Microsoft
Topics: Combine, track, Big Data
Transcript Excerpt:
Word lets users combine the documents with seeing everyone’s changes clearly marked in one place. Here’s how it works. First, save the documents to the computer. Then go to the REVIEW tab, click Compare, and Combine. Under Original document, click Browse, click the original, and Open. Then, under the Revised document, click Browse, and Open the document from the first reviewer. By default, Word compares just about everything, but users can uncheck items that they don’t want Word to compare. Also, by default, Word shows the changes in the original document, but users can change that to show changes in the revised document or create a new document. Click OK. By default, Word uses the formatting from the original document, but if users want, they can use the formatting that their reviewer changed. Click Continue with Merge. And Word copies the changed items from the revised document into the original and presents them as markup as if the reviewer had added the changes with track changes turned on.
Now, if the user needs to include more reviewers’ changes, they can continue to combine documents into the original. First, Save the original. Then, click Compare and Combine. Add the original. Then, select the document from the second reviewer under the Revised document, and click OK. Now the changes and comments from both reviewers are together in one document using markup. By default, each reviewer’s changes appear in a different colour. But the automatic colours may be different on the reviewers’ computers. Make sure Track Changes is turned on. Then, the users can go through the document and decide what they want to do with the comments and changes. If the user plans to send the document back to the reviewers for another go-around, they can reply to comments. Click the reply button, and type the reply. If overlapping changes make it too difficult to read, click Compare and Show Source Documents. Users can show the Original, the Revised, or both documents. Scroll the document in the main window, and all the windows scroll in sync.
Sometimes getting the markup out of the way also helps to make it easy to read. And users can always show the markup again by clicking All Markup. Once finished, keep Track Changes on. Then, click FILE and Save As if the user wants to save different document versions. The reviewers can open the document, add changes, and reply to the owner’s replies. Whether users collaborate by email or online, the Review tools can make the job easier.
