Word 2007[c] The Missing Manual

9.5. Navigating with Hyperlinks

Hyperlinks are those bits of underlined text or pictures that, when you click them, take you to a new place, like another Web page. Most people never think of adding links to their Word documents, because they're thinking of them as printed documents. However, if some of your readers may read your work onscreen, consider adding hyperlinks (Figure 9-16).

Word's hyperlinks are identical to the hyperlinks on Web sites. They even use the same programming language (HTML). Hyperlinks you create in Word stay intact if you save the file in a format other than Wordlike a PDF file or a Web page. And since other Office programs also use HTML, if you copy or cut the text and paste it in another document in a program such as Excel or PowerPoint, the hyperlink will work just fine in the new document.

Links aren't just for Web pages anymore. Word lets you make hyperlinks that go all sorts of places:

• Locations in your document . If your document refers to another section, add a link so your readers can jump right there instead of scrolling.

• Other documents on your computer or network . If you're working with a group of people on an office network, hyperlinks to related shared documents can be very effective. When you click the link to a shared document, Word opens that document even if it's not on your computer, as long as you have permission to open it.

• Documents on the Web . Whatever topic you're writing about, you can find related Web pages, photos, maps, news items, and blogs on the Internet. If you can find them, you can create hyperlinks for your readers.

• Email forms . You can give your readers an easy way to interact with you or your company by inserting email hyperlinks in your document. When they Ctrl+click the link, a properly addressed email form appears. All they have to do is fill in their comments (Figure 9-17).

To create a hyperlink to any of the above places, the steps are almost the same. You select the text you want to turn into a hyperlink, and then, in the Insert Hyperlink box, you tell Word what to link it to:

1. Select the text for the link .

   Choose text that gives your readers a good clue to where the link goes. Two or three words is usually enough to catch your readers' attention.

2. Go to Insert Links Hyperlink (Alt+N, I or Ctrl+K) to open the Insert Hyperlink dialog box .

   The Insert Hyperlink box looks much like a standard Windows Open file box, but there are some significant differences (Figure 9-18). In fact, the box is something of a chameleon and changes when you click the buttons on the left side.

3. On the left, in the "Link to" box, choose the type of link you want to create .

   You have several options:

   • Existing File or Web Page is the button to click if you want to link to another Word document on your own computer or network, or if you want to link to a Web page. Just to the right of the "Look in" drop-down menu, click the folder icon to browse your computer or network for documents (as shown in Figure 9-18). Double-click the document you want to link to. The Insert Hyperlink box closes , and Word creates the link.

     To link to a Web page, click the Internet icon in the upper-right corner (it looks like a globe under a magnifying glass) to open your Web browser and go to the Web page you wish to link to. After you've found the page in your browser, go back to the Insert Hyperlink box and once again click the Existing File or Web Page button. Word adds the address in your Web browser to the Address box. (It begins with http:// , as do all good Web addresses.) Click OK to close the box and create the hyperlink.

   • Click Place in this Document if you're creating a link to help readers jump around in a long document. Within a document, Word can create links to either headings or bookmarks, and shows you a list of your choices. (If you don't have anything for Word to attach the link to, click Cancel to close the dialog box and create a bookmark, as described in the next section.)

   • Create New Document lets you create a hyperlink to a document you haven't even started yet. When you click Create New Document, the Insert Hyperlink box changes. Type the name of the new document you want to create in the " Name of new document" text box, and then click OK. Word creates and saves your new document on the spot. You can go back and add text to it later.

   • Email Address creates a mailto hyperlink in your document. When you choose this option, the Edit Hyperlink box changes, as shown in Figure 9-18, so you can type the email address you want to link to. It's also helpful (but not necessary) to provide a Subject for the email. Click OK to close the box and create the link.

9.5.1. Inserting Bookmarks

Bookmarks, which mark a spot in your document, may seem like a somewhat mild-mannered Word tool, but more power is hidden under their Clark Kent exterior than you may expect. Bookmarks come in handy in long documents because so many other features depend on them:

• Browsing by bookmark . You give each bookmark a name when you create it, and you see those names listed in the Go To dialog box (Home Editing Go To). You can then use these bookmarks to hop from place to place in your document, as described in Section 2.3.4.2.

• Indexing . Because bookmarks are based on selected text, you can create a bookmark that includes several pages. In this way, you can use bookmarks to create page ranges for building indexes, as described earlier in this chapter.

• Hyperlinks . When you create a hyperlink (Section 9.5) to a specific point in your document, Word needs something to anchor the link to. That can be a heading or a bookmark that you've created at any point in the text.

• Cross-references . When you create cross-references in your documents, you can link to headings, but what if you want to link to specific text within a topic? You can create a cross-reference to any part of your document, by simply creating a bookmark first, and then referencing the bookmark. (More on cross-references in the next section.)

• Macros . These mini-programs that automate Word tasks also frequently use bookmarks. Say you create a macro that performs a task with the text from a particular part of your document; you need to be able to identify the text. You can do that by creating a bookmark. The macro uses the bookmark's name to do its magic. For more on Word's macros, see Section 19.2.

Detailed tips on how to create and use bookmarks are in Section 2.3.4, but in a nutshell , here's how to quickly insert one into your document: Just select some text, and then go to Insert Links Bookmark (or press Alt+N, K). Proceed as shown in Figure 9-19.