Customizing Toolbars
Toolbars help make PowerPoint and other Windows programs easy to use. A quick click on a button and you avoid having to search through endless menus to get to the command you want. PowerPoint has several predefined toolbars and by default places a few of them at various locations around the screen. For example, the Standard and Formatting toolbars display by default at the top of the screen, whereas the Drawing toolbar appears at the bottom, above the application bar (see Figure 21.1).
Figure 21.1. PowerPoint uses toolbars to help you access commands easily and quickly.
Displaying or Hiding Toolbars
The Standard and Formatting toolbars contain buttons for the most commonly used PowerPoint procedures, such as saving, printing, editing, and formatting. If you need to have other features easily at hand, you can choose additional toolbars for specific tasks. To display toolbars, choose View, Toolbars, and scroll through the list that displays to choose the toolbar you need. The choice of toolbars include:
Control Toolbox This toolbox is handy for building dialog boxes using Visual Basic. Most PowerPoint users will probably never need it.
Drawing This toolbar enables you to draw and enhance objects in your presentation.
Outlining If you click the Outline tab in Normal view, the Outlining toolbar automatically appears along the left side, ready to help you create or edit the slideshow outline.
Note
Some toolbars appear automatically when you select a feature or command related to that toolbar. For example, the Picture toolbar automatically appears if you select a picture.
Picture When you click a picture object, the Picture toolbar appears to help you modify the picture's colors, brightness, contrast, lines, and so on.
Reviewing This toolbar assists in collaborative editing of a slideshow. Reviewers can add comments or review comments by others, create Outlook tasks, or send the show as an attachment via e-mail.
Revisions Pane Displays the Revisions pane, in which you can see what changes reviewers have suggested.
Tables and Borders With this toolbar, you can quickly and easily draw or edit freehand tables and borders.
Visual Basic For advanced users, this toolbar assists in the creation of Visual Basic scripts.
Web This toolbar can help you add hyperlinks and search for and link useful information from the Internet.
WordArt Add or modify WordArt objects quickly and easily with this handy toolbar.
You never actually remove a toolbar. Instead, you simply hide it from view. Suppose, for example, that the Web toolbar displays, but you really don't need it and want to reclaim the screen space it takes up. Simply choose View, Toolbars, and click Web to deselect that toolbar.
Note
You can also right-click any toolbar to display the Toolbar menu. You then select or deselect the toolbar from that menu.
To close a floating toolbar, click the Close button at the right side of the title bar.
Note
When you close a toolbar that opened automatically, that toolbar no longer automatically opens when needed. You must open the toolbar from the menu to display it and also to make it appear automatically in the future.
Repositioning Toolbars
Typically, you expect a toolbar to appear at the top of the screen. However, you've already noted that the Drawing toolbar is located at the bottom. When you select other toolbars, they may appear vertically along the side of the screen. Toolbars that appear on any side of the screen are said to be docked, whereas floating toolbars can be found in the middle of the screen.
You can reposition a toolbar simply by dragging it to the desired location. For example, to move the Standard toolbar to the left side of the screen, follow these steps:
Place the mouse pointer on the Move handle on the toolbar. A four-way arrow appears (see Figure 21.2).
Figure 21.2. Drag a toolbar by clicking and dragging the toolbar's Move handle.
Click and, while holding the left mouse button down, drag the toolbar away from the edge. PowerPoint displays the toolbar along with a title bar (see Figure 21.3). If you release the mouse button at this stage, the toolbar appears as a floating toolbar.
Continue dragging the toolbar to the desired location—for example, along the left edge.
When the toolbar's title bar disappears and the Move handle reappears, release the mouse button to dock the toolbar along the edge of the screen (see Figure 21.4).
Note
It's easy to lose toolbars as you drag and drop them. For example, if you accidentally drop a toolbar on top of another one, you might not notice that they've been combined. Use the Move handle to drag one toolbar from on top of another one.
Figure 21.3. A floating toolbar also displays a title bar and can be placed anywhere on the screen.
Figure 21.4. Docked toolbars can appear at any side of the screen.
Note
If you drag a toolbar to a new location, it remains there until you move it again, even if you close PowerPoint.
Adding and Removing Toolbar Buttons
Everyone uses PowerPoint differently. You use some of the buttons on the PowerPoint toolbars on a regular basis, whereas you rarely or never use others. PowerPoint makes it easy to add or remove buttons.
Adding and Removing Buttons from the Toolbar
To add or remove toolbar buttons directly from the toolbar, follow these steps:
Click the Toolbar Options down arrow at the right end of the toolbar.
Choose Add or Remove Buttons from the menu.
Choose the name of the toolbar you want to customize from the menu, such as Standard or Formatting. A complete list of currently selected and commonly used buttons associated with that particular toolbar displays (see Figure 21.5).
Figure 21.5. Select or deselect commands to add or remove buttons from this list.
Click a button to add or remove it from the toolbar. Buttons that are currently active on the toolbar display a check mark in front of them. PowerPoint automatically adds buttons to the end of the toolbar or removes buttons from wherever they're located on the toolbar.
Click anywhere on the screen to close all menus.
If you want to go back to the original toolbar but forget which buttons it contained, simply scroll to the bottom of the Add or Remove Buttons menu and click Reset Toolbar.
Adding and Removing Buttons in the Customize Dialog Box
You can also add or remove toolbar buttons using the Customize dialog box, which offers additional options. To add buttons using this method, follow these steps:
Select View, Toolbars, Customize to open the Customize dialog box, shown in Figure 21.6.
Figure 21.6. The Customize dialog box offers numerous options for customizing your toolbars.
On the Toolbars tab, select the toolbar you want to modify, if it doesn't already appear on the screen. Active toolbars have a check mark in the check box that precedes them.
Click the Commands tab to display a comprehensive list of standard PowerPoint buttons by category (see Figure 21.7).
Locate the command for the button you want to add. For example, if you want to add a button to help you quickly view your color slides in black and white (as they might be printed on a laser printer), first click View in the Categories list, and then scroll through the Commands list until you find Black and White.
Note
If you're not sure what a command is used for, select the command and click the Description button.
Position the button using the I-beam mouse pointer as a guide (see Figure 21.8).
Figure 21.8. Drag a command button to the target toolbar and use the I-beam pointer to position it.
Release the mouse button to add the button to the toolbar.
To save changes to the toolbar, click the Close button to close the Customize dialog box.
To remove a button from the toolbar, open the Customize dialog box, select the button you want to remove, and drag it from the toolbar.
You can also reposition buttons on the toolbar by simply dragging them to their new locations. Note that you can't drag and drop toolbar buttons if the Customize dialog box isn't open.
Customized your toolbar too much and want to start over? See the “Troubleshooting” section near the end of this chapter.
Adding Commands to Menu Buttons
Some toolbar buttons also function as menus. For example, the Font Color button on the Formatting toolbar displays a menu of color options (also referred to as a palette). Figure 21.9 illustrates this menu.
Figure 21.9. The Font Color toolbar button also displays a menu of options.
You can customize menu buttons by adding and removing commands. To add a new command to an existing menu button, follow these steps:
Open the Customize dialog box by choosing View, Toolbars, Customize and click the Commands tab.
Locate the first command you want to add to the toolbar button's menu (for example, Insert, Duplicate Slide).
Drag the command from the Customize dialog box to the desired toolbar button and wait until the menu drops down.
Position the new command where you want on the menu, using the I-beam as an insertion guide (see Figure 21.10).
Drop the command where you want to place it on the drop-down menu.
Repeat steps 2–5 until you have added all the menu commands you want.
Click Close to close the Customize dialog box and to save changes to your toolbar menu.
To remove a command from a toolbar button's menu, simply select the command and drag it off the toolbar. You need to have the Customize dialog box open to do this, however.
Figure 21.10. An I-beam shows where to position a command you want to add to a drop-down menu from a toolbar button.
Modifying Toolbar Buttons
The power and ease of use derived from using toolbars instead of menus depend largely on the ease with which you can visually identify a button and its function. If you find that one of PowerPoint's standard toolbar buttons simply doesn't convey to you the visual information you need to quickly identify what the button does, you can modify the button or even create an entirely new one.
To modify a toolbar button, follow these steps:
Open the Customize dialog box by choosing View, Toolbars, Customize.
Select the button on the toolbar that you want to modify. A black border surrounds it.
Right-click the selected button to display the Modify Selection menu (see Figure 21.11).
Note
You can also access this menu by selecting the Commands tab and clicking the Modify Selection button. Note that this button is only available if you've already selected a toolbar button to modify.
Select one of the following modifications:
Reset Restores the button to its original PowerPoint default. Any changes you have made to the button will be lost.
Name This is the text version of the button that is used if you choose to display text along with or instead of the button, or if the command appears in a toolbar menu. Also, if you point the mouse at the button, a text prompt appears to remind you what the button does. If you add the ampersand (&) before a letter in the name, that letter appears underlined in menus where you can select the command using the keyboard.
Figure 21.11. The Modify Selection menu enables you to customize a toolbar button.
Note
The name you choose can be important in making it easy to identify the function of a button. Be as descriptive as possible, but also try to keep the name brief because the name may appear in menus as well.
Copy Button Image Copies the selected button image to the Clipboard.
Paste Button Image Pastes a copied button image to the current selected toolbar button.
Note
Although you can do so, you should avoid having two identical images on the same toolbar. Furthermore, you should avoid using images that are commonly used for other functions (such as Save, Print, and so on).
Edit Button Image Opens the Button Editor dialog box, shown in Figure 21.12. In the Button Editor dialog box, you can move the direction of your button's image, change its color, or even design a new image by adding colors pixel by pixel. Click the Preview button to preview your changes before accepting them.
Figure 21.12. Let your creative side take over as you create or edit new button images.
Tip from
Even if you plan to create your own image, you can get a head start by first changing the image to something that closely resembles what you want to create. You then simply edit that image instead of completely starting from scratch.
Reset Button Image Resets the button image to its original state.
Change Button Image Displays a palette of optional button images (see Figure 21.13) you can apply to your toolbar button. If you don't like your selection, you can choose Reset Button Image to restore the original image.
Figure 21.13. If you don't like the current button image, you can choose from a palette of alternative images.
Default Style Displays the button as an image when it appears as a button, and as image and text when it is located in menus.
Text Only (Always) Ignores the image and displays only text, including the underlined character when appropriate.
Text Only (in Menus) Displays an image when the command is a button, but ignores the image when the command is located in menus.
Image and Text Displays both image and text, even when the command is a button.
Begin a Group Adds a vertical line to the left of the button, helping to establish the beginning of a group of buttons.
Note
As you add, move, or delete buttons, you might find that you want to group your buttons so they're more easily distinguished by function. You can do this by adding a vertical line between buttons on the toolbar. You might not notice these vertical lines right away, but if you look to the left of the Bold button and to the right of the Underline button on the Formatting toolbar, you can view existing group lines.
Assign Hyperlink Enables you to add a link to the button which, when clicked, takes you to the Web or to another document or program.
→ For details on adding links to PowerPoint objects, seeChapter 16, “Using PowerPoint's Web Features.”
Tip from
Don't be afraid to experiment with changing toolbar buttons. You want to create buttons that work for you, and you can always reset the images if things go awry.
Creating a New Toolbar
If you're like many of us, it seems that the buttons we use on a regular basis are scattered about on different toolbars. Perhaps you'd like to create your own toolbar with all those buttons you use the most. Creating your own toolbar also means you won't have to modify PowerPoint's original toolbars.
To create your own toolbar, follow these steps:
Click the Toolbars tab.
Click the New button. PowerPoint displays the New Toolbar dialog box (see Figure 21.14).
Figure 21.14. Create a new toolbar using the New Toolbar dialog box.
Create the name of the toolbar (for example, “My Tools”) in the Toolbar Name text box.
Click OK and PowerPoint displays a new floating toolbar (see Figure 21.15).
Figure 21.15. A new toolbar also needs command buttons to make it complete.
Click the Commands tab to add and arrange buttons and groups.
→ To learn more about accessing the Commands tab, see“Adding and Removing Buttons in the Customize Dialog Box” earlier in this chapter.
Dock the toolbar along one of the sides of the screen, or position the floating toolbar where you want it to appear when you access it.
Resetting the Toolbar
If you make many changes to a toolbar, you'll find it's nearly impossible to remember which buttons are original to the toolbar and which ones you added. If you decide you want to restore your original toolbar, you can do this in one of two ways.
Click the Toolbars tab in the Customize dialog box, select the toolbar you want to restore, and click Reset. PowerPoint asks if you're sure you want to do this, and if you're sure, just click OK.
You can also click the Toolbar Options down arrow at the right end of the toolbar, choose Add or Remove Buttons from the menu, choose the name of the toolbar you want to customize from the menu, and click Reset Toolbar.