fixed : Two-sided printing in MS Word for Mac

Question :

I usually work in Apple’s Pages.app to do my text editing, but now someone sent me a school document that was made in MS Word. It opens just fine in Word for Mac, but when I want to print, I can’t find the “Two-sided printing” option…

How can I do Two-sided printing in Word for Mac ?

Answer :

As always, the solution is simple, you just have to know where to look and what to look for…

…anyway, here’s how-to do this in Word 16 (2021) :

Note : in older versions it is similar, but sometimes slightly different (just one of those things to know is that “Two-sided printing” is called “Duplex printing” on Windows and therefore also in older versions of MS Office for Mac…)

  • open the document in Word for Mac
  • press the [CMD] + [P] key combo on your keyboard to open the Print window ( or goto Word > File > Print )
  • click on “Copies & Pages” and choose “Layout” from the pulldown menu
  • in the Layout settings view, see that “Two-Sided” is listed, with the option to choose “Long Edge Binding” (for portrait mode documents) and “Short Edge Binding” (for landscape mode documents)
  • > note that if “Two-Sided” is not listed here, your printer doesn’t have the option to print two-sided automatically, and you will have to do the two-sided printing manually [see below]

That’s it !

If your printer can’t do two-sided printing automatically, you can do this to get two-sided printing manually :

  • open the document in Word for Mac
  • press the [CMD] + [P] key combo on your keyboard to open the Print window ( or goto Word > File > Print )
  • click on “Copies & Pages” and choose “Microsoft Word” from the pulldown menu
  • in the Microsoft Word settings view, set “Print:” to “Even pages only”
  • then go back to “Copies & Pages” and at “Pages:” set both “From:” and “To:” to 1 and click the Print button
  • when your print is ready, draw a huge arrow on the back of the printed page pointing upward like the text on the front side
  • then put the page in the printer’s feeder drawer and make sure the arrow you have drawn on it is on the upside and pointing into the printer drawer and close the printer drawer
  • then click on “Copies & Pages” and choose “Microsoft Word” from the pulldown menu
  • in the Microsoft Word settings view, set “Print:” to “Even pages only”
  • then go back to “Copies & Pages” and at “Pages:” set both “From:” and “To:” to 1 and click the Print button
  • now look at the printed page that comes out and figure out how to put the pages in after having them printed on one side (make sure you have this correct before proceeding ; if you can’t get your head around this, just redo the above steps and print a new testpage)
  • now, get ready to print the entire document :
  • press the [CMD] + [P] key combo on your keyboard to open the Print window ( or goto Word > File > Print )
  • click on “Copies & Pages” and choose “Microsoft Word” from the pulldown menu
  • in the Microsoft Word settings view, set “Print:” to “Even pages only”
  • then go back to “Copies & Pages” and at “Pages:” select “All”
  • then wait for all even pages to print
  • when done, flip over the bulk of printed paper the way you figured out to be right (using your test page as a reference) and put it back in the printing drawer
  • make sure that not only the orientation is correct, but that the first page is on top and the last page is at the bottom also
  • click on “Copies & Pages” and choose “Microsoft Word” from the pulldown menu
  • in the Microsoft Word settings view, set “Print:” to “Odd pages only”
  • then go back to “Copies & Pages” and at “Pages:” select “All”
  • then wait for all odd pages to print
  • …now check if your document is printed correctly on both sides !
  • if not… you have gotten your page flipping incorrect… too bad… you’ll have to redo from start…

That’s it !

enjoy 😉

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fixed : where is the Show Thumbnails option in Microsoft Word for Mac ?

Question :

I am loosing track of what I’m doing in the multi-page Word document that I’m working on. It’s over 20 pages and I am referring to info I have written on various previous pages, so I keep scrolling back and forth to find the exact pieces of text I have previously written…

It would be great to have a Show Thumbnails option like I have in Pages, Preview and Acrobat Reader, but I can’t find anything similar in Word.

Is it possible to have something similar in Word ?

 

Answer :

Yes, there is a Show Thumbnails option in Word ( Word 365 / Word 16 for Mac ). It’s just that Microsoft didn’t name it Show Thumbnails and put it somewhere deep inside the menu-structure where you won’t find it if you don’t know that Microsoft calls it Navigation Pane… here’s how to activate it :

  • open Word.app
  • don’t go to the top-of-screen Word application menu bar
  • go to the menu bar of the Word Document window
  • click on the View tab
  • then put a checkmark at “Navigation Pane”

…that’s it !

enjoy 😉

fix : send iOS Pages document as Word document from iPad

Question :

I have MS Office running on my Mac, but it’s not Office 365, so on my iPad I can’t unlock all editing features of Word, PowerPoint and Excel for iOS …so I only have the option to open, view and read Word documents, PowerPoint presentations and Excel sheets.

At this moment, I only have my iPad available and not my Mac. Is there any way to quickly do a little editing on a Word document on my iPad, even though I don’t have Office 365 ?

 

Answer :

There are several options to do so. You could use Google Docs or Office 700 (an OpenOffice version for iOS), but you probably have Apple Pages already installed on your iPad, so that is most likely the quickest solution :

  • open Pages.app on your iPad
  • under “Locations” find the Word document you want to edit
  • you will see that the Word document is opened as if it were a Pages document
  • now edit it as you wish
  • when finished, click on the button top-right (the button that looks like a circle with three dots in it)
  • in the menu that appears on the right, click on “Export”
  • in the pulldown menu that appears, click on “Word”
  • in the popup window, click on “Save to Files”
  • in the next window, select a location to save the Word document, then click “Save”

That’s it !

enjoy 😉

fixed : typing a spiritus asper in an Ancient Greek text on Mac or PC

Question :

I am learning Classical Greek (a.k.a. Ancient Greek) in school, and I want to typ words on my computers (both Mac and PC) to improve my vocabulary.

I found I can add a Greek keyboard layout (on both my Mac and my PC) so I now am able to all Greek letters, but it turns out that this these are Modern Greek letters… these are generally the same, but Modern Greek doesn’t have any of the accents I need in Classical Greek. I especially need to be able to typ the ‘spiritus asper’ (a.k.a. the H-sound accent) and the ‘iota subscriptum’ (a.k.a. the I-sound that can be added to e.g. an Omega).

Is there any way to ‘switch on’ typing Classical Greek on my Mac (and PC) ?

 

Answer :

To be able to typ the accents of Classical Greek, you need to enable the ‘Greek Polytonic’ keyboard.

in macOS, you can activate the Greek Polytonic keyboard by doing this :

  • go to Apple-menu (Apple-icon top-left in the menu bar) –> System Preferences –> Keyboard –> Input Sources (tab)
  • on the left, your currently installed keyboard-layout(s) is/are listed
  • click on the +button just below the list of installed keyboard-layouts
  • in the window that opens, in the Search Field, typ “greek”
  • on the right, two keyboard-layouts will be listed : “Greek” and “Greek – Polytonic”
  • choose “Greek – Polytonic” and click the Add-button
  • then make sure there is a check-mark at “Show Input menu in menu bar”
  • then exit System Preferences
  • now, whenever you want to typ Ancient Greek, go to the little flag-icon top-right in the menu bar and select “Greek – Polytonic” from the dropdown list
  • and after you’re done typing Ancient Greek, go to the little black flag with the Epsilon top-right in the menu bar and select your regular keyboard layout from the dropdown list

in Windows 10, you can activate the Greek Polytonic keyboard by doing this :

  • go to the Start Button bottom-left and typ “region and language” in the search field, then press Enter
  • in the window that opens, at Languages, click “Add a language” and typ “greek” in the search field
  • then, select “Greek”
  • then, at Languages, select “Greek” and click “Set as default”
  • then, at Languages, choose “Greek” and click the “Options”-button
  • now, at Keyboards, click “Add a keyboard”
  • then, choose “Greek Polytonic”
  • to simplify things, I suggest deleting other Greek keyboards from the list of activated keyboards
  • then exit
  • now you can switch between your main keyboard-layout and the Greek Polytonic keyboard-layout by pressing the {WINDOWS}+{SPACE} key-combo on your keyboard

To get the ‘spiritus asper’ (a.k.a. the H-sound accent) in your Classical Greek text, typ this : {SHIFT}+{ ‘ } to get the ‘spiritus asper’, then the A/E/R/V/Y/H/I/O-key to get the Alpha/Epsilon/Rho/Omega/Upsilon/Etha/Iota/Omicron-letter you need underneath the ‘spiritus asper’.

To get the ‘iota subscriptum’ in your Classical Greek text, typ this : {SHIFT}+{ [ } (in which { [ } is the [-key on your keyboard) to get the ‘iota subscriptum’, then the V-key to get the Omega-letter you need above the ‘iota subscriptum’.

To get the ‘regular sigma’ in your Classical Greek text, typ { S }

To get the ‘word-ending sigma’ in your Classical Greek text, typ { W }

to get the ‘Greek question mark’ in your Classical Greek text, typ { Q } which will give you the ; (semi-colon) which is Classical Greek for a ? (question mark).

That’s it !

enjoy 😉

 

fixed : where are my Office 365 AutoRecovery files ?

Question :

I accidentally messed up the Office documents (Word/PowerPoint/Excel) I was working on, and I didn’t save it before, so I wanted to get the auto-saved version from the AutoRecovery-folder as I’ve done in the old days of Office 2008 and 2004.

But now I am using Office 365, and I can’t find the AutoRecovery folder anywhere… where is it ?

 

Answer :

You might have guessed : nowadays, the AutoRecovery-folder is located in an entirely different location on your Mac.

If you are running Office 2011 for Mac (whether as part of Office 365 or not) the correct path to the AutoRecovery-folder is this :

~/Users/username/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Office/Office 2011 AutoRecovery

And if you are running Office 2016 for Mac (whether or not as part of Office 365) the correct path to the Word 15‘s AutoRecovery-folder(s) is :

~/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Word/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery/

for PowerPoint 15 the correct path is :

~/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.PowerPoint/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery/

and for Excel 15 the correct path is :

~/Users/username/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Excel/Data/Library/Preferences/AutoRecovery/

BEWARE : it’s not straight-forward to get to this folder in recent/current versions of OSX and macOS, as the user’s Library-folder is a hidden folder. So if you want to access it, the easiest way to do so is :

– in the Finder, click on “Go” in the top menu bar

– when the pulldown menu appears, press the ALT-key on your keyboard (a.k.a. OPTION-key) and an extra option named “Library” will appear in the pulldown menu

– while holding the ALT-key, click on “Library” and your personal (hidden) Library-folder will open in the Finder

– there you can navigate further using the paths listed above to find the AutoRecovery-folder you’re looking for

That’s it.

Enjoy !

😉

NOTE # 1 :

It is advisory to also switch on the “file overwrite protection” (or “double backup”) option as it stores the previous version of the file you are working on. In Word, you turn this feature on from Word –> Preferences –> Save and then mark the “Always create a backup copy” check box. This way, whenever you click “Save”, a backup version is made of the previous/stored version before it overwrites the stored version of the file… so with it turned on, you at least have one prior version of your file.

NOTE #2 :

If you do not see the autosave file you were expecting to find in the AutoRecovery-folder, you might need a ‘show hidden files’-app to find it. Especially Excel-autosave-files tend to be hidden.

There are various ‘show hidden files’-apps :

The FREE one in the Mac App Store is Show Hidden Files: best finder but you could also use another FREE app like Hidden Files Toggle (by ZandorSmith.nl) or Funter (by Nektony.com) or HideSwitch (by CreativeCag.com)

Just beware! that you can mess up OSX or macOS entirely is you accidentally delete or alter files that are hidden in regular use !

[ a big Thank You to thekurrgan for discovering this and posting this find here ]

NOTE #3 :

it turns out that there’s a bug in Excel 2011 for Mac : even though the Autosave does save  a file with an .xlsx file extension, it’s not a true .xlsx file ! trying to open it will lead to an “Microsoft cannot open this file”-error. The solution is to change the file extension to either .xlsb (Excel binary format) or .xlb (older Excel backup format), to enable Excel to recognize the file and enable it to open.

[ a big Thank You to Paul Preston for noticing this problem and for Bryan P for posting the solution on Superuser.com and to Rich Michaels for posting his updated solution on answers.microsoft.com ]

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tip : get the latest versions of Word, PowerPoint and Excel for FREE, legally

If you are looking for a FREE (and legal) version of the latest version of MS Office, you just might be in luck :

Microsoft is offering the newest version of MS Office for FREE to students and staff of schools and universities that have licensed MS Office.

This program has run in the US since 2013 under the moniker “Student Advantage”, and is now available in the Netherlands also.

What you get is a FREE one year license to Microsoft’s online cloud service “Office 365”, in the “Pro Plus”-version, including FREE downloads of the latest versions of Office to be installed on maximum 5 Macs or PCs and on maximum 5 Android or iOS devices (like iPhones and iPads).

These latest versions are Office 2011 for Mac and Office 2013 for Windows, both including Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook, OneNote, Skype and OneDrive (Microsoft’s cloud-drive formerly known as SkyDrive).

In the Netherlands, these FREE versions are available for two specific groups :

1- (parents of) students of the primary schools [“basisschoolleerlingen” in Dutch] https://www.surfspot.nl/officeleerling

2- students of (some) higher education [“Hogescholen en Universiteiten” in Dutch] https://www.surfspot.nl/officestudent

The procedure to get this (nearly) FREE software, is quite complex, but it’s well worth the hassle :

– first you need an account at Surfspot.nl (the website for educational discounts)

– then, you need to ‘buy’ the FREE version of Office 365 Pro Plus

– with that, you’ll get a voucher (which might take several days due to popular demand)

– using that voucher, you can activate Office 365 at Microsoft, and you will get FREE download-links to the latest versions of Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook, OneNote, Skype, OneDrive, etc.

–  those apps you can install on maximum 5 Macs or PCs and 5 iOS or Android devices

 

…as mentioned : it’s a hassle, but it’s well worth it !

Enjoy !

😉

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fixed : where are my Office 2011 AutoRecovery files ?

UPDATE : the updated version of this post for Office 2016 / Office 365 (Word 15 / PowerPoint 15 / Excel 15) can be found here :

fixed : where are my Office 365 AutoRecovery files ?


Question :

I accidentally messed up the Office documents (Word/PowerPoint/Excel) I was working on, and I didn’t save it before, so I wanted to get the auto-saved version from the AutoRecovery-folder as I’ve done before in Office 2008 and 2004.

I forgot where to find the AutoRecovery-folder, so I used Office 2011’s build-in Help-option to get a hint. It told me I would be able to find the folder via this path :

~/Users/username/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Office 2011 AutoRecovery

But when I open that folder I have a “Office 2004 AutoRecovery” and a “Office 2008 AutoRecovery”-folder, but there’s no such folder for Office 2011…

I checked in the Office 2011 Preferences to make sure Auto-saving is switched on, and it is… so where did the folder go ? where are my auto-save documents ?

 

Answer :

You might have guessed : there’s a fault in the Office 2011 Help file. Nowadays, the AutoRecovery-folder is located in an entirely different location on your Mac. The correct path is this :

~/Users/username/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Office/Office 2011 AutoRecovery

But there is yet another tiny hurdle to get to it : in the current version of OSX, the user’s Library-folder is a hidden folder. So if you want to access it, the easiest way to do so is :

– in the Finder, click on “Go” in the top menu bar

– when the pulldown menu appears, press the ALT-key on your keyboard (a.k.a. OPTION-key) and an extra option named “Library” will appear in the pulldown menu

– while holding the ALT-key, click on “Library” and your personal (hidden) Library-folder will open in the Finder

– there you can navigate to Application Support–>Microsoft–>Office to find the “Office 2011 AutoRecovery”-folder you are looking for

That’s it.

Enjoy !

😉

Note : It is not clear if this problem is due to OSX 10.9 “Mavericks” or that it is occurring with all installations of Office 2011 for Mac. Either way, the solution is as mentioned above.

UPDATE :

it turns out that there’s a bug in Excel 2011 for Mac : even though the Autosave does save  a file with an .xlsx file extension, it’s not a true .xlsx file ! trying to open it will lead to an “Microsoft cannot open this file”-error. The solution is to change the file extension to either .xlsb (Excel binary format) or .xlb (older Excel backup format), to enable Excel to recognize the file and enable it to open.

[ a big Thank You to Paul Preston for noticing this problem and for Bryan P for posting the solution on Superuser.com ]

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