Mastering The Quick Access Toolbar And Office Button In MS Excel
Like the rest of the Office 2007 suite MS Excel 2007 contains no menus or toolbars. However it does include a feature called the Office Button which bears a remarkable similarity to a menu as well as a Quick Access Toolbar which functions a lot like the toolbars found in previous releases of Microsoft Office. In this article we’ll take a look at these two features & see how they work.
Excel’s Office Button
The Office Button is found in the top left of the Excel screen. When you click it a menu appears which resembles menus found in most software programs & also in previous versions of Excel. The Office Button menu allows you to create open save & print documents. It also contains options for preparing documents for distribution closing the currently active document & exiting Excel altogether.
The Office Button also contains a list of the recently opened files. Next to the name of each file is pin icon. This icon is used to pin the associated document. Pinning a document means that it won’t disappear form list of recently opened files. By contrast unpinned documents will eventually disappear form list as files are created & opened.
It is also here that you will find “Excel Options”. This is equivalent to Tools-Options found in previous versions of Excel. Excel Options are displayed as a column of categorised tabs on the left of the dialog. Just click on a tab to reveal options in that category. The Excel Options customise the way in which Excel works. Let’s look at a few examples…
Excel’s Developer Tab which contains commands for working with macros is not visible when Excel is first installed. To make Excel display it choose “Excel Options” form Office Button and in the “Popular” category switch on the option “Show Developer Tab in the Ribbon”. A second example… By default each new document you create has three sheets. If you find this too many or too few you can change the number of sheets which each new work will contain. Choose “Excel Options” form Office Button and in the “Popular” category under the section headed “When Creating New Workbooks Include this Many Sheets” simply enter your preferred number of sheets for each new workbook you create.
The Excel Quick Access Toolbar
The Excel Quick Access Toolbar is usually displayed in the top left of the screen next to the Office Button. It functions in a similar way to the toolbars found in old versions of Microsoft Excel.
By default the Quick Access Toolbar contains only three commands saving the current workbook undoing commands & redoing commands.
To the right of the three default commands is menu which enables you to personalise the Quick Access Toolbar & determine which buttons are displayed & which commands remain hidden.
Each of the commands in the Quick Access Toolbar menu is switch if a command is active when you select it it will be removed if a command is hidden choosing it will make it visible.
Another method of customising the Quick Access Toolbar is to add your favourite options form Excel Ribbon. Just right click on an option in any of the Tabs of the Ribbon. In the context menu which pops up simply choose “Add To Quick Access Toolbar”.
If you find that you are using the Quick Access Toolbar a lot you may find it convenient to move it below the Ribbon. Simply choose “Show Below The Ribbon” form Quick Access Toolbar drop-down menu. You can also make the Quick Access Toolbar more accessible by minimising the ribbon. To do this double-click on the name of any ribbon Tab or choose “Minimise the Ribbon” form Quick Access Toolbar menu.
The author is trainer & developer with Macresource Computer Training a UK IT training company offering Microsoft Excel 2007 courses in London & on-site courses throughout the UK.