Using OneNote s Research Library Pane


Using OneNote's Research Library Pane

Office 2003 introduced a new feature, Research. Users can open the Research pane from all Office applications and search for information on any topic from a variety of free and paid sites. This can be particularly helpful for those using OneNote for college classes, or work research projects.

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You can also launch the Research pane by right-clicking on a word on your page and choosing Look Up.


To launch the Research pane, select Research from the Tools menu. The Research pane is displayed in Figure 18.7.

Figure 18.7. The Research pane allows you to search free and paid sites.

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If you opened the Research task pane with a word highlighted on your page, or by right-clicking a word and choosing Look Up, your search term is already in the Search for box. If it isn't, to start your research, enter the topic in the Search for box and click the green arrow. Your results are displayed within the Research pane, as shown in Figure 18.8.

Figure 18.8. The Research pane displays search results from a variety of locations.

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There are a number of free sites that are searched automatically. They include Encarta dictionary, thesaurus, and translation services.

Searching Free Online Sites

The only sites searched initially are the free online sites. For example, in Figure 18.8, searching for the phrase tabby cat displays a number of entries for tabby. The first entry is a definition for tabby that includes a pronunciation. Clicking the pronunciation opens the Encarta pronunciation key. To return to your search results, click the Back button.

You can use the plus and minus buttons next to various components of your search results to expand and collapse the results for easy readability.

Translation

If you need to translate a word or phrase into another language, you can do that within the Research pane as well. Just enter the word or phrase in the Research pane, use the drop-down immediately below the Search for dialog, and select Translation. Click the green arrow to display your results. If a match is found in the translation service, it's displayed in the Translation section of the Research pane as seen in Figure 18.9.

Figure 18.9. You can translate words or phrases into other languages.

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The default translation is from English to French. You can change both the originating and ending languages by using the drop-downs. As you change one or the other, your results change as well.

You can change a few options for the translation service by clicking on the Translation options hyperlink in the Research pane to display Figure 18.10.

Figure 18.10. You can choose the available languages for your translation.

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You can choose from 16 different translation options. When you've finished making changes to your translation options, click OK to exit the dialog box.

Encarta Encyclopedia

If you don't find what you need in the Encarta dictionary, you can search the Encarta Encyclopedia. You'll need to choose Encarta Encyclopedia from the drop-down box in order to utilize it. When you do, your search results change, as shown in Figure 18.11.

Figure 18.11. The Encarta Encyclopedia can help with your research.

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The Research pane only displays a small amount of the information available from the Encarta Encyclopedia. You can display more information by clicking on one of the topics displayed in blue in the Research pane. For example, clicking on II. Origin of Species in the Research pane opens the Web page displayed in Figure 18.12.

Figure 18.12. You can display in depth research in your Web browser.

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You can choose any of the research options available in the drop-down. Each will likely show you slightly different information. Experiment to find the research site that works best for you.

Adding More Research Sites

If the currently available research sites don't meet your needs, you can add other research sites by following these steps:

  1. Click Research Options to display the dialog shown in Figure 18.13.

    Figure 18.13. You can add more research services to OneNote.

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  2. Scroll through the list of available research services and check the boxes next to the ones you want to add.

  3. If you don't see the service you're interested in, click Add Services. You can choose from a list of advertised services or type in the address of a service. There are a number of currently available services, and more are added all the time. It's quite possible that more subscription services will appear in the future. These services may require you to pay a monthly or yearly subscription fee.

  4. When you've added your custom service address, click the Add button to add the service to the main Research Options dialog box.

  5. Click OK to save your changes.

The Absolute Minimum

Once you amass a significant amount of information in OneNote, it can be difficult to quickly find information by scanning pages. In this chapter, you learned how to search for information within OneNote. One of OneNote's strengths is its ability to search through a variety of information stored in a variety of locations. You learned

  • How to search typed and handwritten notes

  • How to search notes on a SharePoint site

  • How to use Office 2003's new Research capabilities to find additional information on a topic

  • How to add and change Research sites

In the next chapter, you'll learn how to personalize OneNote to meet your needs.




Absolute Beginner's Guide to Microsoft Office OneNote 2003
Absolute Beginners Guide to Microsoft Office OneNote 2003
ISBN: 0789731487
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2003
Pages: 182

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