Word Processing – Disable Auto Bulleted And Or Numbered Lists

Word automatically formating bulleted and numbered lists, is very aggravating to me. I turn this function off for that reason.

The following instructions will show you how to turn this off. Of course, if you want to put up with this in the future, just reverse the process:

  • Select AutoCorrect Options from the Tools menu.
  • Click the AutoFormat As You Type tab.
  • Deselect Automatic bulleted lists.
  • Deselect Automatic numbered lists.
  • Click OK.

There are ways to get rid of the automatically bulleted or numbered lists, but I prefer to turn them off all together, rather than having to stop writing to fix the problem.

To turn this function off in OpenOffice the instructions are similar, but not entirely the same:

  • Select AutoCorrect from the drop down Tools menu.
  • Select the Options Tab.
  • Uncheck Apply numbering – symbol:
  • Click OK.

OpenOffice does not give you the option to have one or the other functioning, both bulleted and numbering is either on or off.

This will be one of the topics of tonight’s BPCA Word Processing SIG (Special Interest Group) session.

Internet – Firefox Multiple Home Pages

Would you like to have more than one home page automatically open when you start Firefox? Here is one way to do so:

  • Open the pages you want to see in separate tabs.
  • Go to the Tools menu.
  • Select Options.
  • Click on “Use Current Pages”, in the Home Page of the General Tab.
  • Click on OK.

I use this to show tabs with a blank page, the Broward Personal Computer Association home page, and the Boca Raton Computer Society, each time I open my Portable Firefox on my thumb drive  That way I can see if there is any updated information for the user group pages and have a blank tab for anything else I want to check on.

See my July 17, 2006 post Open Browser To A Blank Page for how to set your browser to open to a blank page and the reasons I like to do that.

XP – Lost Window?

For some reason, known only to the computer gods, every once in a while a window disappears. This tip should get it back for you.

  • Hold down the Alt key and keep tapping the Tab key until you get to the icon of the program you want.
  • Hit the Alt key and the Spacebar at the same time.
  • Press the M key and use the arrow keys to position the window to the right place and the Esc key when it is where you want.
  • Drag on the window edges to resize it as you like. (Caution: Do not use the Maximize button for this.)

Now the next time you open the window it should work correctly.

Actually, there are no computer gods of course, at least to my knowledge, somehow or other we must have inadvertently dragged the window beyond the accessible area of the screen. This doesn’t happen often thankfully but can be really frustrating when it does happen.

I have only used this myself in both XP Home and XP Pro but, I believe it works the same in older versions also.