8 Tips: Using Zoho Writer

After finding the Zoho Office Suite, I wanted to tell all of my clients about it. But unlike MS Office, there did not appear to be much documentation or even many references to using it that were easily found on the internet. So I am starting a series about using the different applications in the suite. Today, I will be focusing on 10 things all noobs to Zoho Writer should know.

1. Assign Titles to Documents – When you create a document, you will see the title ‘Untitled’ in the top tab. If you click on the tab, you will be able to assign a title to your document. This is not a requirement, since it will be titled with the name you save it as. I like to do this first thing so that I have this task out of the way.
2. Using Templates – There are a number of predefined templates that you are able to use. What will confuse some users is the list on the left hand column. This is a list of templates that you have added to your library. If you would like to choose a new template, click the link at the top of page which is titled ‘Template Library’. This will allow you to add any of these templates to your personal library. You can find a template that suits your needs and select the link on the right that is titiled ‘Add to my Templates’. This gives you access to the template from Writer.
3. Maximize the Editor – If you don’t need the list on the left side and you would like more working area for writing, you can select the top-left pointing arrow beside the document title tag. This provides the user with a near full screen editor.
4. Export – Zoho has far surpassed Microsoft with the options they provide by default for exporting your documents. Before using this option, be sure to save your document as the export function appears to only export what has been saved. The options that exist are…
   1. Word Document – This allows you to save your document in word 97-2003 document format. This means that you can create your document from anywhere and still export it to word format to share your document with anyone who requires it be in word format.
   2. SXW – This is the OpenOffice and StarOffice format when saving a text document.
   3. PDF – Great format that can be opened by anyone who has the Adobe Reader installed. This is a great format if you have a document you don’t want others to edit.
   4. ODT – This is another OpenOffice and StarOffice extension.
   5. Rich Text Format – MS Word and Wordpad documents are often saved to this format.
   6. Text File – Saves the file as a generic text file. You will lose most formatting when using this export option.
   7. HTML – Great option if you would like to put you document on the internet.
5. Desktopize Widget of Zoho – Using the desktop widgets, you can edit your documents, spreadsheets, and presentations on your desktop rather than opening your internet browswer.
6. History – Allows the user to revert back to a previously saved version of the current document. This can be very useful when you have large documents and you want to go back to a time before you made large quantities of modifications.
7. Modifing Tables – After adding a table to your document, writer makes it very easy to add additional rows and columns to your table. This is something that I always have trouble teaching others to do. With Zoho Writer, it is just a matter of a click or two and you have made your changes. By clicking on the row or column where you would like to add additional items, you are presented with a right and left or up and down arrow as well as an x. The right and left arrows add a column and the up and down adds a new row. The x will delete the column or row.
8. Publish – The user is able to publish to a blog, make the document public, or add to doc roll. Publishing to a blog will post your document content into your blog as a post. Making the document public allows other Zoho users to view your document. The doc roll provides one of the coolest features I have ever seen. Zoho provides you with the javascript code to have your documents listed on your website.

There is a ton of other options to explore in Zoho writer, so have a great time exploring all the features.