An overview of the interface features

In this overview, you will learn about the elements of the interface and be able to recognize some new features that have been incorporated into the latest update of the desktop versions of Word, PowerPoint, and Excel 2019.

This topic will focus on all three aforementioned applications. The reason for this is that most of their interface features and explanations are identical. Let's browse through the environment and learn about the different elements that make up Office 2019 applications.

The title bar

The title bar area is located at the very top of each program launched on the Windows environment. This bar displays the name of the file you currently have open. Normally, when you launch Microsoft Word, the blank page displayed is titled Document1. This means that you have not yet saved any elements that have been added to the document.

In the following screenshot, Document7 is printed in the title area as this is the seventh blank document that I have opened (this is the same as using the seventh piece of paper from a notebook):

You need to save the current document to keep its changes. The title bar also houses the Quick Access Toolbar (QAT) and the program manipulation icons to the right of it.

The QAT

To the left of the title bar, you will find the QAT. This toolbar contains, by default, the save, undo, and redo icons. You can easily add frequently used icons to the QAT by clicking on the small arrow icon that is always present at the rightmost end of the QAT, as shown:

Icons that already display a checkmark next to them indicate that the icon is already an option on the QAT. You simply have to click on the name of the shortcut that you want to add to the QAT.

You can select the More Commands… option, which opens a dialog box that allows you to search for any additional icons from the comprehensive list of Office 2019 commands. The Show Below the Ribbon option is used to change the location of the QAT to display it below the ribbon (just above the ruler bar).

Using tabs and groups

The tabs are a list of words that you can use to access the program functions. They are located just underneath the title bar and span the Office 2019 environment from left to right. These are similar to the file divider tabs that you would use in an office. There are quicker ways to complete simple tasks, either by right-clicking your mouse button or using shortcut keys, but you will always find more comprehensive options when using the tabs.

Simply click on a tab with your mouse pointer to make it active, then use the icons it offers. Familiarize yourself with the contents of each of the tabs. Knowing exactly where to go to perform a certain action in the program is of the utmost importance when taking any certification exam:

Double-clicking on a tab will collapse the groups underneath it. Simply double-click on the tab to return the groups.

You will find that when selecting a tab with a mouse click, various groups are defined on the ribbon via light separation lines that define boxes around groups of icons:

Most of the group sets in Office 2019 present a show dialog box arrow, where you can access more options relating to a group of related icons. For instance, to access the Page Setup dialog box within any of the Microsoft Office applications, click on the arrow, as shown:

In the next section, we will look at how to access ribbon commands if your mouse stops working or you prefer using the keyboard.

Using shortcut keys to access the ribbon

Pressing the Alt key on your keyboard grants you access to the shortcut keys available for each of the tabs. If you look at the tab shortcuts available (see the following screenshot), you will see that the Insert tab shows N as the shortcut key:

If you press the N key on your keyboard, further shortcut keys will present themselves for each of the options available under that specific ribbon:

Using these shortcuts allows you to quickly access the various tabs and options without using the mouse.

Accessing the rulers

We use the ruler bars (vertical and horizontal) in Word 2019 to measure and set the distance between tabs, margins, the page layout, and the header and footer distances. You can adjust these settings using the mouse pointer or the relevant dialog box settings. Rulers can also be accessed on PowerPoint slides when you are working with bullet-pointed or numbered lists.

To remove or display the ruler bar, click on the View tab and then check or uncheck the checkmark option next to Ruler:

Minimizing the ribbon

To allow more space to work with documents, simply fold away or minimize the ribbon. This can be achieved in more than one way:

• Use the Collapse the Ribbon option (the tiny upward-facing arrow) to the right of the ribbon to hide everything on the ribbon except the tabs. If you click on a tab, it will unfold the ribbon options for that particular tab:

After selecting the desired options from the tab, take your focus back to the document by clicking back on the document. The ribbon will fold away again.

• To display the ribbon permanently, click on the ribbon display options icon to the left of the minimize icon on the title bar:

This drop-down list also allows you to auto-hide the ribbon and to only show the tabs. Alternatively, you can click on any tab to select it and then double-click on the tab heading to hide the ribbon; then, double-click on the tab heading again to un-hide the ribbon. The ribbon display options icon provides another method of auto-hiding the ribbon and showing the tabs and commands.

Adding items to the status bar

The status bar is located at the bottom of the Office 2019 environment. It displays information about the current file you are working on and provides quick access to some tasks. Right-clicking on the status bar provides you with a shortcut menu to make changes to it. You can add or remove items from the status bar:

A tick to the left of an option identifies that it is already active. When we say active throughout this book, we mean already selected, visible, or selected. To add or remove an item from the status bar, simply click on the desired option in the shortcut menu:

Average, Count, and Sum are the default functions that reside on the status bar. They provide a result when selecting values on a worksheet in Excel 2019. To change how these values are calculated, right-click on them and select another function to perform. If you highlight a range of numerical values on a worksheet, Excel will display the count, sum, and average of those values on the status bar.

Using the help facility

Office 2019's help function can be accessed by pressing the F1 keyboard key, which opens the Help pane to the right of the worksheet. You are able to select a topic of interest from the list provided, which offers further sub-topics until you find what you are looking for. Alternatively, you can search for a topic using the Tell me what you want to do feature located along the top of the ribbon at the end of the list of tabs:

1. Simply click to the right of the light bulb icon, located to the left of the empty placeholder (see the following screenshot).

2. Start typing a question and the feature will offer suggestions as you type:

3. Click to select a topic from the drop-down list to obtain the help topic you require.

Now that we have learned how to navigate the user interface, let's learn how to create documents in the next section.