How to Create & Use Wordles

Wordle on Performance People Webpage (created at www.wordle.net)

I have previously written about what Wordles can used to achieve (click here for the post).  I thought it might be useful to explain how you can make one yourself, and how to transfer it to Word or PowerPoint.

Create a Wordle

1. Open the Wordle webpage at www.wordle.net (or Google 'wordle').
2. Click on Create in the sentence 'Create your own'.
3. Paste some text into the large box on the screen.
4. Click on the Go button.
5. And check out your Wordle.

Edit a Wordle

Click 'Randomize' to see your Wordle presented in a number of ways.

You cannot add words (or 'grow' them by duplicating them multiple times) without going back to the Create window and repasting your text.

You can remove words by right clicking on the word and selecting 'Remove word'.  For example, a word which appeared in a header on every page may not be suited to the topic of your Wordle.

Browse through the menus immediately above your Wordle to see what you can change.  I particularly like the 'Edit Custom Palette' option.

At the bottom of the Language menu is the option 'Show word count'.  This brings up a box with the number of times each word appears.  You can re-sort the list by clicking on the column titles.  In case you are curious too, I pasted more than 25,000 words into Wordle to see whether there was a limit.  I did not find a limit.

Transfer a Wordle Elsewhere
Once you are satisfied with your Wordle, you will probably want to use it.  The Wordle creation screen includes options to 'Open in Window' or 'Print'.  However, these may not be sufficient.  You might like to put the image into a Word or PowerPointit file, or save an an image file or a PDF file.

To create an image file, or put it into Word or PowerPoint as an image, you can use a screen capture utility, like the useful Snipping Tool in Windows (Vista or later).

1. Click 'Open in Window'.
2. Drag the bottom right corner of the window out-and-down to fill your screen (to get the highest resolution screen capture you can).
3. Launch the Snipping Tool using StartMenu>AllPrograms>Accessories>Snipping Tool (or on the keyboard, WindowsKey>snip>enter).
4. Click in the top right corner and drag the pink box to envelope the Wordle.  (You may need to change the snip type to 'rectangular snip'.)
5. The Wordle is now in your clipboard, and you can paste it into a Word or PowerPoint file.  Alternatively, you can use the Save function in the Snipping Tool to save the image as a JPG file.

To create a PDF, you can use a PDF creator, like the useful and free CutePDF Writer. Once installed, CutePDF Writer creates PDF files by pretending to be a printer.  (Click the 'Print' button on the Wordle creation screen; then select the printer called CutePDF Writer from the mini-menu on the Print box.  You will get another box in which you specify where the PDF file should be saved.)


All the best creating and using Wordles!

...Geoff
www.performancepeople.com.au