You can hide the extra styles easy enough. First display, display your list of styles. (In Word 2003, click Format >> Styles and Formatting.)

Below the style list, change the Show drop-down list from Available Formatting to Available Styles. All variants that word generated due to special formatting will be hidden.

At its essence, storyboarding is a method used to sketch out content at a high level in order to validate flow, find gaps, and iron out complicated areas. Walt Disney is often credited as inventing storyboards for his animations.

Instructional designers use storyboarding to sketch out content for courses that are ultimately delivered through various formats, such as by an instructor or online. The storyboard defines content, slide by slide or screen by screen, to show the progression of learning topics, and can be developed in PowerPoint, Word, a special storyboarding tool, etc.

Many designers use a two column format, with slide or screen text in the left column and either detailed instructor notes or, for online learning, a narration script in the right column. Here are some free storyboard templates for you to check out: http://theelearningcoach.com/resources/storyboard-depot/

For elearning, the storyboard also contains notes on graphic ideas for the developer who puts together animations and visual presentation of the content using tools such as Flash. For instructor-led training, the narrator script is replaced with instructor notes, which provide more detailed talking points than the content that appears on the slides. Instructor-led presentations are often developed in PowerPoint, which allows the instructor to update the content as he or she gains classroom experience with presenting the content.

Now that you know about storyboards, I bet you can see the similarity to screen mockups or can envision storyboards used for web sites.

• Companies that were once somewhat satisfied to pay too much for mediocre results are looking for better options, often turning to smaller specialty companies like Logical.
• Our contacts, previously somewhat concentrated at our larger clients, have been dispersed into other organizations where they have carried our brand, and tools like LinkedIn have made it easy to stay in touch.

We have a saying: "With change comes opportunity." To expand: "With unprecedented change comes unprecedented opportunity."

And already in business for 10 years, Logical is well positioned to respond.

• Use gimp in cases when you normally use Photoshop.
• Use inkscape in cases where you normally use Illustrator.
• Use Screen Hunter for screenshots,when you might use SnagIt.

gimp and inkscape are opensource.

My thanks to Dick Hamilton, author of Managing Writers,  for offering the tip on the first two tools an STC listserv.

Most Microsoft programs have a self-repair these days, and IE does too. Before you use it, just be sure to figure out what add-ons you are using, because those will have to be reloaded after the repair.

Then click the Tools menu... Options, open the Advanced tab, and click Reset.

The easiest way to fix this is to change the kind of break you are using. Seems to me the Continuous page break is often the culprit.

Try Insert menu >> Break command. Select any other type of section break and click OK.

By the way, if you add an odd section page break, it forces the next page to start on an odd page, which is a right hand page when using double-sided printing. But you can't see the blank page it inserts unless you use Print Preview.

Right-click the desired text, and click the Text Direction option. Select the orientation, and click OK.

The feature is a little tricky to find, since it is not accessible from either the cell or font formatting areas (or so it seems to me).

Note: The text must be located in a table or you won't see the Text Direction option on the right-click menu. Also, for older versions of Word, the only available text rotation was Word Art. I think the rotation-in-table feature was added in the 2003 version.

If you share that interest, check out the following. Well done!

A Visual Study Guide to Cognitive Biases

In case you are unfamiliar with the term, a wireframe is a mockup of a screen in a software application.

Historically, wireframes consisted of a set of mock screens, either hand-drawn or developed with a computer. A reviewer would validate design concepts by reviewing the wireframes in printed form so he could follow screen flows by juggling papers. Some people still swear by hand-drawn wireframes because they are quick to generate and require no special software. The main drawback is the impact on the review cycle: some people just can’t seem to envision the flow of screens from paper, in which case a quality review is impossible.

As an alternative, an analyst or developer can develop screens in HTML. Benefits: (1) The reviewer can click around the screens a bit to better understand activity flow. (2) The code serves as a starting point for development. Drawback: (1) The time invested is significant.

Some newer prototyping tools provide the same sort of clickable benefits as a coded HTML prototype. Benefits: (1) The process is quicker than HTML coding. (2) The wireframe analyst doesn’t need coding knowledge. Drawbacks: (1) Software licenses can cost thousands of dollars per seat. (2) No reusable code is generated.

So where is this all going?  

Some really advanced prototyping tools are already entering the market. They can export the prototype in real HTML code. Benefits: (1) It’s quicker than HTML coding. (2) No HTML coding knowledge needed. (3) HTML base code is produced. Drawbacks: (1) The system-generated code is allegedly pretty clunky, perhaps similar to the code generated when you export a Word doc as HTML. (2) The software is costly.

Still, it’s a matter of time before the tools advance to make the system-generated code more usable. And when the analyst investment noticeably reduces the development effort, those expensive software licenses will become more cost effective.