Editing (Grade 11 NSC Matric Computer Application Technology): Revision Notes

Editing

When working with documents in Microsoft Word, editing tools help you modify and manipulate content efficiently. Two essential editing functions are Paste Special and Find and Replace, which give you greater control over how you work with text and graphics.

Paste special

Paste Special is a powerful feature that gives you different options for how content appears when you paste it into your document. Instead of just using the regular paste function, Paste Special allows you to choose exactly how you want the copied content to be inserted.

Accessing paste special

To use Paste Special in Microsoft Word, you need to first copy some text or graphics from another source. Once you have content in your clipboard, you can access Paste Special by clicking the drop-down arrow under the Paste button in the Home ribbon.

The Paste Special option will appear in the dropdown menu, giving you access to more advanced pasting choices.

Paste special options for text

When you're pasting text content, Paste Special provides several formatting options to choose from. These options determine how the text will appear in your document and whether it keeps its original formatting or adopts the formatting of your current document.

The text paste options typically include:

• Keep source formatting - maintains the original appearance of the copied text
• Match destination formatting - changes the text to match your document's current style
• Keep text only - removes all formatting and pastes plain text
• HTML format - preserves web-based formatting if copying from online sources

Paste special options for graphics

When working with images and graphics, Paste Special offers different format choices that affect how the image is stored and displayed in your document.

The graphics paste options include various image formats such as:

• Picture formats - different image file types like JPEG, PNG, or GIF
• Enhanced metafile - a scalable vector format
• Bitmap - a standard image format
• Device independent bitmap - a universal image format

Choosing the right format depends on how you plan to use the image and what quality you need.

Find and replace

The Find and Replace function is an incredibly useful tool that helps you quickly locate specific words or phrases in your document and replace them with different text. This saves enormous amounts of time when you need to make consistent changes throughout a long document.

Accessing find and replace

You can access the Find and Replace function in two ways:

• Click on Replace in the Home ribbon
• Use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+H (a quick way to remember this is "H" for "Hunt and replace")

Using the find and replace dialogue

The Find and Replace dialogue box has two main sections:

• Find what - where you type the text you're looking for
• Replace with - where you type the text that should replace what you found

After entering both pieces of information, you can choose to replace instances one at a time or replace all instances at once.

Advanced replace options

For more precise control over your search and replace operations, Word provides several advanced options:

Find whole words only

This option prevents partial matches within larger words. For example, if you search for "man" with this option selected, it won't match "manual" or "human" - only the complete word "man". This prevents unintended replacements that could change the meaning of words.

Match case

When this option is selected, the search becomes case-sensitive. This means "CAT" would not match "cat" or "Cat". This is particularly useful when dealing with proper nouns, acronyms, or when case matters for the meaning.

Format options

The Format feature allows you to search for and replace text that has specific formatting. For example, you could find all bold text containing "important" and replace it with "critical" while maintaining the bold formatting, or even change the formatting to a different style.

Special characters

The Special option lets you search for and replace punctuation marks, spaces, and other special characters. This is helpful for cleaning up documents, such as replacing double spaces with single spaces, or changing regular dashes with em dashes.

Practical tips for find and replace

When using Find and Replace, it's important to be careful with your replacements. If you don't use the advanced options appropriately, you might accidentally change words you didn't intend to modify. Always consider using "Find whole words only" when replacing common letter combinations, and review your changes before applying them to the entire document.

The Find and Replace function becomes especially powerful when combined with the advanced options, allowing you to make precise, targeted changes across large documents efficiently.