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Should I "Link" or "Insert" My Images?
by Tim Campbell, editor —
W
hen inserting graphic images like clip-art or photographs, you can choose to link them or simply import them. What's the difference?

Inserting images
When you simply insert an image into your Word document, the program imports all of the image's information that it needs to print it. When you do this, your document's file size will grow. If you import a 500kb image into a 15kb document, the document will grow to approximately 515kb. If you add several images, it won't take long for your document to get quite big. Large documents take longer to e-mail, use more space on your hard drive and won't fit on floppy disks.

Linking and inserting images
When you link and insert an image (click here to learn how), most of the image's information will not be imported. You'll see the image in your document but, when you print it, the printer will look to the image file for the information it needs. The Word document and the image are invisibly linked. The positive side is that your Word document won't grow very much no matter how many images you link and insert. The negative side is that, if you break the link between the document and the image by moving either one, you'll have to reestablish the link or reimport the image for the document to print correctly.

Which is best for me?
If you have enough storage space and can easily move big files, I reccomend just inserting the image. It's much less hassle and you can share the documents with others without worrying about breaking links to images. If you have limited hard drive space and will print the document from your own system, then linking might be right for you. You can leave the images on a disk like a CD-ROM and then just make sure you have the disk inserted when you want to print the document (keeping the link intact).

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