Five tips for working with PowerPoint 2007
If you're a longtime PowerPoint user, you no doubt have accumulated a set of shortcuts and customizations. Many of those have gone away under PowerPoint 2007. But fear not, because there are plenty of ways for you to bend PowerPoint 2007 to your will. Here are some tips to get you started.
1. Turn off the Ribbon.
Here's what may be the best tip you'll ever come across for PowerPoint 2007 -- how to turn off the Ribbon. Doing this will get you back plenty of screen real estate.
The Ribbon will still be available when you want it -- all you need to do is click on the appropriate menu (Home, Insert, Page Layout and so on), and it appears. It then discreetly goes away when you are no longer using it, as you can see in the screen shot below.
There are several ways to turn off the Ribbon:
- Click the Down arrow to the right of the Quick Access toolbar button and select Minimize the Ribbon.
- Press Ctrl-F1. (Press Ctrl-F1 to make it appear again.)
- Double-click the current tab above the Ribbon.
2. Get your PowerPoint 2003 toolbars back.
Say you've given the Ribbon a fair shake and you just can't stand it. Although Microsoft doesn't provide a way to get the old PowerPoint 2003 interface back, a couple of third-party tools, Classic Menu and ToolbarToggle, do.
3. Customize the Ribbon.
Maybe you mostly like the Ribbon, but some of the commands aren't located where you'd like them to be. Another third-party program called RibbonCustomizer Pro lets you create new Ribbon tabs or customize existing ones the way you like them.
It's a powerful way to take advantage of the Ribbon's interface while asserting control over which commands appear where.
4. Use keyboard shortcuts.
If you're a fan of PowerPoint 2003's keyboard shortcuts, take heart -- most of them still work in 2007. So keep using them.
You can also use a clever set of keyboard shortcuts for working with the Ribbon. Press the Alt key, and a tiny letter or number icon appears on the menu for each tab -- for example, the letter "H" for the Home tab.
Now press that letter on your keyboard, and you'll display that tab or menu item. When the tab appears, there will be letters and numbers for most options on the tab as well.
Once you've started to learn these shortcuts, you'll naturally begin using key combinations. So instead of pressing Alt, then H to display the home tab, you can press Alt-H together.
5. Find your old friends.
In PowerPoint 2007, no features or functions are where they used to be. But it's easy to find them.
