Business computing

1. Business computing Session 2 22nd October 2003

2. The MS Office suite softwares • The word processor : « Word » • The spread sheet : « Excel » • The presentation software : « PowerPoint » • The database : « Access » • The web page editor : « FrontPage »

3. Web pages vs Word pages • Web pages are prepared using a language called HTML (Hyper Text Mark-up Language, invented in 1989, by Tim Berners-Lee) • They adapt their display to the size of the window • Word pages do not adapt to the window

4. The right way to write a document • A document is organised in paragraphs • Each paragraph should start with a first punchy sentence. The rest of the paragraph are sentences illustrating the 1st one. • The last sentence introduces the next paragraph (but is not the punchy sentence of the following paragraph).

5. Well written books • Well written books apply this rule : each paragraph contains only one idea, expressed in a punchy way in its first sentence. • Consequence : well written books can be « read » in two hours : read only the 1st sentence of each paragraph. • Prepare your ESCEM papers this way!

6. The accompanying Website • All AC’s courses are found at • http://www.lapasserelle.com/escem/notre_dame.html • With all the Office softwares, when we type a web address it automatically becomes a « clickable link »

7. The Great Wall is a tourist attraction

8. How to get a picture of the Great Wall ? • Use the Web « search engine » called Google • Address : http://www.google.com • Google will search within 425 million images

9. The Futuroscope is a modernistic set of buildings Find an image to put here

10. All Office softwares have the same structure • All office softwares have similar « toolbars » (with the exception of Access) • The main toolbars, Menu, Standard, Formatting are very similar across Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and FrontPage

11. What is Shift + F1 for ? • Shift + F1 is designed to give us Help • It transforms our pointer into a Question mark • Then click with the « question mark » onto the icon we want to understand and we get a little explanation

12. The companion • For extensive help we can ask the « companion » : • Click on the question mark of the menu bar • A companion appears, and a window where we write our question • The companion is better than a textbook • It is very complete, up to date • It proposes explanations close to our problem

13. The web dictionary • The site http://www.dictionary.com offers a great online dictionary and thesaurus • Plus pronunciation • A thesaurus is a book listing « words close to the one we entered »

14. A standard business letter • Your name (or your firm’s name) and address, and logo in the top left corner of the letter • The name of the addressee below shifted to the right • The main body of the letter • Signature

15. The importance of well presented business letters • A business letter is often the first image of yourself you give • And, as you know, the first image is often the one that remains

16. The importance of well presented business letters (2) • A business letter is often the first image of yourself you give • And, as you know, the first image is often the one that remains

17. We shall prepare a picture of the word « Our Firm » How do we do this ? Use a drawing software : Paint is the simplest one Paint Shop Pro Adobe softwares Logos are subtle signs. Firms spend a lot of money to get a good logo. Let’s prepare a logo

18. We use tabulations or (better) indentations How to move a text to the right ?

19. A first mail merge • In the menubar select tools and select display the mailmerge toolbar • Then prepare a database of names and addresses (we did that with Excel) • Then prepare the model letter with fields like « surname », « firstname » etc. • Then merge • And print • This creates in minutes 150 personalised letters

20. Word models • Word offers plenty of prepared letters along various models • We don’t have to create new letters from scratch