Tip 486: Flashing Office Orb

I thought I covered this tip last fall but can’t find it in the archives, so here it is. If it’s a repeat, sorry.

For some reason, a lot of new Office 2007 users have a hard time figuring out how to save documents. It happens too often to pass it off as a user problem. A few can’t figure out how to stop the annoying flashing icon. I’m convinced its not a “user problem” but a usability problem – its not obvious enough that the Office orb replaces the File menu.

My story:

My daughter attends college about 3 hours away and her computer was overheating. Rather than try it fix it from a distance, I ordered her a new system. When we spoke on the phone, she said she loved Vista and Office 2007, especially the ‘new citation stuff’ but she kept complaining about trying to save documents in other locations. Every time this came up, I mentioned Save as and we changed the subject. A few weeks later, I saw her in person. As we’re chatting over lunch, she again complains that saving to two locations is a PITA, and “oh, spell check is funky and doesn't work quite right”. As usual, I said to use Save as. She said she hadn't found it. Ah! Now I see the problem and told her the File menu was replaced by the Office icon menu… she seemed to ignore me and goes on to say she likes the Save icon and uses it and the undo button a lot. At least she’s using the icons on the Quick Access bar…

I asked her if the Office icon was flashing. She said yes. I asked if she ever thought to click it, she said she did when she first got it but nothing happened so she figured it was supposed to flash. (I wonder what the record is for orb flashing. Hers flashed for more than 30 days.)
A few weeks later I received an email from a former client who just got a new computer with Vista and Office 2007. He complained that he couldn’t find anything in Office but didn’t elaborate. Remembering my daughter, I had my suspicions that it was the same issue and related her story. Problem solved. Since then I’ve had several more users who couldn’t find the File menu or just asked how to stop that annoying flash.

So… for those new to Office 2007:

1. The Office orb replaces the file menu and flashes to get your attention. Double click it. Hard. Keep clicking until you see the menu fly out.
2. While the orb is flashing there is a bug that keeps spell check from working. (It may be fixed in SP1.)

For those who have Office 2007… you are either laughing or saying "damn, I don't feel so stupid after all". :)

Published March 11, 2008. Last updated on June 17, 2011.

Related posts:

If you upgraded to Office 2007 and are having trouble finding the commands you need, there are interactive flash "cheat sheetTip 427: Find Commands in Office 2007 Tip 379: Office 2007 and OE Spell Check Beginning with some versions of Office 2000, activation is required if you want to continue to use Office applications after 50 usTip 53: Saving your Office Activation Outlook supports spell checking in tasks, contacts, email, posts but not in Notes. This is because Notes uses a much simpler richTip 388: Spell-check Notes