DigiTips are returning next week! 📢

Shân Saunders DigiTips Leave a comment

Since September 2023, the Digital Skills Team have been publishing weekly tips and tricks to help improve your Digital Skills one DigiTip at a time. So far, we’ve published 60 DigiTips from Microsoft shortcuts to digital wellbeing app suggestions!

We’ll be returning next week on Tuesday 29 April with a further 5 DigiTips, if you want to go back and look at previous DigiTips you can read them all from this webpage.

How can I follow the DigiTips?

If you want to keep up weekly with our DigiTips, there are a couple of different ways you can follow our DigiTips.

  1. You can bookmark this webpage and a new DigiTip will appear here at 10am each Tuesday during term time (Read DigiTip 1 if you’re unsure how to bookmark a webpage).
  2. If you want to receive an email notification each time, we post a new DigiTip, you can subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog.
  3. We also publish each DigiTip on Facebook and Instagram pages which you can access from the icons below. From there, you can follow our hashtags #TipiauDigiPA #AUDigiTips

DigiTip 60: Power up your PowerPoint! ⚡

Shân Saunders DigiTips, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Support Leave a comment

Have you ever struggled with presenting your PowerPoint online through sharing your screen? Did you know that you can present directly from PowerPoint to Teams? With DigiTip 60 – now you do! 

When you’re in your meeting and ready to share your slides – simply select the “present in Teams” button in your PowerPoint and present! 

View the short video below to see how easy it is: 

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!

DigiTip 59: Remember to Stay hydrated with the My Water 💧

Shân Saunders DigiTips Leave a comment

Forgetting to stay hydrated while at Uni or work? This DigiTip is for you. Staying hydrated is a major part of wellbeing as it influences how much energy you have and helps you to stay focussed. 

My Water has a free version which will send you notifications at set intervals reminding you to drink to reach your goal for the day. Alongside this you are also given statistics based on how you are doing for the week with your water intake. There’s also an Achievements page that shows what milestones you’ve hit and how to achieve more. When reporting what you have drank on the free version you are given the option of selecting water, coffee or tea which will return different amounts to your water progress based on the water balance of the drink. 

Below are some screenshots from the app that show some of these features. 

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!  

DigiTip 58: Take Ctrl of your Headings in Word ⌨️

Shân Saunders DigiTips, Microsoft Support, Microsoft Word Leave a comment

Sometimes, it can be a pain swapping from different headings in Word but with DigiTip 58 it doesn’t have to be a pain anymore!  

Use the simple shortcut: Ctrl + Shift + S to easily swap between all the different heading styles available in Word.

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!

Final reminder: Download your LinkedIn Learning Certificates 💾

Shân Saunders LinkedIn Learning Leave a comment

There is still just over a week until our subscription to LinkedIn Learning ends. If you have completed any training courses on LinkedIn Learning and wish to retain your certificate(s) of completion, you have just over a week to download them. You can view this short video for guidance of how to do this. 

Contact us with any questions 📧

International Day of Forests 🌲

Shân Saunders Digital creation, problem-solving and innovation, Digital proficiency and productivity, DigiTips, LinkedIn Learning Leave a comment

Today – 21st March 2025 – is International Day of Forests and to celebrate we’re revisiting all our blogposts and DigiTips related to nature! 

  1. Plant your Productivity with the Flora app! đŸŒź: Available on iOS and Android, Flora is an interactive productivity app where you can store to-do lists and build positive habits.
  2. DigiTip 40: Get More Connected to Nature with Seek by iNaturalist 🔎🌼: You may come across birds, plants, fungi, and amphibians that you can’t identify. Using image recognition technology, the Seek by iNaturalist app will help you take your knowledge of nature to the next level! 
  3. Nature at your fingertips: My favourite apps for exploring the outdoors 🍃🌻: To enhance your outdoor adventures, I’ve compiled a list of my favourite free apps that will hopefully spark your curiosity and deepen your appreciation for nature.
  4. DigiTip 4 – Increase your productivity whilst helping the planet with the Forest App 🌱: Do you want to increase your productivity whilst helping the planet? The Forest App will help reduce your procrastination and distractions whilst giving you the extra incentive to stay productive, by growing trees and earning virtual coins to unlock new plants depending on how long you have stayed productive for.

DigiTip 57: Counting Specific Data in Excel 🔢

Shân Saunders DigiTips, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Support Leave a comment

Wanted to count how many times a name appears in a column alongside other conditions in Excel? With DigiTip 57 we can show you the formula to get this done. 

First you will need data similar to that shown in the screenshot where you have multiple columns of information where you want to count how much of a certain criteria exists such as names or dates for example. 

To do this we are going to need to use the COUNTIFS function in the formula tab, this is shown in the screenshot below.  

This takes the criteria range which in the example is the column of names and then the criteria itself which in the example would be the name Chris at E2. Also include in the example is another criteria range of the column of gifts and the criteria of Chocolate. This will then go through all the information and count only when these two criteria are met.  

This could be useful on a larger scale for tracking any number of things that are happening on a spreadsheet. 

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!

DigiTip 56: Personal PowerPoint with Cameo 🎥

Shân Saunders DigiTips, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Support Leave a comment

If you want to take your presentations to the next level you could try inserting a cameo, learn how with DigiTip 56! 

A cameo is a recording of yourself talking through your slides and presenting your PowerPoint.  

You can view how to do this through the video below. 

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!

International Women’s Day 2025 #AccelerateAction

Shân Saunders Code First Girls, LinkedIn Learning Leave a comment

Today we celebrate International Women’s Day! The 2025 theme is #AccelerateAction and is an important message that focuses on speeding up the achievement of gender equality. At its current rate it is predicted that we won’t achieve gender equality until 2158 and so this International Women’s Day calls for us to work together to create a more inclusive world. You can view the resources below inspired by International Women’s Day. These include a selection of LinkedIn Learning videos and courses, please note that the University’s subscription to LinkedIn Learning finishes on 28th March 2025. If you have completed any training courses on LinkedIn Learning and wish to retain your certificate(s) of completion, please view our previous blogpost to learn more about this.  

  1. Code First Girls: Code First Girls is a free online service that is partnered with Aberystwyth University and is dedicated to providing coding courses to help women and non-binary people develop their coding skills. 
  1. What is equality? (3m 43s) 
  1. What is equity? (2m 19s) 
  1. Inclusive Tech: Closing the Pay Gap (53m) 
  1. Inclusive Female Leadership (40m) 
  1. Does inclusion really change the game in tech? (2m 22s) 
  1. The link between inclusion, equity, and allyship (2m 20s) 
  1. Unconscious bias (28m) 

If you have any issues accessing the LinkedIn Learning videos or courses, please contact the Digital Skills Team at digi@aber.ac.uk.  

DigiTip 55: Focus Mode in Windows 11 ⏱️

Shân Saunders Digital proficiency and productivity, DigiTips Leave a comment

Struggling to focus when you’re trying to get work done? DigiTip 55 has what you are looking for with focus mode in Windows 11. Focus mode is a new feature for Windows 11 that has multiple features to help you try to concentrate on your work. These include: a timer that can be set to whatever time you need with the default set to 30 minutes, hiding the badges on taskbar apps, hiding the flashing on taskbar apps and turning on do not disturb. 

To use this feature, you need to go to Setting -> System where you should see Focus. Once the options are selected as how you want them you just need to click ‘start focus session’ and a timer should appear in the corner of your screen which you can cancel or pause at any time. 

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!