tutor

CLICK AND TYPE TUTOR HEADER

WORD 2000
CLICK AND TYPE
Wo rd 2000 includes a little known feat u re that lets you double cl i ck any w h e re on a page and commence typing. We show you how it works.
or those who prefer the mouse over the keyboard for navigating Word 2000 documents, theres a handy but not very well known feature called Click and Type. Even if you favour the keyboard, you may find Click and Type useful. At its most basic, this feature lets you double click anywhere on the page and then type. To use Click and Type, you have to be in Print Layout or Web Layout view. (If youre not sure what view youre in, choose View | Print Layout.) If you try moving around a new, blank document using the keyboard, the cursor wont go anywhere, because there arent any characters to move through. Click and Type bypasses this limitation. Move the mouse pointer anywhere on the page within the marg i n s , double click, and the cursor will jump to that spot. If this doesnt work, choose Tools | Options, click the Edit tab, and check the Enable Click and Type box. Also note that there are times you cant use Click and Type when using multiple columns or embedded pictures, for example. Check Words help files for more details.

If you want to see what Click and Type is really doing, you need to see paragraph marks and tab characters. If they dont already show, click the button on the toolbar or press Ctrl-Shift-*. Now select and delete everything in the file. All you should see is a paragraph mark on the first line. Set the zoom and window size so you can see the entire width of the page. (Use View | Zoom | Page Width). Double click anywhere on the page. Word will insert blank lines, which will show as paragraph marks, from the first line on the page up to the line the mouse cursor is in. Depending on where the pointer is on the line, Word may also insert a single tab

from the left margin to the mouse pointer position. If you click again immediately, Word will remove all the paragraph marks it just inserted and return you to the top left of the page. There are some subtleties surrounding this trick. Delete everything again. Now place the mouse pointer in the left margin below the paragraph mark. Move the mouse slowly across the page, from left to right. As you do, youll see the pointer change, as shown in the diagram, with different sets of lines appearing next to the Ibar. Each icon indicates a different format for the line youd be typing on if you were to double click at that point. The results will vary

depending on how the Normal style is defined. Assuming Normal has no left indent and the page has 1-inch margins, youll get the results shown. This also works for areas to the right of the paragraph return, for single lines. If there are no characters other than a paragraph return in the line, youll get the same formats as shown in the diagram. If youve already typed something in that line, however, Word will leave the paragraph format untouched, insert a tab that leads to the mouse cursor position and format the tab to match the pointer icon. Experiment with this feature and youll quickly see how it works.

HOW IT WORKS
As you move the mouse pointer across a Word 2000 page, the I-shaped cursor changes to reflect the alignment of the text youll be entering after using Click and Type. Word 2000 cycles among leftaligned text, left-aligned text with a first-line indent, centre-aligned text and right-aligned text, depending on where you double click.

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July 2001

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