Thesis and Dissertation

This page contains a hodgepodge of useful information to help you with your document.  Scroll through to find step-by-step instructions for a variety of situations.

Click on the HELP! tab for style manual and citation resources.

Copy an Excel 2016 chart to another Office application

Provides instructions on how to paste an Excel image into a Word document without getting error messages.

Update or remove a broken link to an Excel worksheet

If you've copy and pasted an Excel graphic into a Word doc, then there's a very good chance that the Word doc will give an error message when emailed to someone else.  To fix this, break the link to the original Excel document that you copied from.

• Right-click on the image.
• Select the CROP feature that pops up.
• Click and hold down on one of the thick, black lines that appears on the sides and corners of the image.
  • Drag this in to crop. 
  • Let go when you think the image is cropped enough, then click anywhere on the page to de-select the image.

• Click on the VIEW tab.
• Click on Gridlines.  Now you can easily see if any tables, figures, or text is outside the margins.

How to view hidden table gridlines

When adjusting a table to make content fit better, it helps to see the hidden vertical and horizontal lines.  The easiest way to do this is:

• Click anywhere on the table.
• Click on the LAYOUT tab that appears at the top of the screen.
• Click on View Gridlines. 

How to repeat a table's headers onto a second page

Tables often contain so much data that they span two or more pages in a document.  When this happens, the table's headers need to repeat on each continued page so that readers can easily reference them.  The easiest way to repeat headers is:

• Highlight the row(s) that contain the table's header.
• Right-click on the table.
• Select Table Properties.
• Select the Row tab.
• Make sure Repeat as header row at the top of each page is selected.
• Click OK.

Template users can easily delete unwanted sections from their documents:

• Click on the SHSU tab.
• Click on Navigation Pane to open it.
• Right-click on the item you wish to delete.
• Select Delete.  This should remove that section from your document.

MAC's versus PC's:  Using Remote Desktop

All students have access to SHSU’s Remote Desktop, which they may use to access a Windows version of Microsoft Office.  Tutorials about Remote Desktop can be found on this web page http://www.shsu.edu/dept/it@sam/technology-tutorials/remote_desktop/.  This allows you to log into Remote Desktop using your Mac, and then work on your Microsoft document in a Windows environment.  Just be aware that the connection may be slow depending on your internet service.