June
2007
Tidbits
- Changing the default file format in Office 2007
- Reading Office 2007 files in older versions of Office
- Learning MS Excel
- Adieu
Note: A special thanks to Gerri Moeller for writing this month's Tidbits!
Changing the default file format in Office 2007
If you're using Microsoft Office 2007, you may have discovered that the document formats have changed from previous versions. Instead of a .doc extension (for Word documents) or a .xls extension (for Excel documents), Office 2007 appends these with an "x". So, Word documents are now .docx and Excel documents are .xlsx. These new file formats are compressed files, and can't be opened in previous versions of Office without a downloaded update to the software.
Since most people haven't yet upgraded to Office 2007, you can make sure that everyone can read your documents by changing the default format in Office 2007 back to the older file format:
- Open Microsoft Word 2007
- Click on the Microsoft Office button
in the upper left-hand corner of the screen
- Click on Word Options
at the bottom of the drop-down menu - Choose Save from the right-hand menu, then change Save files in this format to Word 97-2003 Document
- Click OK to save your changes
Make the same changes in Excel 2007.
Reading Office 2007 files in older versions of Office
If you're using an older version of Microsoft Office and receive a file with a .docx or .xlsx extension that you can't open, you can download a converter to open these files. The converters for Microsoft Word and Excel are in the Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats available from Microsoft online.
- Before installing, you'll want to make sure you've installed all of the high priority updates for Word and Excel.
- Open the link in Internet Explorer and follow the instructions to install the compatibility pack.
Please note: this will only apply to Office 2000 and newer. If you're using an older version of Office, you won't be able to convert the files.
Learning MS Excel
If you're a newcomer to Microsoft Excel, here's a great way to learn the basics. You don't need to have Excel to view and learn from this excellent overview, but you could open up Excel and follow along with their examples. Highly recommended!
Adieu
Farewell until next time from the library system where all the computers are fast, all the books are worth reading, and all the librarians are above average!
This issue of Tidbits was written by Gerri Moeller, Library Automation Manager for the Outagamie Waupaca Library System. Please send any comments or questions about this issue to Gerri.
Supporting public libraries in Outagamie and Waupaca counties