What Is Word Designed to Do?

Word's fundamental mission is simple: to help you type, revise , and format text. To this end, it offers a complete set of tools that enable you to create just about any type of document imaginable. You can produce anything from basic letters and memos to complex documents such as reports , papers, newsletters, brochures , r sum s, mass mailings , envelopes, and mailing labels. You can even compose e-mail messages and design Web pages in Word.

Each person who uses Word needs a slightly different combination of features. If you're an administrative assistant, you may need to use Word's mail merge feature to generate mass mailings. If you're a student, you'll want to learn about footnotes and endnotes for your term papers. If you're a marketing executive, you may want to use the table feature to present information in charts . Depending on the documents you create, you'll use some parts of Word constantly, and others you will never venture into. This is to be expected. Learn the areas of Word that you need, and don't feel compelled to explore every nook and cranny.

Word is part of Microsoft Office, a suite of business applications. The other key players in Office are Excel, a spreadsheet program, and PowerPoint, a presentation program. Depending on the edition of Office you have, you may also have a database program called Access, a personal information manager (PIM) and e-mail application called Outlook, and possibly a few others. All the Office applications have a similar look, and they are tightly integrated to let you use them in combination with one another (see Hour 20, "Integrating with Other Office Products").