AutoCorrect, AutoFormat, and Smart Tags

These three features provide a trio of conveniences that many users have come to take for granted. The AutoCorrect feature makes certain corrections as you type. For example, it capitalizes the first word of a sentence if you’ve failed to do so, or it can change a typo such as “acessories” to “accessories.” The AutoFormat feature supplies automatic formatting, such as creating true fraction characters or automatic numbered lists. And the Smart Tags feature displays a red dotted underline under particular types of data such as a date. Click the button that appears with the data and you see a menu of special operations pertaining to that data, such as seeing your calendar for an underlined date.

Most users will want to keep these features working as they were originally installed. However, in other cases, you may want to turn off one or more aspects of these features, such as whether AutoFormat converts Web or e-mail addresses to hyperlinks or whether the Smart Tags feature flags dates.

You can access the settings for all three of these features in the AutoCorrect dialog box. To display the dialog box, click the Microsoft Office Button and then click the Program Name Options button that appears at the bottom of the menu. Click the Proofing category in the list at the left side of the Options dialog box that appears and then click the AutoCorrect Options button. The AutoCorrect dialog box appears. (In Publisher, choose Tools AutoCorrect Options.)

Change settings on each of the tabs as needed and then click OK to apply your changes. Here’s a look at the tabs and the changes you might want to make:

• AutoCorrect. Clear the checkbox beside any of the standard corrections that you want the program to stop making. If you want to add your own correction to the list of typos that AutoCorrect fixes, type entries in the Replace and With text boxes (see Figure 3-27) and then click Add.

  Figure 3-27. You can create a new typo correction for AutoCorrect.

  

• AutoFormat As You Type. On this tab (Figure 3-28), clear the checkbox beside any of the formatting changes to disable that change.

  Figure 3-28. Choose which AutoFormatting changes the application will make.

  

• Smart Tags. As on the other two tabs, clear or check checkboxes as needed to disable or enable Smart Tag features. The Label Text with Smart Tags checkbox turns smart tags on and off altogether.