Word Processing
Word processing refers to the use
of a computer program to prepare and print documents. Through this software, a
user enters text, views it, changes it as necessary, saves it and prints and
shares it.
15.1 word processing packages
Software packages like Word
Perfect, Word Star, and MS Word are examples of Word Processing packages.
MS Word
MS Word provides facilities like
bookmarks, auto text, auto table, links, pictures, symbols, video clips, header
and footer, footnotes, fonts, borders and shading, columns, spell checker,
grammar checker, auto correct, thesaurus etc.
Components of MS Word
MS Word has the various
components on its window which are:-
Title bar
It is upper most bar of a window
having Control Icon on its left. Next to control icon is the name of the
program and document. At the right on the title bar are Minimize, Restore and
Close Buttons.
Menu bar
Ms Word commands are grouped
together in Menus on Menu bar. The menus are File, Edit, View, Insert, Format,
Tools, Table, Window and Help. To display a command, click on a Menu option or
press alternately Alt and the underline letter in menu command.
Tool Bars
Standard and Formatting Toolbars
appear below the Menu bar in the form of buttons.
The Standard Toolbar contains various
tools which provide access to file management and editing commands.
The Formatting Toolbar contains
various tools which are used to format character, fonts and text.
Ruler
Ruler appears below toolbars,
Horizontal ruler at the top of working area and vertical ruler at the left.
Scrollbars
Scrollbars are used to move a document
vertically and horizontally . the vertical bar is on the right while the
horizontal scrollbar under the window’s working area.
Status Bar
Status bar is located at the
bottom of the application window. It displays the status or mode and other useful
information about active file.
Entering text into a document
Insert mode
In this mode, text is inserted
into the document at the insertion point. When you type any character it appears
at the insertion point while the existing text on the right moves forward.
Overtype mode
In this mode, text overwrites the
existing text from the insertion point.
Editing a document
Editing is a process of making
alterations in the contents of your document. Some editing features are:-
Insert
It is adding text in a document
by placing the cursor at the desired position and start typing.
Delete
Deleting is removing text using
delete or backspace keys.
Find and replace
The find command allows you to
find any word, phrase, or number that exists in your document, the replace
command allows you to replace it with something else.
Cut/copy and paste
The cut command is used to move a
selected item in a document and copy command is used to copy a selected item.
You can paste it any number of times and anywhere in the same document or in
any other document.
Spell checker, grammar checker
and thesaurus
Spell checker tool check the
spelling, lists correctly spelled words and provides auto correct facility to
replace the typed word with correct one. Grammar checker checks grammar
mistakes. Thesaurus provides a list of appropriate and alternative words.
Formatting documents
Document formatting is a process
of improving the overall appearance of a document. All word processing programs
have a number of features that make it easy to format your document. This
includes margins and indents setting, font, column, header and footers, borders
and shading, etc.
Text formatting
Changing the appearance of text
in a document is referred as text formatting. There are four different levels
of text formatting, which are;
Character formatting, paragraph
formatting, section formatting, and document formatting.
character formatting
Improving the appearance of text
is called character formatting, it involves selecting typeface, font size and
attributes. Character commands can be accessed through the font dialog box on
the formatting toolbar, or by using format command on Menu bar or by using
keyboard shortcuts.
Typefaces, fonts, and
point sizes
Font refers to the physical
characteristics of a typed character. These characteristics include its
typeface, point size, style pitch
spacing.
Typeface: refers to the
design of the characters such as Balochistan Residential College.
Paragraph formatting
Paragraph formatting involves
changing indentation, alignment, line spacing and tab settings for a paragraph.
All these features allow you to enhance the appearance of your document.
Paragraph formatting commands are accessible using mouse or keyboard shortcut
combinations.
indenting paragraph
Indenting a paragraph means
shifting the body of text within the normal page margin. When you indent a
paragraph, you temporarily change the position of text relative to the left and
right margins.
First line indent marker
This indent marker sets the first
line of a paragraph on the left margin. It avoids the use of tab key at the
beginning of every new paragraph.
Left indent marker
The left indent moves the entire
paragraph from the left margin.
Right indent marker
The right indent marker moves the
entire paragraph from the right margin.
Changing paragraph alignment
Aligning text to the left, right
or at the center of the page affects the outlook of your document. The way how
the text is aligned with the margins of a document is called justification.
Word provides four different types of justification or alignment.
Left justification, aligns text
at the left margin.
Center justification, centers the
line or paragraph between the margins.
Right justification, aligns text
at the right margin.
Full justification, spreads the
text entry between the left and right margins by automatically spacing the
words in a line.
Changing line spacing
Line spacing allows you to change
the spacing between the lines of a paragraph or the document. You can specify
various line spacing options from the paragraph dialog box using format menu.
Page/ Print layout
MS Word provides four primary
views for working with documents; Normal, Web layout, Print layout and outline.
You can select your desired view for your document from View menu.
Normal, Allows to type, edit and
format documents, but does not display additional information such as header
and footer.
Web layout, displays the document
as it would appear if published on the web.
Print layout, allows to display
multiple columns, footnotes, header and footer in the document and graphics.
Outline, allows to view and edit
the document structure.
There are two more options for
view.
Full screen: in Full screen
mode, you can type, edit and format a document without Menu bar, toolbars and
ruler.
Zoom: it is used to
enlarge or reduce the view of a page on screen.
Specifying Page layout
Page layout of a document is
affected by many factors including margins, paper size and print orientation.
The control of these factors through page Setup is accessed from file menu.
Previewing the document
Before you pass a document for
printing, it is better to look at the document that how would it appear when printed. Word provides the
facility to preview document in full page display before printing. To access
print preview mode, you can select Print Preview option from the File menu.
Printing the document
Open the document you want to
print. If you are satisfied with your document after viewing it in page layout,
and Print Preview, then you can send the document to the printer for printing
it.
