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We
talked a little bit about the different ways to use the different parts
of the interface above. Now, let’s break down different types of action
items and see how we can interact with Project. As examples, we are
going to refer to some concepts we haven’t covered yet, so try to focus
on the action item rather than its possible applications.
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Icons |
Just like icons on
your desktop, toolbar icons are small buttons with pictures that
represent actions. When you click the button, that action will
happen. Icons are mostly seen on toolbars. For example, you
could click the  icon on
the standard toolbar and your project would print out.
One great thing
about icons is ScreenTips. If you put your mouse over an icon, a
small box will pop up telling you what it does, like this:
This can be really
useful if looking at an icon doesn’t tell you what it does. |
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Drop-down menus |
You can use these
menus to pick from a number of choices. With some menus, you can
type in your choice. A good example is the Group menu on the
toolbar, which looks like this:  . You can
click where it says No Group and then click on an item
from a list of values. |
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Menu items
 |
If you click on a
menu heading at the top of your Project screen (like, File,
Edit, Window, or Help), the menu will expand to show a list of
commands. You can then click on any item to perform that action.
In the sample to the left, we’ve clicked on the Project menu.
Now, we can click any of the items below it to perform that
action.
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Expanding menu items
 |
Some menu items
have a right-facing arrow (►) beside them. This means that once
you click on (or put your mouse over) that item, an additional
menu will show up (called a sub-menu).
In the sample on
the right, you can see that we chose Outline, and now we can
choose an outlining task. |
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Checked items
 |
Some items in a
menu may have a check next to, or a box around, them. This means
that the item is turned on or enabled. If it has a check,
normally you can turn the command off by clicking it, which will
uncheck it.
Other items can’t
be unchecked; you must pick another item to switch. |
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Chevrons
 |
In the sample on
the right, do you see the two stacked arrows at the bottom of
the menu? Those are called chevrons. Microsoft Project only
shows you the items you have (or the items it thinks you will)
use most by default.
To see the rest of
this menu, click the chevrons. (The menu may also automatically
expand after it’s been open for a few seconds.)Then you’ll see
the entire menu. You may notice that items that were in the
shortened menu have a lighter colour next to them. |
Another way to open menus is by right-clicking. Right-click menus aren’t
like the main menu bar, which stays the same. When you right-click,
menus are contextual, which means they change depending on what you’ve
right-clicked on.
For
example, if we right-click on a toolbar, here’s the menu we see:
This
menu allows you to choose which toolbars we have open. (Ones already
open are checked; we can click them again to close them.)
But if
we right-click on a task, we get a very different menu:
Right-click menus can contain any of the items that we talked about
before (menu items, expanding menu items, or icons with menu items),
although they are never shortened with chevrons. Using a right-click
menu is as easy as clicking on the command you want!
Another way to implement commands in Project is by using shortcut keys.
Shortcut keys are when you press a key (or sometimes a combination of
two or even three keys at once) to perform an action instead of clicking
on the icon or finding its toolbar command. Sometimes you can see this
shortcut in the icon’s ScreenTip, and sometimes it’s listed in the menu
next to the command.
There
are hundreds of shortcuts in Project, but here’s a list of the most
common ones:
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Open a new project |
Ctrl + N |
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Save a file |
Ctrl + S |
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Open a file |
Ctrl + O |
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Print a project |
Ctrl + P |
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Close Project |
Alt + F4 |
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Select All |
Ctrl + A |
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Copy text |
Ctrl + C |
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Cut
text |
Ctrl + X |
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Paste text |
Ctrl + V |
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Find text |
Ctrl + F |
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Undo last action |
Ctrl + Z |
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Redo last action |
Ctrl + Y |
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Check spelling or grammar |
F7 |
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Get
Help |
F1 |
We’ll
refer to more shortcut keys as we learn more project tasks. |
