Skip to main content

The left-handed shortcuts

I normally muse about philosophical things on this blog, but this entry is specific to a very practical matter.  What are the most productivity enhancing keyboard shortucts (For Windows) that you can do solely with your left hand?  (Why solely with your left hand? Because (a) most of the cool shortcuts are left-handed, and (b) many of these shortcuts can benefit from also using the mouse, which most people use with their right hands.)  This is by no means an exhaustive list -- it's just a list of productivity-increasing keys that I use a lot.
I will put these together based on the "special" key that accompanies it.

1. Alt-tab.  If you don't know alt-tab, your productivity may as much as double for certain jobs.  Alt-tab allows you to switch between applications without using the mouse and without going to the taskbar. If you keep holding alt, you can tap tab and rotate through the open applications.  And if this doesn't make sense, try it.  Now, imagine you are trying to copy from one application and paste into another ... Woohoo!
1b. Ctrl-tab.  This does the same thing as alt-tab, but inside a single application that is tabbed (like Internet Explorer, Excel, etc.)

2. Ctrl-[key] (key: A, S, Z, X, C, V, T)
I assume most people know these, but they are extremely helpful, especially when modifying Office documents.
Ctrl-A: Select All.  If you want to copy everything or delete everything, select it all this way.
Ctrl-S: Save.  Instead of clicking the file, you just hit ctrl-S.  I do this nearly obsessively because I have lost too much work over the years.
Ctrl-Z: Undo.  If you want to go back, unstead of searching for that curvy arrow, just hit ctrl-Z. (Redo is usually ctrl-Y, but that requires a heck of a reach for the left hand.)
Ctrl-X: Cut.
Ctrl-C: Copy.
Ctrl-V: Paste.
Ctrl-T: Open a new tab (in an application that has tabs).

3. WindowsKey-[key] (key: [nothing], E, R, D)
WK-[nothing]: Hitting just the WindowsKey (the key with the curvy Windows icon) will bring up the Start menu.
WK-E: Open Windows Explorer (folders on the computer, not Internet Explorer)
WK-R: Open the "run" dialog. You can then type some neat things, like "calc" (to open the calculator), "notepad" (to open ... um ... notepad), "mspaint" (to open paint), or "msconfig" (to open an app to deal with startup items).
WK-D: Go to the desktop (i.e., minimize all applications).  This can be very helpful if you have a window that won't go away, for some reason.

4. Alt-[key]. The alt key mainly messes with menus. If you have an application that hides the menus, just hitting Alt will often bring the menu up. If you hit a key, you can usually look to whatever letter is underlined in a menu to bring up that option (like alt-F for File, or alt-A for Save As).
Alt-F4 closes the current application.  Ctrl-F4 closes the current tab, if the application has tabs).

5. Ctrl-Shift-Esc.  Open Windows Task Manager (the thing let shows you what applications are open and lets you close them).

I'm not going to detail FN keys because not all keyboards have them and they are very specific to the particular hardware -- but just know that the normal paradigm there is for whatever color the FN key is, there will be similarly colored icons in the functions key above (and maybe other keys, like arrows) that let things work together.  Sleeping, power options, display choice, etc., are usually controled by these combinations.

Enjoy!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to read the Bill of Rights

The legal rights in the Bill of Rights didn't exist until the 20th century Social media has been abuzz with the Bill of Rights, and in particular the 1st Amendment, recently. Many posts, explicitly or implicitly, trace the Bill of Rights to the Founders.  That's wrong and leads to a poor understanding. A proper reading of the Constitution and the law reveals that, while the text was written then, these rights did not apply even on paper to the states until 1868, in fact until the middle of the 20th century, or even into the 21st century for the 2nd Amendment. “It is a Constitution we are expounding.” The Constitution sets out principles and goals, structures and limitations, and we must never forget that . It is law -- the highest law of the land , in fact -- but it is not code , which is detailed and often attempts to be exhaustively complete and explicit. The Constitution was written to provide a framework of balances by a group of  flawed aristocrats trying to rebel from ano
Post a Comment
Read more

Election 2016: Why Hillary’s conflated scandals are unconvincing #ImWithHer

This is part of a series of posts on Election 2016 . To be honest, I’ve stopped listening to most of the scandals about Hillary. That’s not because I think she is perfect or would never do something scandalous, but because the noise of obvious crap, generated over 3 decades, has made me jaded about spending any time investigating stories by people who think Killary is a fascist Communist. To be clear, I think she is an imperfect human. We don’t subject most politicians to the kind of scrutiny that Hillary has faced – how much do we know about George and Laura’s relationship, or his struggles with addiction, for instance?  But she isn’t perfect.  I think she is a bit paranoid and has a tendency to “circle the wagons” at the slightest sign of problems, and I think she is a fierce competitor that swings first and asks questions later. Like all successful politicians, she is willing to spin the truth to meet her needs, and she comes across, in crowd settings, as a bit fake.  Unlik
Post a Comment
Read more

Astrologists and racists, or this is where the party ends

How are astrologists like racists?  There could be a funny one-liner response to that, I'm sure, but the answer I'm looking for is simple:  They are lazy thinkers. I'm going to spend a few paragraphs here doing a cursory job of debunking both viewpoints and showing why they are lazy, but I'm not going to go into much detail, as that's not the real point I want to make. Astrology:  Really?  You honestly think that 1/12th of the human race will have the same general set of experiences based on when they were born?  (This is assuming the "normal" Zodiac, though a similar thing can be said about, for instance, the Chinese Zodiac, and this is ignoring the silliness added in by distinguishing between "Sun signs" and "moon signs.")  Do you realize that these signs were based on people believing some quite inaccurate things about the stars (like virtually anything besides that they are gaseous giants that are light years away)?  Did you kno
2 comments
Read more