his contact details should you need some woodworking done. This seems like a legitimately useful expansion on the location services already available on GPS devices, but — as with the Nokia flexible display patent — the application was filed back in 2008 indicating that nothing is imminent. Still, at least it’s comforting to know that good ideas can fleet by carriers’ brain trusts when they’re not too busy talking trash about each other on TV.

[Thanks, Anand]

Verizon patents system for location-aware classifieds originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 07:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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