Two Mad Geeks

PDFCreator is a free tool to create PDF files from nearly any Windows application.

Link: pdfforge

A basic Excel tutorial.

Link: University of South Dakota

Most people use word processors like MS Word like they would use a typewriter — manually making section headers bold and centered, inserting hard breaks between paragraphs, etc. This formatting method is fine for short documents, but for long documents that include multiple sections, figures, tables and other elements that need to be styled consistently throughout the text, it pays to learn Word’s advanced features.

These features are easy-to-use, but poorly documented and, in my experience, underused — even by professionals that frequently write long documents. This tutorial presents ten tips to help you start using Word the smart way.

Link: General Disarray

You probably e-mail business letters, resumes and personal documents as Word documents. But you may be telling people things that would make your hair curl. Unless you take extra steps, recipients of Word documents can easily see items deleted or modified. (Related item: Ask Kim)

For example, how about that letter you sent to Joe Jones? You first referred to him as a "sniveling creep." You changed that to "great guy." But Joe may know what you really think.

Hidden within that letter was your original wording. Microsoft Word dutifully saved it all. And Joe doesn’t have to be a rocket scientist to find it.

There are a number of ways to ensure that your personal or company data stays with you:

• Turn off Fast Save. This feature speeds up saving a document by saving only changes made to a document. However, text that you delete from a document may still remain. Microsoft recommends turning off this feature to eliminate any chance of deleted text remaining in the document. Click Tools, then Options. Click the Save tab. Clear the "Allow fast saves" check box and click OK.

• You can remove personal information from a document when you save it. In Word 2002 and 2003, click Tools, then Options. Click the Security tab. Under Privacy options, select "Remove personal information from file properties on save" and click OK. In Word 2000, click Tools, the Options. Select the User Information tab. Clear the information in Name, Initials and Mailing Address and click OK.

• Turn off the Track Changes tool. In Word 2002 and 2003, click Tools, then Track Changes. In Word 2000 and earlier versions, click Tools, Track Changes, Highlight Changes. Click to clear the check mark in the "Track Changes while editing" box.

You can tell if the Track Changes feature is on by looking at the status bar (located at the bottom of every document). When Track Changes is enabled, TRK appears in the status bar. When Track Changes is disabled, TRK is dimmed.

Track Changes must be disabled before writing the document. Otherwise, any changes made will not be removed.

• Finally, a free Microsoft tool removes hidden data from Word, Excel and PowerPoint. The Remove Hidden Data add-in tool (snipurl.com/3osw) will delete hidden text and comments from individual files or a batch of files at once.

Link: USA Today