CS 211 INTRODUCTION TO INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (LIVING IN THE IT ERA)

WORD PROCESSING
Word Processing refers to the creation, editing, formatting, storage, and output of both printed
and online or electronic documents.

Word Processing Software are programs that allow users to create, edit, and print documents. It
enables you to write text, store it electronically, display it on a screen, modify it by entering
commands and characters from the keyboard, and print it.

Standard Features of Word Processors

Word processors vary considerably, but all word processors, whether cloud-based or installed on a
system, support the following basic features:

1. Insert text – Allows you to insert text anywhere in the document.

2. Delete text – Allows you to erase characters, words, lines, or pages.
3. Cut and paste – Allows you to remove (cut) a section of text from one place in a document
and insert (paste) it somewhere else.
4. Copy – Allows you to duplicate a section of text.
5. Page size and margins – Allows you to define various page sizes and margins, and the word
processor will automatically readjust the text so that it fits.
6. Search and replace – Allows you to direct the word processor to search for a particular
word or phrase. You can also direct the word processor to replace one group of characters
with another everywhere that the first group appears.
7. Word wrap – Automatically moves to the next line when you have filled one line with text,
and it will readjust text if you change the margins.
8. Print – Allows you to send a document to a printer to get hard copy.

Full-Featured Word Processors

Word processor provides additional features to format documents in more sophisticated
ways. Following are some important features of an advanced word processor.

1. File management
Provides file management capabilities that allow you to create, delete, move, and
search for files.

2. Font Specification
The appearance of text in the document is called font or typeface. Full-featured
word processor can change the font of all or selected text to improve readability. Fonts are
used to create the text of different styles and sizes. The user can specify bold, italic and
underline.

Topic: WORD PROCESSING

CS 211 INTRODUCTION TO INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (LIVING IN THE IT ERA)

3. Graphics
Full-featured word processor is used to insert images and graphs in a document.
Some word processors also provide the facility to create images. Some word processors
only provide the facility to insert images created in different programs.

4. Header, Footer and Page Numbering

Full-featured word processor provides header and footer feature. Header is the text
that is added to the top of every page. It may include document title or page number.
Footer is the text that is added at the bottom of the every page.

5. Spell checker
Spell checker features in full-featured word processor help the user to correct any
spelling in the document. The misspelled words are highlighted.

6. Layout
Full-featured word processor provides the facility to specify different margins within
a single document. Is also specifies different methods for indenting paragraphs.

7. Table of contents and indexes

Full-featured word processor can also generate a table of contents and index. It is
based on special code inserted in the document. It is very helpful in writing books.

8. Merges
It is used merge text from one file into another file. It is useful to generate many
files that has same format but different data. Generating mailing labels is an example of
merges.

9. Thesaurus
Thesaurus feature allows you to search for synonyms or alternate words without
leaving the word processor.

10. Auto Correct

Word processor automatically corrects many commonly misspelled words and
punctuation marks with the autocorrect feature.

11. Document Window

Full-featured word processor can be used to edit two or more documents at the
same time. Each document appears in a separate window. It is very useful if a user is
working on a large project that consists of several files.

12. Footnotes and cross-reference

Automates the numbering and placement of footnotes and enables you to easily
cross-reference other sections of the document

13. WYSIWYG
It stands for what you see is what you get. It means that the printed copy of the
document will be similar as appears in the word processor.

Topic: WORD PROCESSING

CS 211 INTRODUCTION TO INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (LIVING IN THE IT ERA)

14. Macros
A macro is a character or word that represents a series of keystrokes. The
keystrokes may represent text or commands. The macros are defined to save a lot of time
for repeating the same task.

Topic: WORD PROCESSING

CS 211 INTRODUCTION TO INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (LIVING IN THE IT ERA)

Topic: WORD PROCESSING