Today’s Author: Eric Patterson, a program manager on the Excel team. Eric is going to discuss applying pattern fills to chart data points and includes a sample add-in for this purpose. Overview In Excel 2007, the interface for applying Pattern fills to chart elements has been removed in favor of the interface for applying Picture and Texture fills. Charts formatted with pattern fills in previous versions of Excel will retain and display the pattern fills when opened in Excel 2007. Here is an example...

The title of this post sounds simple. Should be easy to do, right? But customers tell us that it's very confusing and not at all clear where to find the features to get the results they want. It all depends on what you want to merge or split. For example, you may want to create a large header cell by splitting the cells below it into a number of smaller cells.

I often create such headers but use a different method than you'd expect, because an individual cell simply cannot be split into smaller cells. Instead, I merge several cells into one larger cell above the cells for which it will be the header. The result is exactly the same.

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“I tried to send a large attachment to a friend and now the e-mail is stuck in my Outbox! I’ve been trying to delete it and I can’t because Outlook says it’s still trying to send it. Help!” This is a fairly common issue that we’ve heard a lot of users report through the blog, so we wanted to write a quick post and explain the easiest way to get out of this situation. E-mail messages can get stuck in the Outbox for a few different reasons, but the most common case...

We received a question from a reader named Eric week before last about how to write a Count(Distinct) query in Access. In other database applications such as SQL Server, Oracle, and MySQL, the Count(Distinct) aggregate is used to count the number of unique items in a given rowset. For example, consider a table on SQL Server named tblColors, such as: Color Value Red 5 Green 2 Blue 8 Orange 1 Red 8 Green 6 Blue 2 To get a count of the number of unique colors in the table, you could write a query such...

Earlier this autumn, we shipped enhancements to Office Web Apps based on your feedback, delivering new features such as the ability to view ink in OneNote Web App, merge and autofit cells in Excel Web App, and print directly from the browser in Excel Web App. Today, the SkyDrive team is announcing some updates that are also based on your requests. Today’s SkyDrive updates will make it easier than ever to share and collaborate on Office documents using Office Web Apps on SkyDrive.

With today’s SkyDrive improvements, you can share individual files stored on SkyDrive, not just folders. Also, you can easily collaborate on Office documents through SkyDrive with anyone, even if you don’t know their Windows Live ID. You can even share directly with friends on Facebook and LinkedIn.

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The installation of Outlook Social Connector is different from most downloads. Besides downloading Outlook Social Connector (for Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2003; it’s included in Outlook 2010), you must download provider files for each social network you want to connect to. Watch this short video to see how, and see the important links plus an overview of the Outlook Social Connector below.

Note: To use Facebook in the Outlook Social Connector, you must allow a third party application (which is the default setting). If you have edited these settings in Facebook, you may need to edit them again. On your Facebook home page, click Account, and then click Application Settings.

For more help, ask questions at Microsoft Answers.

--Doug Thomas

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Matt Shelton contributed today's post about how to use Out of Office and Automatic Replies to send email responses when you're away from the office. Matt, a senior writer, focuses on creating Office content for teachers and students.

If you can't reply to e-mails during the work day (or if you're away from your computer), you know how emails can pile up. And it can be frustrating when you email someone with a question and you get no response. For days. Only to find out later that they were on vacation.

Enter the Out of Office Assistant and Automatic Replies. You can send an automatic email response to anyone who emails you during the time you're away from your desk. If you're on vacation, in an extra-long meeting, or just taking a lunch break, use Out of Office to tell the sender where you are, when you'll be back, and who to contact in your absence.  Find out how ...

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(This post was first published in 2010. It's obvious from the number of hits this page gets that people's inboxes are still overflowing. We thought we'd share it again to help you out.) Hi, I am Roby Kurian, Product Manager for Outlook. How often do you ask yourself, “Where’s that message?” Whether you are a filer (you keep messages carefully organized in folders) or a piler (you keep all of your messages in your Inbox), these three tips can help you find that elusive message. Personally...

Join us every Tuesday for free webinars about how to use Office programs. You can watch the Office 15-Minute Webinars live, or view them later. They run 9:15 am-9:30 am Pacific time on Tuesdays with a live Q&A session to follow. We'll add links to previous recordings below as they become available. You can also download a calendar reminder for the series.

To join the meeting, click the link below after 9 am Pacific Time on the day of the webinar and read the instructions below if you need help connecting. We'll be online to help you solve any technical matters at 9am, and the webinar will start promptly at 9:15 am.

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Are you confused by how Excel handles percentage formatting, or by percentages in general? It's okay, you're not alone.

In this post, find out more about how Excel displays percentages, and learn basic techniques for calculating percent decrease, percent increase, and percent change.

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