today we're talking about google docs
not to be confused with google drive
they are not the same thing and don't
worry i'll talk a little bit more about
that later so now that i've cleared that
up or maybe created some more confusion
on with the show
[Music]
hey friends i'm tasia custodia and
welcome back to my youtube channel where
i share tech tips app reviews and so
much google content it should be illegal
so today i'm going to cover how google
docs is different from google drive and
then i'm going to share the best google
docs features for 2022. we have a lot to
cover so you ready then let's go
so first things first
google drive and google docs often get
confused and as i said so eloquently at
the top they are not the same thing so i
want you to think of google drive as
your storage unit and your storage unit
contains all kinds of different files
here's what i mean
so these files can be sheets slides
forms photos and more and you can
organize all of these files how you see
fit within google drive so google docs
are one of these file types that are
created stored and shared within google
drive so a google doc is basically
google's answer to microsoft word though
as you'll see it's a lot more than that
are you following now okay good so now
that you understand the difference
between google drive and google docs
let's jump right into some of the best
google docs features and we're going to
start with the all new page list view
so pageless format lets you remove the
boundaries of a page so here's a
document of mine that's not pageless and
here's what it looks like in page list
view all you have to do is head to file
then page setup then select page lists
and tap on ok
with page list enabled there are no page
breaks and images adjust to your screen
size wide tables are viewable by
scrolling left and right
now when you do this it could look
different than what you're seeing on my
screen and that's because changing a
page list is document specific
meaning everyone who interacts with your
document will see the pageless view but
changing the setting for one document
isn't going to impact the other
documents you own so i changed this doc
to pageless but if i toggle over to
another dock of mine you can see i have
not changed that specific dock to page
list so it's the original pages view
but that's not all you can do with
pageless view you can actually select a
custom text width too
so from a pageless dock if you head to
view
then select text width you can select a
width of narrow medium or wide now this
particular text setting will apply to
all pageless docs that you view but it
won't affect what others see
so you're just changing the text width
on your end it's also important to know
that some features like columns page
numbers headers and footers and so on
are not available on pageless view so if
you need those you're going to have to
switch back to the original pages view
now before we move on to more 2022
specific google docs features i want to
take a minute to give a special mention
to three features that
aren't actually new to 2022 but they're
little-known features that could change
the way you use google docs and i want
to start with the text substitution
feature this is something that's going
to allow you to automatically replace
your text in google docs
so all you have to do is head on up to
the menu bar
and click on tools
then choose preferences from this pop-up
window click on substitutions
in this pop-up you should have a whole
whack of substitutions already populated
for you but to add your own custom ones
just type them in at the top so let's
say you want a short form for the phrase
youtube video in the replace field let's
type in ytv
and then in the width field let's type
in youtube video
and then just hit on ok
now every time you type ytv
boom it automatically changes to youtube
video for you
and you can do this trick for any short
form or phrase that you want and by the
way any new substitutions you create
will always be added to the bottom of
this list for you if you ever want to
turn them off or change them
and always make sure that the automatic
substitutions option is toggled on
all right now let's learn another great
google doc feature did you know that you
can automatically change capitalization
quickly in your dock well you can and
this is going to save you so much time
so let's say you use google docs to take
notes during a meeting and you don't
have time to capitalize things properly
rather than go back and capitalize each
individual letter one at a time you can
do this much quicker select the text you
want to capitalize
and then head on up to format and hover
over the text option then hover over the
capitalization option here you can
select the desired type of caps that you
want so lowercase uppercase or title
case the capitalization will change
automatically for you
easy as that okay up next is the ability
to make a copy of your google docs
directly so instead of sharing your
precious google doc that you don't trust
another soul with or making copy upon
copy on your own end you can actually
share your doc directly and force the
user that's opening it to make a copy on
their end here's how it works so of
course you could take a bunch of extra
clicks and head to file
and then select make copy in order to
make a copy but then from there you'd
have to share the copy out and you'd
have like a bunch of copies stored on
your drive and it really becomes this
whole thing so instead of you making
your own copies you can easily set it so
someone else has to make a copy in order
to access your dock so first things
first this is important you want to make
sure that in your share settings that
they are set to anyone with a link or
public in order for this url trick to
work then let's head on up to our url
and see here at the end where it says
edit we're simply going to replace the
word edit with the word copy
i swear to you it is that simple now you
can just copy and paste this url
wherever you need to whether it's to
share it with a colleague add to your
website pop it into an email whatever it
is you can just share this link
so now when a user clicks on this new
link they're going to be prompted to
make a copy of the file once they do
this a copy will be made and added to
their google drive how neat is that
by the way i realize this is just a
google docs video but this same url
trick works with sheets and slides too
okay so now let's move on to some more
google doc features for 2022 and this
next feature is made possible by
google's smart canvas
google introduced smart canvas in 2021
at their google i o event and it's
really a bunch of new features that make
docs even more interactive and
collaborative and smart now many of
these smart canvas features announced
are purely for google workspace users
and that's a paid service but there are
a couple great freebies available to
those of us who don't have workspace
so one of the cool smart canvas features
that's available to free users is
google's smart chips think of this as
tagging to the next level
with smart chips you can not only tag
people using the at symbol followed by a
name
but you can use the at symbol to get
information on files dates and events as
well so as you can see you just need to
type at
and then a search menu is going to
appear for you to narrow this down you
can either search through the
suggestions in the list or enter letters
numbers or symbols so for example
let's add a date so you could just type
in at today or tomorrow or yesterday or
even a specific date
but see here the date appears so just
hit on tab to select that date now
you've created a smart chip that you can
hover over to view related information
and you can simply click on the chip in
order to edit it plus you can head to
the settings gear from here to edit the
date format if you want so again if you
want to add a smart chip for a document
rather than a date just hit your at
symbol
and then search for the document you
want to add
and then when you find it just hit tab
to insert that smart chip the cool thing
with smart chips is that they are
dynamic so if i were to update this
document we just added as a smart chip
this chip will always link to obviously
the most up-to-date version of the
document now remember this works for
people files lists media headlines
calendar events page components and more
now something else to note is that say
you put a link into your google doc
you'll automatically be prompted to hit
tab if you want to add that link as a
smart chip pretty neat now an honorable
mention here is google's new inclusive
language feature now this is like a big
upgrade to their assistive writing
feature now there's a butt and it's a
big butt this is not yet live on my free
google account so this may just be a
paid workspace feature
but it's a good one for sure
so this new inclusive language tool
helps remove gendered language or
ableist language automatically so during
last year's google i o we were shown an
example of this in action and they
actually used the term chairman and we
were given the option to use chairperson
or chair instead which is a
gender-neutral alternative
now this goes beyond that one tiny
example but here's the thing it's still
not an active feature for me in my free
google account so if you have a paid
google workspace account let me know if
this inclusive language feature is
working for you but if you have a free
google account give it a try and also
let me know if you have this feature or
not i don't know if it's just a glitch
or not but it would be a real shame to
limit this inclusivity feature to only
paid users so i'm coming to you for help
we'll get to the bottom of this together
so those are the best google docs
features for 2022 and now i want to hear
from you what are your favorite google
docs features and why let everyone know
in the comments below as always thank
you so much for watching if you like
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thanks so much for watching see you next
time