Weekly Computer Tip # 235
12 June 2008

Quickly insert sample text (Word 2000-2007)

One of my astute readers (hi, Jonathan!) and his colleague Tony Laskowski recently shared some great tips with me, for which I am extremely grateful. (Thanks, guys!) My favourite one by far is how to quickly insert sample text into a Word document. (Makes a change from my usual kajf;lafj lfkaj lafj lkafj alfj ;afj afl jafl;afj l;afj af;lj ;fak jaf; afj.)

Here's how:

1. Position the insertion point where you want the sample text to appear
2. Type =rand()
3. Press ENTER

In Word 2000-2003 you get the well-known phrase about the quick brown fox jumping over the lazy dog. Word 2007, however, gives three paragraphs about Word's Insert tab, but if you want to control how many paragraphs and lines appear you can add numbers inside the brackets. For example:

1. =rand(1) inserts one paragraph with three lines of text in the paragraph.
2. =rand(10,10) inserts 10 paragraphs with 10 lines of text in each paragraph.

Or if it's the Lorem Ipsum dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry you're after, simply type =lorem() . (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorem_ipsum for the English translation.

Finally, for our German readers: apparently your version of Word displays the following text: "Franz jagt im komplett verwahrlosten Taxi quer durch Bayern."

Until next week.

PS I’m committed to sharing the best of what I know with others so please don’t keep me a secret. If you enjoyed today’s tip, please forward it to anyone you feel may benefit. Alternatively, feel free to reprint it (with full copyright and subscription information) in your newsletters and message boards.

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