DON’T you just love tables? You’re reading a long, fairly boring report, when suddenly you come to a table that lists, in simple columns and rows, the data you most most to understand. Ah, you think, now I get it. Time well spent. And you return to your To Do list, feeling like you’ve accomplished something.
Tables play a vital role in helping your readers understand the information you’re presenting. This chapter shows you a variety of ways to add, enhance, format, streamline, and accessorize the tables you add to your Word 2010 documents. You can apply table styles, customize the look and feel, format the data, rearrange the size, and much, much more. You can also import tables from other programs, flow text around tables, and even design your whole document to fit within a well-ordered, nice-and-neat table frame.
Depending on how fancy and involved you want to get, you might just want to insert one of the Quick Tables that are already available in Word or build your own intricate table from the page up. It’s your choice, and this chapter will show you how. We’ll start with the easiest approach first—using Quick Tables.
Years ago—if and when you actually used a typewriter to create documents—preparing a table was a bit of a hassle. You had to be very careful with the tab stops (which meant pressing the Tab key at just the right places). You needed plenty of correction fluid, too. In the early days of Microsoft Word, a table was a fairly straightforward tool you could use to create a grid of rows and columns in your document into which you could simply type text. It wasn’t particularly pretty, but it worked.
Today, Word 2010 offers tables that do all kinds of things. You can stylize them to match the colors, fonts, and effects used in your documents. You can insert functions, perform math calculations, and add content controls to collect information. You can import tables from other programs or copy and paste tables created in Word into other files. You can add hyperlinks, so clicking a table opens a completely different document or Web page.
One of the biggest considerations in this day of reusable content is that the table you create might be used in other formats in addition to print. Using tables is particularly helpful when you are creating content that might be offered in different mediums. Perhaps you’re creating a blog post, a Web page, or a report that you’ll share electronically by e-mail.
The table serves as a container for your data, enabling you to control the way that data is presented. You can also easily move data in and out of tables by using Word’s Convert to Text and Convert to Table features (which you’ll learn more about later in this chapter in Converting Text to a Table).
Word provides you with a number of ways to create tables for your document, but if you want fast and easy (with the option of customizing it after you create it), start with Quick Tables. With Quick Tables, you can add ready-made, professional tables to your document with the click of the mouse button. Other methods involve drawing a table with the Draw Table tool; using Insert Table to display a dialog box where you can enter the number of rows and columns you want; or importing a table from another program. Each method of adding tables has its own merit. A closer look at your choices shows that you can:
Add a Quick Table to insert a predesigned table at the cursor position
Choose the number of rows and columns you want in the Insert Table gallery and let Word create the table for you
Use the Insert Table dialog box to AutoSize cell content and choose the number of rows and columns you want to create
Draw a table freehand on the page
Select text and then choose Convert Text To Table to turn it into a table quickly
Embed a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet
The method you choose will depend on your data—for example, if you want to take advantage of formula creation in Excel, use the Excel Spreadsheet method; or use the Convert Text To Table method if you are transforming a data list that already exists in your document into a table.
This section introduces you to each of these methods. Let’s start with the simplest first: Quick Tables.
When you simply need to create a table of text and numbers so you can present ideas to your readers clearly, a Quick Table is probably the easiest way to go. These tables are ready-made in Word 2010 and stored as building blocks that you can insert on your page and customize as needed.
To add a Quick Table to your document, follow these steps:
Click to position the cursor where you want the table to appear.
On the Insert tab, click Table in the Tables group.
Point to Quick Tables to view a gallery of available Quick Tables (see Figure 15-1).
Scroll through the Quick Tables gallery until you find a table you want to use. Click the format of your choice to add it to your document.
Note
Chapter 4, covers the way in which themes influence formatting options available for various items in your document. A theme includes specific fonts, colors, and effects that are then coordinated with charts, Quick Styles, and even Quick Tables and table styles (more about this in How Do Themes Affect Table Styles?). The content and overall design of the tables you see displayed in the Quick Tables gallery will remain the same no matter which theme you have selected for your document. But if you change the theme, you will notice that the colors, fonts, and shading effects used in the Quick Tables change to match the new theme.
When you click Table in the Tables group on the Insert tab, a mixed list of options appears, as is shown in Figure 15-1. The grid of blank boxes at the top of the Table list is a clickable control that you can use to point and click your way to creating a new table. Here’s how to do it:
Display the Table list by clicking Table on the Insert tab.
Move the pointer down and to the right until the number of rows and columns you want to create in the table is selected (Figure 15-2). Notice that the number of rows and columns is displayed at the top of the list. Additionally, Live Preview shows the table at the cursor position in your document.
When the table is the size you want, click the mouse to add it to the document.
When you know the number of rows and columns you want to create in a table and you want to control the way the text fits in those cells, you can use the Insert Table dialog box to create the table in the dimensions you want. On the Insert tab, choose Table then click Insert Table. The Insert Table dialog box appears, as you see in Figure 15-3.
Figure 15-3. Use the Insert Table dialog box when you know the number of rows and columns you want your table to have.
Enter the values you want by clicking in the appropriate field and typing (or use the arrows to increase or decrease the numbers displayed in the fields). In the AutoFit behavior area, choose whether you want the columns in the table to be set to a specific width (this is helpful if you are formatting a table to precise specifications so that it will fit in a particular spot in your document). Additionally, you can click AutoFit To Contents to have Word adjust the size of the table cell to fit the contents of that cell, or choose AutoFit To Window to resize the table to maximize the space available in the document window.
Tip
The AutoFit To Window choice becomes important if you are preparing a document that will be used on the Web. The table will adjust automatically based on the width of the window used to display the document. This means that the entire width of the table will always stay within your reader’s viewing area, no matter how wide their browser window is.
If you want Word to remember the settings you’ve entered in the Insert Table dialog box so they will be applied to other tables you create in the current document, select the Remember Dimensions For New Tables check box and then click OK.
If you prefer to draw tables as you go along rather than relying on ready-made tables and tools, then on the Insert tab, click Table and choose Draw Table. The pointer changes to an electronic “pencil” that you can use—by clicking and dragging—to draw the table the way you want it. You can also add lines for rows and columns and make editing changes while you work.
The contextual Table Tools appear on the Ribbon, with Draw Table selected in the Draw Borders group on the Design tab. You can customize the line style, thickness, and color by using the tools in this group (more about this in How Do Themes Affect Table Styles?). If you add a line you want to remove, click the Eraser tool then click the line you want to delete. Figure 15-4 shows columns being added to a drawn table.
When you have lists of information that you think would look better—or make more sense to your readers—in table format, you can easily convert the text to a table. Select the text in your Word document and then on the Insert tab, click Table. Then choose Convert Text To Table.
The Convert Text To Table dialog box asks for input similar to that requested in the Insert Table dialog box. You specify how many columns and rows you want to use, how you want to use AutoFit, and finally, which characters have been used to delineate the individual text entries. That is, which characters instruct word that the text following the character should be in the next column (a tab character, for example). Click your choices then click OK. Word makes the text into a new table.
In situations when you’re working with a lot of numeric data or you need to be able to perform calculations with that data, you can take advantage of Excel features that are available to you as you work in Word. When you add an Excel spreadsheet as a table in your Word document, you have access to the conditional formatting features in Excel, which include cell styling, table formatting, and more. You can even include the new sparklines feature in Excel 2010 in your Word document. Here are the steps for including an Excel worksheet in your Word document:
Position the pointer at the location in the document where you want to create the table.
On the Insert tab, choose Table.
Click Excel Spreadsheet in the Table list.
An Excel worksheet window pops up over your Word document. The Ribbon changes to reflect Excel features.
Enter your data, create formulas, and apply formats as needed (see Figure 15-5).
Return to the Word document by clicking outside the Excel worksheet area.
Whenever you want to modify the table, simply double-click it in the Word document, and an Excel window will open. You can then edit the information as needed, apply formatting changes, and more. When you click outside the worksheet, the window closes and the data in your table is updated to reflect your changes.
With Word 2010, you can create nested tables—tables within tables—in your documents. A nested table makes it possible for you to show readers various elements that go into a particular data item in your table. Suppose, for example, that the Wide World Importers annual report includes a table that shows sales results broken down by quarter. One product in particular offers a greater number of models than the others, and in this case, inserting a table within a table can show readers how each of the different products contribute to the results shown in the cell (see Figure 15-6).
Figure 15-6. You can easily create a table within a table to help display your data as completely as possible.
To create a nested table, simply click in the cell in which you want to add the second table and repeat the table creation steps described previously. For example, you can add a Quick Table or choose to draw the table freehand. Either way, you can then use Table Styles to format the table to achieve the look you want.
Tip
For more about formatting your table with Table Styles, see the section titled Changing Table Format by Using Table Styles.
One of the nice aspects about tables is that once you get the structure in place that you like—which data goes in the rows, and which data goes in the columns—you can easily plug different data sets in to display different results.
Once your data is entered, you might want to reorganize it, edit it, add to it, and delete some of it. That means adding rows and columns—perhaps moving the rows you already have—and deleting others. You might decide to rearrange the order of columns, which means moving data from one side of the table to the other. To do that without any unexpected surprises (“Hey, why did Word paste my whole table in that single cell?!”), you need to understand some of the hidden features behind the table display you see on your screen.
One of the secrets in moving and editing table data successfully lies in seeing the unseen. Each cell, row, and column in a table is given a marker that delineates the end of the item. When you move, copy, or paste information, these unseen markers might go along, giving you unexpected results at best or overwriting your existing data at worst. To display the hidden marks in your current Word table, click Show/Hide in the Paragraph group on the Home tab. The various table formatting marks will appear, as shown in Figure 15-7.
Figure 15-7. Table formatting marks identify the end of individual cells, rows, columns, and the table itself.
When you select table data for moving, copying, or deleting, be sure to turn formatting marks on to avoid inadvertently including hidden formatting codes that can change the look or behavior of your table.
To move and copy rows, columns, and cells, start by selecting the ones you want to move or copy; this lets Word know which data you want to work with. As you get comfortable working with tables, you’ll discover the tricks to selecting just the data you want for various operations. Table 15-1 lists the different methods you can use to select the content in your tables.
Table 15-1. Selecting Table Segments
Selection | Method | Use |
|---|---|---|
Entire table | Click the table and then click the table move handle that appears in the upper left corner of the table. | You want to move, copy, format, or delete an entire table. |
Single row | Click outside the table to the left of the row. | You want to reorder, format, copy, move, insert, or delete a row. |
Single column | Click outside the table just above the column. | You want to move, format, copy, insert, or delete a column. |
Single cell | Click to the left of any data entered in the cell. | You want to move, copy, delete, or clear that cell. |
Multiple cells, rows, or columns | Drag across the elements you want to select. | You want to move, format, copy, or delete sections of a table. |
Although copying is basically a simple operation, copying table data can be a bit tricky because the pasted data can sometimes go where you’re not expecting it to go. For example, if you want to copy all the information into one cell in the new table, the data might instead be spread over the entire row, replacing existing data. If you want to copy multiple cells to multiple cells in the new table, the incoming cells might all be lumped into the cell at the insertion point. Or you can easily—and accidentally—create a nested table in your existing table when you really just meant to copy a few cells. How do you avoid these kinds of copy surprises?
First, know what you’re copying. The trick is to select cell data if you want to copy cell data. Likewise, select the cells themselves (or rows or columns) if that’s what you want to copy. By capturing the table formatting marks when you highlight the section you want to copy, you can be sure you get the results you expect.
Next, know where you’re copying to. If you are copying a row or a column, make sure you’ve allowed enough room for the incoming data so that important entries won’t be overwritten and lost. The new changes to the Paste tool in Word 2010 can help you with this. After you copy the table data you want, click in the table where you want to place the data then right-click. The context menu displays the Paste Options that are appropriate to the type of data you’ve copied—you might see a Keep Source Formatting option, a Merge Formatting option, or Keep Text Only option (see Figure 15-8).
Some tables seem to take on a life of their own once you begin adding data in the columns and rows. If you want to increase the size of your table by adding a column, you can do it using either method described here:
Click the column label of the column beside which you want to add the new column. Then click Layout in the contextual Table Tools and choose Insert Left or Insert Right in the Rows & Columns group (see Figure Figure 15-9).
Right-click the column label of the column, point to Insert, and click Insert Columns To The Left or Insert Columns To The Right.
When you manually add data to a table by typing the entry and pressing Tab, Word will continue creating new rows as long as you continue entering data. But when you want to add rows in the middle of a table, for example, or add many rows at once, you can follow the procedures given previously but choose Insert Above or Below instead of Left or Right.
If you want to insert multiple columns or rows, simply highlight the number of columns (or rows) that you want to insert. For example, to add three columns to the left of an existing column, highlight three contiguous columns, beginning with the one beside which you want to insert the new columns. Then right-click the selected columns, point to Insert, and choose Insert Columns To The Left. The three columns are added as you specified.
In some circumstances, you might want to insert cells in a table without adding an entire row or column. You might need to do this, for example, when you have overlooked a product name and number in your listing and need to add it without changing the entire table. To insert cells in a table, simply select the cell (or cells) below which you want to insert new cells. Right-click the selected cell, point to Insert, and choose Insert Cells. In the Insert Cells dialog box, click the option you need (as shown in the graphic that follows) then click OK. The cells in the table are changed accordingly.
If you decide that you don’t need certain rows or columns after all, or if you have empty rows you didn’t use, you can easily delete them. Simply highlight the rows or columns and right-click to display the context menu which will display a choice for deletion, depending on what you’ve selected. If you selected a row, you’ll see Delete Row in the context menu; if you selected a single cell, you’ll see only Delete Cell.
You can also delete table elements by clicking the table handle in the upper-left corner of the table then click Delete in the Rows & Columns group on the Layout tab. A list of deletion options appears from which you can choose the item you want to delete.
When you choose to delete cells in a table, Word displays the Delete Cells dialog box so that you can identify where you want remaining cells to be shifted. Click your selection and then click OK to return to the document.
In some instances, you might want to select parts of your table and move them to other parts of your document—perhaps you want to create a new table, move rows to another position in the table, or divide one large table into two to make them easier to understand. (You can also use the Split Table command, located on the Layout tab of Table Tools, to divide one table into two.)
When you want to move rows or columns, simply select the rows or columns you want to move and drag the selected block to the new location. Be sure to click Show/Hide in the Paragraph group on the Home tab before you select the columns or rows to ensure that you’ve included the end of row or column markers in your selection. The table rows or columns are relocated as you specified.
Sometimes tables seem to grow out of proportion. Or perhaps data in one cell is related to data in two or more other cells. For example, you might want to display the text “2010” over four adjacent cells in the next row that contain the text “Q1”, “Q2”, “Q3”, and “Q4”, so that these cells appear as a subgroup under “2010”. If you’re looking for a way to consolidate data, you can use the Merge Cells command to take data from separate cells and combine it in one cell. To merge cells in your table, select the cells—or the rows or columns—you want to merge and select the Layout tab in Table Tools. Then click Merge Cells in the Merge group. The cells you selected are combined into a single cell.
As you might imagine, splitting cells is the opposite of merging them. When you have a collection of data that you want to divide into separate cells, rows, or columns, you can use Split Cells on the Layout tab of the contextual Table Tools. To split cells, begin by selecting the cell, row, or column you want to split. Click Split Cells in the Merge group of the Layout tab. In the Split Cells dialog box, enter the number of columns and rows over which you want to divide the data. If you have previously merged the data you are now splitting, Word “remembers” the original number of columns and rows and suggests those values for the division. To retain the basic format and apply existing row and column formatting to the new columns and rows, leave the Merge Cells Before Split check box selected. Click OK to split the cells.
After splitting or merging table cells, you’ll probably need to redistribute the space in the columns. To resize a column quickly, point to the column border in the top row of the column you want to change. When the pointer changes to a double-headed arrow, drag the column border in the direction you want to resize the column. When the column is at the size you want, release the mouse button.
If you need to apply a more precise measurement to the width of the column, right-click in the column and choose Table Properties. Click the Column tab in the Table Properties dialog box, enter the appropriate column width in the Preferred Width box, and then click OK.
One aspect of working with tables that can be frustrating to new users involves getting the content in the table to look just the way you want. Sometimes the text is too close to the cell border; at other times, a picture aligns oddly in the cell space or changes the look of the overall table.
You can control the amount of spacing in a cell as well as the alignment of the content within the cell by using the tools in the Alignment group on the Table Tools Layout contextual tab. The nine tools on the left side of the group enable you to choose how you want the content to be aligned within the cell.
Clicking the Cell Margins tool displays the Table Options dialog box in which you can enter the amount of space you want to appear along the Top, Bottom, Right, and Left sides of each cell.
Once upon a time, tables might have been boring columns of text and numbers, but no more. In Word 2010 you can apply any number of styles to your table—or create your own—to add color, typography, pictures, and more to give them just the look you want. You can change basically everything about a table—from the font to the shading to the line style and thickness and the display (or not) of the table grid.
By far, the easiest way to change the format of your table is to apply a table style. This section covers this method and also provides quick steps for customizing specific elements of your table.
Word 2010 gives you a simple and elegant way to control a host of formatting options in your document. The theme you selected controls the formatting choices you’ll see for all kinds of elements—your tables included. If you didn’t choose a theme for your document, the Office theme is applied by default.
When you add a table to your Word document, the tabs for the contextual Table Tools appear above the Ribbon. On the Design tab, you’ll see the Table Styles. Use these styles to change the format of your table with a simple click of the mouse. A table style can add the following formatting elements to your table:
A new font, size, style, and color for table text
A different look for gridlines and the table border
A new style of shading for columns and rows
A different kind of alignment for table data
Tip
Use the Table Style options on the Design tab of the contextual Table Tools to control the types of styles you see in the Table Styles gallery and to apply quick changes to your selected table. For example, if you want to see styles that include shading behind alternate columns, select the Banded Columns check box.
To apply a style to your table, click in the table, then on the Design tab in the contextual Table Tools, click one of the designs in the Table Styles gallery on the Ribbon.
If you don’t see one you like, click the More button in the lower-right corner of the gallery to display a larger selection. As soon as you click a style, it is applied instantly to your table (see Figure 15-10).
If you have adopted a particular type of table format that you want to use for all your company’s documents, you can easily create a table style and save it to the gallery for reuse later. To create a new table style, follow these steps:
Create the table as usual and apply any formatting you want to be reflected in the final style.
Click in the table to select it.
On the Design tab of the contextual Table Tools, click the More button in the lower-right corner of the Table Styles gallery.
At the bottom of the gallery, click New Table Style. The Create New Style From Formatting dialog box appears, as Figure 15-11 shows.
Make any additional formatting choices (for example, font color, size, and style; line width, style, and color) and enter a name for the style in the Name box.
Select whether you want the table style to be available in all documents or only in the current document, and then click OK to save the new table style.
Figure 15-11. Create a new table style based on a table format you want to use regularly in your documents.
Now your new table style is available in the Table Styles gallery. If you decide that you’d like to further modify or delete the style, simply right-click it and choose Modify Table Style or Delete Table Style.
As mentioned earlier in this chapter, the simplest and most convenient way to format your tables involves using the table styles that come with Word because they are predesigned to coordinate with the overall theme selected for your document. When you use one of them, you know they’re going to look good with the other formatting in your document. But if you really want to break out of the mold and make some customizations of your own, you might want to use the following table formatting tools to do it:
Experiment with custom borders on your table by selecting the table and choosing Borders on the Design tab of the contextual Table Tools (see the graphic that follows). Use the Line Weight, Line Style, and Pen Color tools in the Draw Borders group to help get the style just right. And of course, if you don’t like what you see, use the Eraser tool to remove it.
Put your own shading behind table data by using the Shading tool on the Design tab of Table Tools. When you click Shading, a color palette appears, displaying choices that are in line with the selected theme. The palette also gives you the option of choosing custom colors. Again, have fun and experiment, but if things go horribly wrong, choose No Color or press Ctrl+Z to undo your creative catastrophe.
In some cases, you might be perfectly happy creating a table at the cursor position and leaving it at that. In other cases, you might want to position the table more intentionally. You can use the options on the Table tab of the Table Properties dialog box to control the way in which your table is positioned. Display the dialog box by right-clicking in your table and choosing Table Properties. Click Table then click Left, Center, or Right alignment to specify whether you want your table to be positioned on the left margin of the document, centered between the margins, or aligned on the right.
Tip
You can have Word indent the table by a specific amount of space by using the Indent From Left option on the Table tab of the Table Properties dialog box. The default setting is zero, but you can increase the indent by clicking the up arrow.
Text wrap becomes an important consideration when you’re working with multiple tables in a long document. Two options are available: None, which means text will not wrap around the table at all but appear above and below it, or Around, which flows text up to and around the table. Choose how you want text to flow by clicking the Table tab in the Table Properties dialog box.
When you click Around, the Positioning button becomes available. Click Positioning to display the Table Positioning dialog box (shown in Figure 15-12) in which you make choices that control where the table is positioned in your document by default.
Figure 15-12. The Table Positioning dialog box enables you to control the default table position for your document.
These choices include the following:
The horizontal and vertical positioning of the table (choose Left, Right, Center, Inside, or Outside)
The element to which the table position is relative (choose Margin, Page, Column for the horizontal position and Margin, Page, Paragraph for the vertical position)
The space you want to leave between the table and surrounding text
Whether you want to allow the text to overlap the table boundary and whether you want the table to stay fixed in place or move with text if it is reformatted
One of the great features of Word tables is that they provide more than a clear way of organizing data—they also give you a means of reorganizing data. Word includes a Sort function so that you can easily reorder the information in your table by searching and sorting on certain key words or phrases. You might, for example, want to organize a conference registration list by sorting first according to state and then alphabetically by last name.
To use the Sort feature, select the table data you want to sort and click Sort in the Data group on the Layout tab. In the Sort dialog box, enter your preferences for the sort procedure and click OK to complete it.
It’s not unusual to need to resize a table either while you’re creating it or soon after. When you begin to create a table, you don’t always know how large it will be. Perhaps you add more columns, include more information, or incorporate another set of data. Making the change to a new size—larger or smaller—is straightforward. Word gives you options for controlling the size of the table and offers flexibility for resizing your table exactly the way you want. This section explains how you can work with Word to best handle table-sizing issues.
Remember that when you create a table using the Insert Table dialog box, AutoFit is one of the setup options available to you. With AutoFit you can automatically resize your window as needed, and it is actually already working, by default, to create fixed column widths in your table. AutoFit offers three options:
Fixed Column Width. With this option, you can choose a specific width for the columns you create.
AutoFit To Contents. This adjusts the width of columns to accommodate the data you enter.
AutoFit To Window. Choosing this option sizes a table so that it fits within a document or Web browser window. This size changes depending on the size of the window, which means that the table will be automatically redrawn as the user resizes the window.
Although AutoFit does a good job of keeping on top of the way your table needs to grow (or shrink), there will be times when you want to make those changes yourself. The easiest way to resize a table is to drag a table corner. Here’s the process in a nutshell: click the table resize handle in the lower-right corner of the table and drag it in the direction you want the table to be resized. The cells are redrawn to reflect the new size of the table.
The Table Properties dialog box gives you two very different sizing options. To open it, right-click in your table, and then choose Table Properties. To create a table based on a fixed measurement, click the Table tab and in the Size section, select the Preferred Width check box and enter the width for the table you’re going to create. Click the Measure In arrow and select Inches, then click OK.
The best use of this feature, however, is in creating a table that reformats automatically, based on the size of the browser window. In other words, if you’re viewing your table as part of a Web page, and you reduce the size of your browser window, the table will reformat so that it will stay entirely visible, even in the smaller window. This is a great feature if you’re often switching back and forth between applications and want to keep your information open on the screen. To create a table whose dimensions are based on a percentage of screen display, click the Measure In arrow, select Percent, and then click OK. The table will be reformatted as needed to stay within the size of the Web browser window.
The fastest way to change the width and height of columns and rows is also the easiest. You simply position the pointer over the dividing line of the column or row you want to change and, when the pointer changes to a double-headed arrow, drag the border in the desired direction. Be sure that you’ve grabbed the border for the entire column or row, however, because it’s possible to move the border for a single cell, which won’t help if you want to adjust an entire column or row. (Make sure all cells are deselected if you want to resize the entire column.)
Distributing your data refers to the process of spacing and aligning data within cells. By default, when you create a basic table and enter text, the text aligns along the left border of the cell, placed in the first line of the cell. To distribute your data evenly in the rows and columns of your table (spacing it evenly between the top and bottom margins of the row and in the center of the column), right-click in the column or row you want to change, choose Cell Alignment and then select one of the Align Center commands. Or you can also use the Alignment group on the Layout tab.
While we’re talking about distributing data, let’s also discuss rotating the text in your table cells. You can orient your horizontal text on a vertical axis, which gives you the means to create interesting column headings for your tables.
To change the display of existing text, start by selecting it and then clicking Text Direction in the Alignment group on the Layout tab. Here’s what you can expect to happen:
On the first click, the Text Direction tool displays the text vertically, with the start of the text at the top of the page, extending down toward the table.
Click again and the Text Direction tool displays the text vertically, with the start of the text at the top of the table, extending upward toward the top of the page.
Click a third time and the Text Direction tool puts your text back to normal.
Although Word is happy to leave the truly complicated calculations to its companion, Excel, the program includes support for working with a number of functions in your tables. Some of the Word tables you create will no doubt include numbers—and some of those columns will require totals, averages, and more. You can create a number of calculations, depending on what you want the data in your tables to do. You can create your own formulas and work with other Word functions by using the Formula dialog box, shown in Figure 15-13.
To create a formula in a table, follow these steps:
Click in the cell where you want to add the formula.
Choose the Layout tab in the contextual Table Tools. Click Formula in the Data Group to display the Formula dialog box.
Word might insert the function it expects you to use based on the cell you selected in the table.
You can use the displayed formula as is or highlight and erase the existing formula, type = in the Formula box, and click the Paste function arrow. Choose the function you want to use. The function is added to the Formula box, and parentheses are supplied.
Click OK to close the Formula dialog box. Word will then calculate the answer and display it in the table cell.