Technology Q&A

by Stanley Zarowin

E-mail blind copy (Bcc) addresses are secure…Break Excel formulas into bite-size sections…Document Image Writer: The “printer” you never knew you had…Access Format Painter via the keyboard…Word shortcuts.

E-MAIL BLIND COPY (BCC) ADDRESSES ARE SECURE
Can a spammer grab the addresses off an e-mail’s blind copy (Bcc)? Several people in my office insist it can be done.

Rest assured, the claim of insecurity is a legend that pops up from time to time. You can confirm its safety by sending yourself an e-mail (see screenshot below) and include yourself as a Cc (copy) and a Bcc (blind copy).

When it arrives, it looks like this:

When you send a message, names and addresses in the Bcc are automatically stripped out by the sending server (usually the Internet Service Provider) after they are transmitted so they are never available to the recipients.

BREAK EXCEL FORMULAS INTO BITE-SIZE SECTIONS
My spreadsheets contain very long, complex formulas that are hard to read. Is there some way to break them into smaller pieces without affecting the integrity of the formula?

There is an easy solution.

For example, take this long formula:

Wouldn’t it be easier to read if it were broken into sections, like this?

To “format” the formula this way I pressed Alt+Enter at each natural break in the formula.

Bonus: If you copy the four-line formula from the Formula bar and paste it into a worksheet, each line will be pasted into a different cell (see screenshot below). That gives you the opportunity to test each part of the formula.

DOCUMENT IMAGE WRITER: THE “PRINTER” YOU NEVER KNEW YOU HAD
I use Word to make up multicolor brochures for my firm, then check that the makeup and colors are just right by using Print Preview. While the test image it produces is OK, it doesn’t give me quite the precision I need to feel comfortable printing several hundred copies of the brochures. Any ideas?

While Print Preview provides an acceptable preview in most cases, Windows has another preview printer that does an even better job. It’s called Microsoft Office Document Image Writer and, unlike Print Preview, it makes an actual image that can be copied and saved as a .tiff (tag image file format) file.

To access the Document Image Writer, click on File, Print (or press Ctrl+P) and under Printer cursor down the options. When you come to the Microsoft Office Document Image Writer (see screenshot), click on it.

Then click on the Advanced tab for options on how and where you want the image to appear (see screenshot below).

Notice Output format lets me set it for a Super Fine (300 DPI) image and Default folder gives me the option of where to save it (I will save it to my Tech Q-A folder). When done, click on OK. The resulting image will be just as good as if you printed the document to paper and then scanned in the pages. But, of course, it’s faster and easier.

ACCESS FORMAT PAINTER VIA THE KEYBOARD
One of the handiest functions in Word is the Format Painter. I use it often to copy a format from one section of a document to another. There’s only one thing I don’t like about it: I have to take my fingers off the keyboard to activate it with the mouse. I can’t believe there isn’t a keyboard shortcut.

There is. But, like many Microsoft shortcuts, it’s hard to find. If you click on F1 for information you won’t find even a clue that such a shortcut exists.

The icon tool operates like the keyboard shortcut, except without the mouse. Highlight the area you want the format copied and press Ctrl+Shift+C; the shortcut for pasting is Ctrl+Shift+V. If you put the insertion point inside a paragraph that includes the end-of-paragraph marker (), it will copy all the formats within the paragraph: bullets and numbering, spacing, indentation, style and character formatting shared by most characters. If you select just one or two words without selecting the end-of-paragraph marker, then Ctrl+Shift+C copies only the character formatting (bold, italic and underline, for example).

You’re probably saying, “What’s he talking about—an end-of-paragraph marker?” Well, now’s as good a time as any to learn about it. Microsoft Word is defaulted to hide the paragraph mark at the end of every paragraph. Because the end-of-paragraph marker is such a powerful function, I put an icon for it in my toolbar so I can hide it or evoke it with a mouse click. To place it in your toolbar, go to Tools, Customize, Commands tab and cursor down to Show All (see screenshot) and drag the icon to your toolbar with your mouse.

When you toggle it on, it not only displays all a document’s paragraph marks, it also shows a single dot for every blank space.

Bonus: The shortcut is actually more powerful than the Format Painter icon. When you use the keyboard, the same formatting will be ready to paste for the entire Word session. With the Format Painter, you have to click on it twice to keep it active. However, don’t forget to turn it off by pressing Esc when you’re finished copying formats.

WORD SHORTCUTS
1¹/ 2-line paragraph spacing: Ctrl+5
Centered paragraph: Ctrl+E
Double-spaced paragraph: Ctrl+2
Justified paragraph: Ctrl+0
Left-aligned paragraph: Ctrl+L
Right-aligned paragraph: Ctrl+J
Single-spaced paragraph: Ctrl+1.

Stanley Zarowin, a former JofA senior editor, is now a contributing editor. His e-mail address is zarowin@mindspring.com.