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A couple of months ago we received our copy of Office 2010, so it must be about time we start blogging about it!  Sparklines is a new Excel feature which we’ve been impressed with. Basically they’re miniature charts that fit into a single Excel cell to allow the user to view individual trends at a glance.  A feature such as this is ideal when managing money, e.g. to assess how expenditure for different items has varied over a year.

Here’s how to create Sparklines:

1. Click on the ‘Insert’ tab and locate the ‘Sparklines’ box
   
2. Next you must select the type of Sparkline you wish to use by clicking on either Line, Column or Win/Loss
3. Finally in the ‘Create Sparklines Box’ you need to select your data range and location range
   

A neat feature I’m sure you’ll all agree

Today we have a few simple but very nice features of Windows 7, starting with the show desktop…where is it…it is no longer part of the QuickLaunch that people are used to but now instead it is on the far right of the taskbar where there is a small rectangle…click this and it takes you to the desktop, or alternatively hover over it and it shows you the desktop until you move away and then it takes you back to the program you were using.  Very nice touch!

Wireless Networks – In Vista I always found the connect to a network icon down by the clock a bit annoying, sometimes it would bring things straight up, other times it wouldn’t.  In Windows 7 you click it and immediately get a list of available networks along with the one you may be connected to.  From here you can easily connect to another one.  Nothing revolutionary, just something that worked made to work better!

Icons – Again this nice and simple touch is related to the task bar, the little icons that appear you install so many applications these days are now grouped in one area.  All you have to do to view them is click the arrow and a box appears with them in, see the image on the right to see what I mean.

Tile Windows – If you’re anything like me then you will often want to have two windows open at one time and be able to see some or all of them.  Commonly I use this for transferring files from one folder to another.  Arranging the windows like shown in the picture below can take time and if you are not used to using the mouse to do this it could be a fiddly process.  Now all you do is drag the windows to the left and then the right respectively and they align themselves as shown in that picture..nice and easy!

And on a similar note, if you drag a window that is not fully maximised to the top of the screen and let go…it maximises it!

Windows 7 really has been designed to make mundane tasks so much easier, it’s great!

See Also:

Windows 7 Beta – First Glance