The Research Task Pane

The newest Office task pane is the Research task pane. The Research task pane provides a tool that can be used to access all sorts of information related to a selection in a Word document, Excel worksheet, or PowerPoint Presentation. These tools can be standard tools such as the Thesaurus and can also consist of specialized data sources created to find specific kinds of information. For example, Figure 3.3 shows the results of a Research task pane search for the term "Microsoft." The results provide company information including employee numbers and yearly revenue.

Figure 3.3. The Research task pane can be used to find a variety of information from any Office application.

To use the Research task pane, follow these steps:

1. From an Office application window, select the term or phrase that will be used in the Research task pane search.

2. Select the View menu and then select Task Pane to open the task pane.

3. Select the task pane drop-down arrow and select Research. The Research task pane will open.

4. Your selected term or phrase will appear in the Search For box.

5. Click the Services drop-down list and select the research services you want to use for the search. You can select All Research Sites, Factiva News Search, All Business and Financial Sites , and a number of other resource services.

6. After selecting the service or services, the search will be performed. A list of found information will appear in the task pane.

7. To switch from the initial source to the next source (found in the search), click Next .

8. To expand any of the found information, click the plus symbol next to a source heading.

If you want to conduct another search, type the keyword or phrase in the Search For box and then click the green Search arrow . Results are returned in the task pane. When you have finished working with the Research task pane, click the Close button to close it.