Geetesh Bajaj

When working with multiple objects above the text layer of an Office 2011 for Mac document, spreadsheet, or presentation, sometimes you may want to combine (group) several objects into a single object that you can move, order, and format together as a unit. Position and order all the objects you want to include in the group.

Inserting symbols and unusual characters to your document is easy with Office 2011 for Mac. Symbols for foreign languages, math and science, currency, and so on, are quickly accessible in Office 2011 for Mac. Just position your insertion cursor (the blinking vertical bar) where you want the symbol inserted in your document and then use one of the following tools to browse the symbols in your Mac's font collections: The Symbols tab of the Media browser is a quick, easy way to get at the most popular symbols.

The old-fashioned idea of a basic tab stop is that when you press the Tab key, the cursor jumps to the next tab stop that’s set on the ruler and then you start typing. In Office 2011 for Mac, this kind of tab stop is the left tab stop. These days, tabs do a lot more than just act as a position to stop the cursor.

The Notebook Layout view in Word for Mac 2011 for Mac has so many uses. Notebook Layout View is great for students who jot notes, office workers who attend meetings, assistants who track tasks, and professionals who need to record meetings with clients. Notebook Layout has its own special tabs on the Ribbon: Home, Appearance, and Audio Notes, which we discuss next.

With Office 2011 for Mac, you can check spelling and grammar in languages other than English. Word 2011 for Mac comes with foreign-language dictionaries such as Czech, French, Russian, and more. The default dictionary determines which language’s proofing tools Word uses for spelling and grammar. You can change Word’s default language dictionary: Choose Tools→Language.

You can easily add all sorts of objects to a Word document in Office 2011 for Mac. Word 2011 gives you shortcuts to position an object in your document. Here's how to get at them: Select an object. On the Ribbon’s Format tab, go to the Arrange group and click the Position button. Choose a position from the gallery.

With Office 2011 for Mac, your guide to mail merging in Word is Mail Merge Manager. You can invoke Mail Merge Manager by choosing Tools→Mail Merge Manager from the menu bar. It’s designed to be used starting at the top in Step 1, and you work your way down to Step 6. The steps in the Mail Merge Manager are as follows: Select a Document Type.

You can use an Excel workbook as your Word 2011 mail merge data source in Office 2011 for Mac. Get ready by preparing an Excel workbook with a data range or table that’s set up as a mailing list and a new, blank document in Word. To make labels from Excel or another database, take the following steps: In the Mail Merge Manager, click Select Document Type and then choose Create New→Labels.

From pictures and graphs to SmartArt, you can easily add all sorts of objects to a Word document in Office 2011 for Mac. But after the object is inserted in your Word document, you’ll probably need to control how text wraps around it. You can adjust text wrapping in Print Layout, Notebook Layout, Publishing Layout, and Full Screen views.