how can I show a textbox (including bullets) in transparant to other items as 
such that it appears inactive or not important ?

I'd probably put a shape on top of it. Fill the shape with the background 
color, then set that to semitransparent.

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"Roland" <Roland@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message 
news:D303B906-B0A9-4B2C-A0D7-7271B32A4EE7@microsoft.com...
> how can I show a textbox (including bullets) in transparant to other items 
> as
> such that it appears inactive or not important ? 

=?Utf-8?B?Um9sYW5k?= <Roland@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in
news:D303B906-B0A9-4B2C-A0D7-7271B32A4EE7@microsoft.com: 
> how can I show a textbox (including bullets) in transparant to other
> items as such that it appears inactive or not important ?

If the background is not solid, you can try this trick, which unfortunately 
makes the box uneditable (make a backup copy somewhere).

Make the box's fill a trasparent copy of the textbox and delete the text to 
make only the fill visible:

1) Select the textbox
2) Copy it to clipboard
2) Check that no automatic size adjustments are on
3) Create an image fill for the textbox, from Clipboard
4) Make the fill transparent
5) Delete the contents (text) of the textbox