GCFLearnFree.org
Topics: Track, comments, Big Data
Transcript Excerpt
Word, provide the users with two features called track changes and comments. To turn it on, go to the review tab. Then click the track changes command. Any changes the user makes to the document will appear as markup. For example, it doesn’t go away when the user deletes text. It just gets crossed out. When they add more text, it gets underlined. This lets the owner of the document see what changes the user made before making them part of the final draft. Users can also add comments in the margins by selecting the text they want to comment on and then click the new comment command.
As the document’s original author, it’s up to the user to accept the changes to make them permanent or reject them if they disagree. Select the changes with the cursor, then go to accept to keep it or reject to return to the original text. Users can even open the menus underneath the commands and accept or reject all the changes in the document at once. To remove any comments, start by selecting the comment box. Then go to the delete command. At this point, users might find it helpful to view some of the markups to the side instead of the text itself. This should make the document a little bit easier to read. First, go to the show Markup command, then balloons. Now click show revisions in balloons. And many of the changes will move to the right margin, though any added text will still appear in a line. Users can choose no markup if they want to hide all of the changes temporarily, and the markup will disappear. Hiding the markup isn’t the same as accepting all the changes. Users still need to accept or reject the changes in their document before they send out the final version.
Let’s say someone reviewed and edited the document but forgot to turn on track changes. It’s still possible to accept or reject the changes they made using a neat feature called compare. To get started, click compare on the review tab. Then click compare again. Users will need a copy of their original document, and also of the revised version. Click OK. At this point, word will compare the two documents and come up with a list of changes that were made between them. Now the user can accept or reject the changes. All of these track changes and comments features can be a huge help when it comes to collaborating on projects.
