How to hide graphic objects in Excel 2007
The Selection and Visibility task pane enables you not only to change the layering of various graphic objects in the worksheet but also to control whetherthey are hidden or displayed.
The way you open the Selection and Visibility task pane depends upon the type of graphic object you’ve selected in the worksheet:
- Charts: click the Selection Pane button on the Format tab of the Chart Tools contextual tab or press Alt+JOAP
- Text Boxes and Shapes: click the Selection Pane button on the Format tab under the Drawing Tools contextual tab or press Alt+JDAP
- Clip Art and Pictures: click the Selection Pane button on the Format tab under the Picture Tools contextual tab or press Alt+JDAP
- SmartArt: click Selection Pane on the Arrange button's drop-down palette on the Format tab of the SmartArt Tools contextual tab or press Alt+JOZAAP
After you open the Selection and Visibility task pane, you can temporarily hide any of the graphic objects listed by clicking its eye check box (to remove the eye icon). To remove the display of all the charts and graphics in the worksheet, click the Hide All button at the bottom of the Selection and Visibility task pane instead.
To redisplay a hidden graphic object, simply click its empty eye check box to put the eye icon back into it. To redisplay all graphic objects after hiding them all, click the Show All button at the bottom of the task pane.
If you hide all the charts and graphics in a worksheet by clicking the Hide All button and then close the Selection and Visibility task pane by clicking its close button, you’ll have no way of redisplaying this task pane so that you can bring back their display by clicking the Show All button. That’s because you have no graphic objects left to select in the worksheet and therefore no way to get the contextual tabs with their Selection Pane buttons to appear on
the Ribbon.
In this dire case, the only way I know to get back the Selection and Visibility task pane so that you can click the Show All button is to create a dummy (pardon my French) graphic object in the worksheet (such as an arrow or oval in the Shapes group on the Insert tab) and then click the Selection Pane button on the Format tab of its Drawing Tools contextual tab. With the
Selection and Visibility task pane open, click the Show All button to bring back the display of all the charts and graphics you want to keep and get rid of the still-selected dummy graphic object by pressing the Delete key (whew, that was a close one!).
Tags: clip art,smartart,wordart,worksheet
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