Introduction

Microsoft Word 2010 is the latest release of the world’s number one word processing program. Like many users, you might have mixed feelings about this new and improved software. On one hand, it’s exciting to see what sort of changes Microsoft has made to the program, but on the other hand, it might mean more time and effort on your part to learn it all over again. Don’t worry. Whether you’re a new user or a seasoned pro, you can get up and running fast with the newest version of Word with the help of this book.

So what sort of changes are we talking about? Most of the changes are subtle. The good news is the user interface hasn’t changed considerably between Word 2007 and Word 2010. As a matter of fact, they’ve added the Ribbon to all of the Office suite of programs now, including Outlook and Publisher. If you upgraded to Word 2007 awhile back, you’re already familiar with the overhaul that produced the Ribbon at the top of the program window instead of menus and toolbars. If you’re new to the Ribbon, don’t panic—it’s not nearly as intimidating as it sounds.

In addition to the Ribbon, Word 2010 has revamped the Office button into a File tab filled with document-related operations. In Word 2007, the Office menu gave you access to standard document tasks like saving and printing. The new File tab, when selected, opens a full page menu screen, called the Backstage view, from which you can control various aspects of your documents, such as saving, printing, and controlling who has permission to open, copy, and edit your documents.

Along with subtle improvements to the Office suite of programs, Word users can also find a new screen capture tool for taking instant pictures of what’s on the computer screen. You’ll also find enhancements to the picture tools, language tools, themes, a paste preview option, and additional document coauthoring features, just to name a few.

When it comes to learning how to use Word, this book focuses on helping you get your work done instead of trying to show you every nuance of the software. Rather than teaching you a hundred ways to do the same thing, Easy Word 2010 focuses on teaching you the most direct way to accomplish a task, and you’ll learn easy shortcuts along the way. Relying on lots of visuals and easy-to-follow steps, you’ll quickly see how to perform a task without having to rely on reading a lot of text. Easy Word 2010 is both a tutorial and a reference book; you can read it from start to finish to learn everything you can about Word, or just pick and choose the topics you need to know about at the moment. The point is this—without a doubt, Word is a powerful program, but at the end of the day you just need to use it to get your work done. Why not have a little fun along the way?