Worlds

Uncharted

Microsoft Office Word 2007

These instructions may work for other versions of Word, but Word 2007 is what I have, so that's what I'm going to refer to throughout this tutorial.

To begin, you need to download the Word .docx file. The easiest way to do this is to click on the link in the e-mail you received, which will take you to the story's BetaWolf area (you'll be asked to log in to the site, if you aren't already). From there, you'll see a list of files available for the story. Right-click on the link for the chapter you're supposed to beta, then choose Save Target As... and Save the file to a directory on your computer. You can also get to the BetaWolf area by going to the story's main page and clicking on the blue BetaWolf Files link at the bottom of the story menu on the right (you'll need to be logged in to see the special button). Download the file as described above.

Next, open the file in Word. You should see something like this:

Click the Review tab and then click on the Track Changes button as shown below:

Select Track Changes from the drop-down list:

This will activate the Track Changes feature (you'll know it's active because the Track Changes button will remain highlighted).

Now you can directly add or delete text wherever you want. Assuming you don't change the default options, any lines that have edits will get a black vertical bar next to them, so I can be alerted to even the smallest change. Added text will appear red and underlined, so I'll even be able to detect new spaces, while deleted text will be turned red with a strikethrough line. (If the edits aren't red or aren't formatted with underlining and strikethroughs, please click the Track Changes button, select Change Tracking Options... from the drop-down list, and make the appropriate changes.)

If you don't have any actual edits for the text, but instead just want to comment, you can still add your comments using the above method. Just put them in parentheses (...) or put the word "COMMENTS:..." in front of them, whichever makes the most sense, as long as I can tell a comment from a direct edit.

However, there is a comments feature available, which I prefer.

Select the text you want to comment on (if it's a whole paragraph or longer section, just select the first few words where your comments apply) and click the New Comment button:

A comment balloon will be created in the margin where you can type your comments so they appear separate from the text:

And that's basically it.

When you're done with your review, save the file (I'd appreciate it if you appended your name/username to the file name, ex: "NG_01.docx" should become "NG_01_Username.docx"), attach it to an e-mail, and hit Send.