Video: A closer look at the ribbon

Take a tour of the ribbon and learn where all your favorite buttons, menus, and commands are.

Let’s start by looking at the commands on the ribbon more closely.

We have already covered the HOME tab.

These are the ribbon commands you will probably use most often as you work on a document.

Commands for copying, pasting, the Format Painter.

Here are the commands for formatting the Font and Paragraph.

For example, Line spacing, and again notice that you can hold the mouse pointer over an option to see a preview.

The INSERT tab has just about everything you’ll want to insert in your document, such as WordArt, Pictures, and a Cover Page.

Let’s insert a Table.

You can use one of these commands; choose a Quick Table, which is similar to Table AutoFormat in Word 2003; or you can drag the mouse over this grid.

And when we do, the TABLE TOOLS DESIGN and LAYOUT tabs appear on the ribbon.

On the LAYOUT tab, you can add or delete rows or columns, or convert a table to text.

On the DESIGN tab, you can change the look of the table.

Check out the Table Styles gallery.

Hold the mouse over a thumbnail to see an instant preview.

When you click outside the table, you’ll notice that the TABLE TOOLS tabs go away.

And they come back again, when you click inside.

Special tabs like these will also appear when you work with other insertable elements, like Pictures, Shapes, Charts, Headers, and Footers. Let’s add a simple Page Number to the Bottom of Page that looks like this.

Come up to the HEADER AND FOOTER TOOLS DESIGN tab and click Close Header and Footer to go back to the document.

The DESIGN tab has commands for working with the overall look of your documents.

With Themes, you can quickly give your document a professional look by formatting your fonts and colors with one click.

The DESIGN tab is also where you go to add a Watermark.

The PAGE LAYOUT tab is for changing Page Setup options like Margins, Orientation, Size, and Columns.

Here’s where you can add or remove Spacing After a paragraph.

The REFERENCES tab has commands for adding Captions, Footnotes, and a Table of contents.

Let’s add one to this blank page, I inserted at the beginning of the document.

How about one of these Automatic Tables?

Word creates a Table of Contents automatically based on your Heading Styles.

The MAILINGS tab is all about commands for Envelopes and Mail merge.

This dialog box might look familiar.

On the REVIEW tab, you can access the Spellchecker and Word count. You can also Track Changes and add comments.

Finally, the VIEW tab has commands for changing how you view a document in Word.

You can change views over here.

You may also want to add the Ruler so you can adjust your tab stops.

After you have finished writing and formatting your document, and inserting your pictures, captions, videos, and tables, it’s time to save and export, or share the documents.