CHRISdotTODD

If you've ever used a Microsoft Word template, you often find the same line that has both left flush and right flush text. I had a recent need to do this and set out to figure out how to accomplish this trick. It ended up not being so difficult - it can be done with Tabs. Have the line you're working on set to left flush. Enter the text that you want to be left-flush. (Leave the cursor at the end of the text.) Select the Home Ribbon (Home tab). In the Paragraph section of the Home Ribbon , click the lower-right corner  where you see the half-square and arrow. This will open the Paragraph properties dialog box. Click the Tabs... button located in the lower-left of the dialog box. This will open the Tabs properties dialog box. There are 2 settings to make in this dialog box. Enter 6.5" for the Tab stop position . This assumes you're using 8.5" width paper and have 1" borders on the left and right sides. 6.5" was determined by this sim...

UPDATED: May 19, 2017 I changed the script to be more user-friendly and the ability to include HTML in the email body. I also found that Google moved a few things in the menus, so I modified the instructions as appropriate. Google Sheets has a nice feature to notify yourself if something has changed, but every person who wants to be notified must add a notification for themselves. With a simple script, you can send notifications to people of your choosing. In this example, I've written a script to send an email when 1 or more rows are added. Get started. Go to the sheet Find a cell in the sheet that wont ever be over-written. Enter the value of the current total number of rows in the sheet. Note the cell for use in your script. I used G2. Go to Tools > Script editor... Write your script. Add this script in the script editor. Change as required to meet your needs. function check4NewLines() {       // /////////////// //////////////// ///...

I recently had to brush up on my CSS skills to develop a solution where two buttons would appear side-by-side unless the viewport was less than 480 pixels, in which case they should then display stacked. Through a bit of research, I found a couple of solutions. When I tried to implement the solutions as presented, the buttons didn't appear side-by-side, but instead on separate rows -- I'm sure something I must have overlooked, but nevertheless, I, therefore, came up with my own modified solution. My particular example used 3 columns -- the middle just for space, which could be done with padding and/or margin. The key is using "@media." By default the widths of the columns were all set for 100% -- configured for stacking. When the screen was 480 pixels or larger, using "@media" the widths are adjusted 45%, 10%, and 45%. If you're not sure what each of these CSS properties does for you, try searching "css [property]" such as " css clear...

Ever copy a webpage of data into Excel, and it brings along a bunch of hyperlinks? Of course, it isn't practical to remove each hyperlink manually. Fortunately, there are a couple of options to perform a bulk removal of hyperlinks. Note that I'm using Excel 2007 in my examples. OPTION 1 Select the cells that contain hyperlinks. On the Home tab, in the Editing section, click the Clear drop-down arrow. Click Clear Hyperlinks . I have found in some cases that the Clear Hyperlinks option isn't available. In those cases, use option 2 below. OPTION 2 Use the following macro: Sub NoMoreHyperlinks() ActiveSheet.Hyperlinks.Delete End Sub For those of us that need a reminder on how to create macros, here's a more detailed process. Press Alt-F8 to display the Macro dialog box Enter a new macro name (such as "NoMoreHyperlinks") in the text box just below "Macro name:" - This will change the Create button from an inactive to activ...

I'm always looking for shortcuts to reduce the time I spend moving the mouse. My company just sent this email with a few helpful Outlook shortcuts, and therefore I'm sharing them with you... Outlook 2010 Shortcuts Ctrl + E will help you find a message or other item. Ctrl + Alt + R will reply to an email with a meeting request. Ctrl + Shift + A will create an appointment. Ctrl + Alt + F will forward an email as an attachment. Ctrl + Shift + M will draft a message from any Outlook view. Outlook 2011 for Mac Shortcuts Shift + ⌘ + K will send all the messages in your outbox. Shift + ⌘ + O will display all unread messages in your inbox. Ctrl + ⌘ + C will check recipient names in an open message. Ctrl + 2 will flag an item for follow up for “tomorrow;” Ctrl + 3 will flag for “this week;” Ctrl + 4 will flag for “next week”.

I recently copied hundreds of rows of data from a webpage into Excel. Unfortunately it brought over several unwanted objects, which I needed to delete. It seemed quite consuming if I was to select and delete each individually. Worse I discovered that I couldn't select some of the objects (checkboxes). I learned two new techniques for mass deleting objects. If you can select the objects Press F5 -- this opens the "Go To" dialog box Click Special...  -- this opens the "Go To Special" dialog box Select the Objects radio button Click OK -- this closes the dialog box and all the objects in the worksheet are selected Press Delete  and all the objects are deleted If you don't want all the objects deleted, first un-select those you don't want to lose. If you get a message "no objects found", then move on to the next method. For those objects that can't be selected For those that know how to create a macro, here's the macro...

I frequently copy formulas from one months data to the next, but I run into trouble when I want to get a total off the last row, when the last row is different each month. I discovered a formula that will read the last value (before blanks) in a range. Enter the formula =INDEX($E$1:$E$5100,LARGE(IF($E$1:$E$5100<>"",ROW($E$1:$E$5100)),1),1) Press Ctrl-Shft-Enter The key here is you must use Ctrl-Shft-Enter. It will insert curly brackets, which wont work if you manually enter them. The curly brackets are needed as this is an array formula. See Introducing array formulas in Excel from Microsoft or search for other websites for further information.

Sometimes we want programs to automatically start for us when we start our computer. For Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, it takes just a few steps. Open System Preferences . Look in the System section and select Accounts . Select Login Items . You will see a list of applications already set to start when you start your Mac computer. Find the + and - boxes below the list and select + . Navigate to the application you want to start when you start your Mac computer, and select it. Select the Add button. Repeat for additional applications, and close the Accounts window when you're done.

In Windows XP it was fairly easy to add a link to the right-click menu in Explorer, so when clicked it would open the Command Prompt at that location . I posted a how-to in April 2008 on how to accomplish this. With the release of Windows Vista and Windows 7, the Tools >> Folder Options is no longer available, so the task required a new solution. I've identified 3 possible alternatives: All 3 options in use Hold the Shift-key while right-clicking. This is built-in behavior. Update the Registery. Open the Registry by entering "regedit" at the Run prompt. Navigate to the following key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell. Create a new key called "Command Prompt." For the default value, add the right-click menu name, such as "Open Command Prompt Here." Navigate down to your new "Command Prompt" key (HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell\CommandPrompt). Create another new key called "Command." For the default value, add ...

Want to use Outlook to access 2 or more email accounts? By adding additional Profiles to Outlook, you can avoid multiple email clients. The upside is that you can share your archive folders across your accounts. The downside is that you can only manage one account at a time. To add a new Profile, follow these simple steps: Open Control Panel Click Mail Click the Show Profiles button Click the Add button Provide a Profile Name Complete the Account Setup Wizard  Once created, you can select to be prompted for the Profile you want to open when starting Outlook or you can have it always open a specified Profile. Once you have more than one Profile, you can force Outlook to open to a specific Profile by configuring Shortcuts for each. Create a copy of your existing Outlook Shortcut Right-click the new Shortcut and select Properties On the Shortcut tab, go to the Target text box At the end of the line (after the ending quote), add the following on the same line: space...

Do you find yourself having to send the same message over and over again? With Outlook Templates you can save yourself from having to recreate the same message. Further, it can help to make sure your messages are consistent. It's actually quite easy to do. Create the Template Start with a new blank message. Write the message. Add a subject. (optional) Add recipients if you like. (optional) Select Office Button >> Save As... Change the Save as Type to Outlook Template (*.oft). Name the file and click Save. Use the Template Go to Tools >> Forms >> Choose Form... From the Look In drop-down, select User Templates in File System. Select your template and click Open. Make any last minute changes, add/remove recipients and Send.

Trouble getting the digital signature in a PDF to print? The solution is actually simpler than you might think. With your document open in Adobe Acrobat Reader, click File >> Print. When the Print dialog box opens, look for the "Comments and Forms:" drop-down below the Properties button, located in the upper-right. Click the drop-down and select "Document and Markups." Now print. That's all there is to it.

Having a few different VMs, but unable to edit them due to not having VMware Workstation can be a hassle. But if you understand the configuration file, *.vmx, and the available options you can actually change up quite a few things. The latest for me was adding a shared folder, so i could get some files from the Host to the VM. Even though I'm using Windows, the Ubuntus Sharing blog had an article the helped me. With the following lines, I shared the C and E drives, with E being Read Only. isolation.tools.hgfs.disable = "FALSE" sharedFolder.maxNum = "2" sharedFolder0.present = "TRUE" sharedFolder0.enabled = "TRUE" sharedFolder0.readAccess = "TRUE" sharedFolder0.writeAccess = "TRUE" sharedFolder0.hostPath = "C:\" sharedFolder0.guestName = "C" sharedFolder0.expiration = "never" sharedFolder1.present = "TRUE" sharedFolder1.enabled = "TRUE" sharedFolder1.re...

I recently downloaded 5 VMs from a cloud service my company is using, and 4 of them couldn't create a network connection. I discovered that the 4 that failed had named network connections for their network adapters, and that it required VMware Workstation to change (which I didn't have). Through some research and help from others I discovered that additional network adapters could be added to an existing VM by editing its *.vmx file with a text editor such as Notepad. As noted in Step 2 of Jesin's Blog post, " Adding Custom Network Adapter in VMware Player ", you can added a few lines to the end of the file to add the new network adapter. I didn't follow Step 1, which is defining another network card on the Host, I just modified the file to use the existing network card. The key is to reference the next available network card in the VM and the network card reference in your Host. I did use the VMware Network Editor (vmnetcfg.exe), which came with the VM...

In Outlook 2003 you needed to go to Tools | Options >> Other >> Advanced Options >> Add-In Manager... and COM Add-ins...; Close and Re-open Outlook to remove various Add-ins. Unfortunately if you try that in Outlook 2007 you wont find the same choices. In Outlook 2007 go to Tools | Trust Center... >> Add-ins and you can see what Add-ins are installed, and of those which are active and which are inactive. Select COM Add-ins in the Manage drop-down and click Go.... The COM Add-Ins screen will pop-up. Uncheck the Add-Ins you want to disable (check those you want to enable). When you are completed, click OK. Close and Re-open Outlook for the changes to take affect. Once you're satisfied that by disabling your Add-in, there was no negative effect, you can return to delete the Add-ins. Go back to Tools | Trust Center... >> Add-ins >> COM Add-ins (Go...). From the Comm Add-Ins screen, select the Add-in you want to delete and click the Remove butt...

With the release of Windows 7, there are new keyboard shortcuts to learn (as I'm sure some actually came in Vista). One day I'll duplicate the shortcuts cheatsheet I had created for Windows XP , but in the mean time, here are a couple that I've started using. Toggle through open windows Most of us are familiar with Alt-Tab to toggle through your open windows, and Alt-Shift-Tab to toggle in reverse order. Some of us used an add-on to XP to display a thumbnail of the window as you toggle. With the familiar Alt-Tab in Windows 7 you now see thumbnails without the add-on. But if you want to see a bit more detail of what's contained within each window, try Windows key-Tab and Windows key-Shift-Tab to get a better view of the windows as you toggle through them. Set window position Using the Windows key with the arrow buttons allows you to position the active window on the screen. This works great when you want to view two windows simultaneously. Click on the window you want...

I had a recent issue with my Chumby, and I couldn't get it back on the network. It took me two steps to get it working again: resetting the Chumby and then manually reconfiguring the network information. Here's how to do a Chumby One Reset: Power off (disconnect power). Press and hold the touch-screen with your finger. A message appears, telling you to continue to hold if you want to get to the Special Options. Continue to hold -- it takes a while. When you finally reach Special Options, release your finger. Select Restore Factory Settings. Confirm OK.

I recently got a new Windows 7 machine, and when I tried to use Recent Items, there was nothing listed. Worse, when I went to configure it... it was set at 0, it was greyed out and I could make any changes. As it turns out, there's any easy fix for this. Go to the Properties dialog: Click Start | Right-click and select Properties Go to the Start Menu tab Click the two check boxes within the Privacy section (items and programs) Click Apply Click the Customize button At the bottom of the dialog you can now adjust the number of items to display as well as the recent programs.

In IE 9, the Menu and Status Bars are missing. In most cases, you can hit Alt and the Menu Bar displays. From here under the View Menu you can enable the Status Bar. In some cases, you may have an Add-On that intercepts the Alt key, so you have no access to the Menu Bar. If you can identify and disable the Add-On, then you can once again access the Menu Bar when necessary. For some of us, we either do not want to disable our Add-On and/or we want the Menu Bar to always to display. With a few Registry entries, you can do just that. Launch Regedit (Run: regedit) Find the following key:" HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft" Right-click Microsoft and create a new Key Name the new Key "Internet Explorer" Right-click your new Key (Internet Explorer) and create a new Key Name this new Key "Main" Right-click the "Main" key and create a new DWORD Name the new DWORD "AlwaysShowMenus" Set the value of the new DWORD (AlwaysShowMenus) to 1...

Back in Windows XP, I found it easy to recover a window that the Title Bar was off the screen. When this occurred in Windows 7, I was surprised to find the same trick didn't work (right-click the icon in the Task bar, select Move, and use the arrow keys to grab and move the window). In Windows 7, it's not difficult, just different. Select the program in the Task Bar. Hold the Windows key and press an arrow key. Repeat the arrow key movement as necessary. The Windows key + arrow key offers other interesting options even with fully visible windows. Try Windows key + right or left arrow to get the window to take 1/2 of the screen. Use Windows key + up or down arrow to maximize or minimize, respectively, the window.