Anchored Objects in InDesign

Q: In my InDesign document, I have a picture or text box in the middle of my body text with a text wrap around the object. But when I adjust the body text (e.g., font size, body text position), the picture or text box is no longer next to the original sentences in the body text (i.e. the object is out of sync with the body text). How can I fix that?

A: You need to make the picture or text box an anchored object.

• Select the picture or text box with the selection tool
• Cut the object (Ctrl + X)
• Choose the type tool from the tools on the left
• Place the cursor in the body text where you would like the object to be anchored to (i.e. when that part of the body text moves, the object will move with it)
• Paste the object into the body text (Ctrl + V)

You are now free to manipulate the object (re-size and reposition) as you like, but now when the body text moves, the object will move with it!

Sign up for one of our classes to learn more about working with graphics in InDesign! Click here to register.

Alt + what?! You will love this shortcut

Quickly look up definitions and articles in Office 2007

This is awesome! Okay, so you are reading a document in Word, or you are making a PowerPoint presentation, and you come a cross a word you are not familiar with. Or maybe, while reviewing some Art History class notes you took in OneNote you come across a word that you need a little more information on, like Neoplasticism (see picture).
Okay, so you could go through the long tedious task of opening dictionary.com, or wikipedia, and attempting to retype the word Neoplasticism. Or, even worse, you could get an actual dictionary or encyclopedia, but I don't want to and neither do you!

So, here we go, hold down Alt on the keyboard and Click the word you want to look up!

The Research task pane opens in Office 2007 and gives you definitions, translations, synonyms, and articles from Encarta online (Microsoft's online encyclopedia). Take a look below for what I got when I Alt+Clicked "Neoplasticism."

Now go try it. Open your most commonly used Office Program, type in a word, hold down ALT on you keyboard, and then CLICK on the word. After you experience it, click here to sign up for our Office 2007 classes or our Computer Basics class. You will learn more great time-saving shortcuts.

Online Suvey: How do you feel about online surveys?

What is Qualtrics?

Whether you are a department trying to meet the needs of students, or a student doing research for a psychology project, Qualtrics can make your life easier. Surveys are a simple and efficient option for getting information and opinions from people. With Qualtrics, surveys are made even easier because you can take care of everything online.

Qualtrics is web-based survey software that allows you to make custom surveys using any type of question you can come up with, including matching, ranking, drill down, likert, hotspots and constant sum questions. It then walks you through simple distribution and tallies your results. You can then have it generate tables and graphs of your data, and even run cross tabulations

BYU has received a multi-year grant from qualtrics, which means that if you are a BYU employee or student you can get a free online account. Once you have an account you can access it from any computer. If you want to learn how to use Qualtrics (or even just learn what all those question types do) sign up for our new Qualtrics class.

What-If Analysis - Goal Seek

What if you are trying to reach a specified result for a formula, but you do not know what the input value for one of the variables should be? Use Goal Seek to find the input value of the variable.

Example: You are trying to project net income for your business. You have projected sales revenue and expenses, but you would like to see if you can cut costs somewhere to increase net income (see income statement below).

What would administration expenses have to be cut down to in order to have net income of $100,000?

Use Goal Seek:

• On the Data tab, select What-If Analysis and then Goal Seek...
• Set cell: $C$7
  (we want to make net income our fixed result)
• To value: 100000
  (the fixed result value)
• By changing cell: $B$4
  (the unknown variable)
• OK

Excel now plugs different numbers into cell B3 (Admin. Expenses) until C6 (net income) equals $100,000.

In order for this to work, the set cell and changing cell have to be linked either directly or indirectly through formulas or functions. In this example, Total Expenses is the sum of the three expenses/costs, and Net Income is the difference between Sales Revenue and Total Expenses. Also, Goal Seek only works when you are trying to find the input value of one variable.

Sign up for our free Excel class on data analysis to learn more about Goal Seek and other awesome tools! Click here to register.