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About this lesson

Learn to quickly preserve files and easily access your most used documents.

Lesson versions

Multiple versions of this lesson are available, choose the appropriate version for you:

2013, 2016.

Exercise files

Download the Word document used in the video tutorial and try the lesson yourself.

File, Recent.docx
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Quick reference

File, Recent

The “Recent Files” list is a time saver, especially when you pin your most used document to the list.

When to use

Rather than searching repeatedly for your most used document or file location, use the push pin to lock it onto the top of the list. When it is no longer necessary, just click the pin to turn it off.

Instructions:

1.There are two places to find recently used documents:

a.Upon opening Word, the left blue panel will show your recent documents.

b.If already using a document, click File, Open and the list of Recent documents will show on your screen.

2.To keep your favourite documents at the top of the list, simply click the Push Pin that appears when you float the mouse over the document name.

3.To save your favourite file locations at the top of the list, select “Computer” and then click the Push Pin that appears when you float the mouse over the file location on the list.

  • 00:04 Hello, what you're seeing on my screen is the opening screen to Microsoft Word, and
  • 00:09 I wanna draw your attention to the left-hand blue panel that says recent.
  • 00:13 Now on this list is the most recent documents that I personally have
  • 00:16 worked on.
  • 00:17 Now notice what's happening when I float my mouse down on this list,
  • 00:20 a little pushpin appears on the right-hand side.
  • 00:23 Now they only appear if you float your mouse on there.
  • 00:26 And that pushpin basically is going to allow me to pin a document,
  • 00:30 that I'm using on a regular basis, to the top of this list.
  • 00:33 So, I'll go ahead and push this tiny pin and you can observe what happens.
  • 00:37 There, it's got its own little section called pinned, and
  • 00:40 then the other ones are underneath the today section.
  • 00:43 So what if I wanna pin another one?
  • 00:45 Just go ahead and click another pushpin, and there it is.
  • 00:48 All right, I do have this file folder here that says open other documents, and
  • 00:52 over here on the right-hand side,
  • 00:54 these are all the brand new templates that are absolutely free to use.
  • 00:58 You don't have any copyright infringement, and you have full access to use these for
  • 01:03 personal or business or whatever you want, simply because you have a registered
  • 01:08 copy of Microsoft on your screen, on your computer.
  • 01:12 Well, the beauty is once you find one you like, you can pin it.
  • 01:15 This one I'll unpin, and then maybe I decide wait a minute,
  • 01:18 I want that one, so I'll pin again.
  • 01:21 Maybe you like this report layout, pin it and it moves itself to the top.
  • 01:24 Maybe you're done with this one, you can unpin it.
  • 01:27 So you can find favorite one's you want to use and you can pin those.
  • 01:30 So the moral of the story is look for these tiny little pushpins.
  • 01:34 The interesting thing is they don't even show up until you float your mouse on
  • 01:38 the title and then the little pushpin will show up on the side.
  • 01:42 So that is true for these little tiny files, for the file list over here on
  • 01:47 the left hand side, and now let me go ahead and open up a blank document.
  • 01:52 And I wanna show you the file open section.
  • 01:55 So if I click File, and then open, it's already on open, notice,
  • 01:59 my recent files are right here, selected on the left, and sure enough,
  • 02:04 they're pinned right over here.
  • 02:07 So, if you're done with these, done working on this particular file,
  • 02:10 just unpin it, and it goes back into the list right here.
  • 02:13 It's really a very nice and convenient way to keep your active,
  • 02:18 current files at the top of the list.
  • 02:21 So, less clicking is always a happier computer user.
  • 02:25 All right, one more thing I wanna show you is on this PC section,
  • 02:29 when I click this PC, this shows me other places that I've got files stored.
  • 02:35 And basically these, in previous versions, did have pushpins,
  • 02:40 so I can actually pin a file location to the list.
  • 02:43 The only reason I'm putting this out to you is that in case you knew that,
  • 02:47 you're going to be looking for these pushpins and
  • 02:49 I'm sorry, you're going to be disappointed if they are not there anymore.
  • 02:52 I myself am very disappointed, but
  • 02:54 at the same time, at least we still have the recent,
  • 02:57 and we still have the pushpins right over there, which are very convenient.
  • 03:01 All right, as long as you are aware of that, that you can pin your files,
  • 03:05 we're ready to move on.
  • 03:06 Thank you.

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