Stupid Windoze tricks...

[the stranger]

I'm sure many others like myself are self-taught computer users. And every once in a while somebody will show me a trick that I didn't know, which usually is something obvious. Anyway, here's some examples...

 

Right click on the taskbar and tile the windows (I use to actually sit and manually size two windows until my buddy showed me this one...)

 

Tab to go to next entry box...(he showed me that one , too. This is probably not even windows, but some typing tip I missed...i skipped that class...it was get high or go to typing...in 10th grade, that's not even a choice. )

 

ctrl+v = paste....duh...can you believe I didn't know some of this stuff?

 

----

 

What other kind of obvious stuff am I missing?

[Dak Lander]

Use Windowz Paint to resize pictures without needing another program.

Open Paint and the picture. Select Image and then Stretch/Skew. In the Stretch windows input some %age you want to resize the picture. Make sure to use the same number is each window or the ration will not be correct.

[BOOKUMDANO]

Of course, the most useful music tip is that thing posted here a few years ago where it was shown Windows is a full blown "professional" polyphonic synthesizer and loop machine (or something). That one was hilarious. Wish I could remember where that info was.

[dman]

Right click in the taskbar select "new toolbar",when prompted make a folder in My documents or wherever name it SC and drag your desktop shortcuts into the SC folder. Now your shortcuts will appear in the taskbar folder. I do this with the programs I don't use all the time, it cleans up the desktop but keeps them at reach.

 

I also create a toolbar folder for the manuals of the programs I use most often so if I want to look up something it's right there.

[Billster]

Right click on the start button for search and explore choices instead of the regular menu.

 

Turn the monitor upside down so the menu bar is across the top and pretend you are using a Mac ... until Windows crashes

[Sp3nc3r]

Originally posted by Billster:

Right click on the start button for search and explore choices instead of the regular menu.

 

Turn the monitor upside down so the menu bar is across the top and pretend you are using a Mac ... until Windows crashes

ROTFLMAO....

 

Aah. A great way to end a Friday afternoon. Thanks for the chuckle, Billster!

 

Cheers!

Spencer

[KenElevenShadows]

Originally posted by the stranger:

Right click on the taskbar and tile the windows (I use to actually sit and manually size two windows until my buddy showed me this one...)

I didn't know that! Thanks!

 

On Mozilla, I use to make the text larger, and to make it smaller.

 

Control A highlights all the text.

Control C is "Copy"

Control V is, as you pointed out, "Paste".

[the stranger]

Another good one is the quick launch. I figured out how to get stuff in there back in win98, and it was the first thing I did when I got my XP machine. Just ask Phait!

[Phait]

Huh?

 

I really wish you could tab to form fields in OS X - you can't and it just annoys me!

[theblue1]

Windows-key-D (in XP) minimizes all windows at once (revealing the desktop) and hitting it again pops them all back up. But if you minimize them all and then hit Alt-Tab only the last window open will reappear.

 

Holding the Alt-Tab combo for a moment will bring up the task-switcher utility.

 

Alt-F4 will close the current program group. Ctrl-F4 closes only the current window (in, say, a multi-window program.

 

Ctrl-Tab will change windows inside a multi-window application.

 

The silly thing is that there ought to be ONE place in Windows where you can look up all those shortcuts.

[Billster]

Phait, huh? to you too. You can tab through form fields in OSX. What programs are you talking about? I tab all day in Mozilla and Digital Performer.

 

I would have tendonitis from all the mousing if I couldn't use keyboard commands in DP.

[Bill Roberts]

Here is an easy one, often overlooked.

 

If you have a window full of file folders open and you want to find a file that starts with the letter "S", (or any letter) instead of scrolling, just type "s"

 

Takes you to all the "esses"

[Robman2]

(cue)

 

The voice of Cher's Grandad in Moonstruck "I'm so confused"

[Phait]

Bill - I can't tab to form fields in any web browser. It'll just tab to the URL bar or the main window or frames (if used).

[Billster]

Phait, place the cursor in the first field using the mouse, then tab from there...

[Phait]

Actually what I forgot to say was I cannot tab to the form buttons. The fields, yeah. I meant the buttons. I can do this in Windows, not OS X. In Windows I usually tab to the submit button and hit space.

[Billster]

Yeah, that's vaguely annoying... Many programs default to use the "enter" key on the extended portion of the keyboard (the numerical pad) if the carriage return (typewriter reference! ) key is not committed to that function (like when you can use it in text boxes).

[mars_dup1]

Originally posted by Billster:

Turn the monitor upside down so the menu bar is across the top and pretend you are using a Mac ... until Windows crashes

Right click on the taskbar and unlock. Drag it to the top of the screen. Right click on the desktop, take off "auto arrand", put your "My Computer" top right, Recycle Bin bottom. More like a Mac. Download "Object Dock". Even more like a Mac.

 

Thanks for the "New Toolbar" tip - cool! You can do something similar in OS X - can't remember the details.

[Bill Roberts]

I deleted my recycle bin. If I delete anything, it is toast.

 

Another annoying folder that I got "rid" of.

[deanmass]

Here is my list of must quickies;

 

shift + DELETE key to bypass the recycle bin ( a bit less risky than nuking recycle.

 

Use CNTRL on Windows or the APPLE key on mac, command transfer.

 

Z-undo

X-cut (remove and copy to ram)

C-copy (duplicate selected text/file)

V-paste

B-bold

I-italicize

U-underline

 

TAB generally will ALWAYS move you to the next open 'space', be it spreadsheet, online form, selection boxes, etc.

SHIFT-TAB will move you BACKWARDS through the same things (mac or PC, btw)

In windows explorer, CTRL CLICK allows you to select NON CONCURRENT files (i.e. this one, that one from a list)

SHIFT and the up down arrows will allow you to select chunks of concurrent files, i.e. you search for all excel files (*.xls) and click the top one, hold shift, then arrow down to the last one you want. MUCH better than mousing in general.

 

There are so many things like this, and most are worth learning. No matter how cool a mouse/trackball/pointer is, and keystroke is ALWAYS fast in my experience

[techristian]

On Mozilla, I use to make the text larger, and to make it smaller.

Thanks for that. It even works under Linux.

 

Dan

 

http://musicinit.com/pvideos.html

[polyt]

Originally posted by Bill Roberts:

I deleted my recycle bin. If I delete anything, it is toast.

 

Another annoying folder that I got "rid" of.

Instead of this approach I use Tweak UI, one of microsoft's "Powertoys" .

 

Using that little prog you can get the recycle bin off your desktop (among many other things), though it still exists.

 

Although it's rare, I have had to retrieve a trashed doc once or twice

[Joe Cole]

In Internet Explorer, in the address bar, simply type the name of the website (an example- google) and press control enter. No need to type in the "www" or the ".com"

[Phait]

Originally posted by Joe Cole:

In Internet Explorer, in the address bar, simply type the name of the website (an example- google) and press control enter. No need to type in the "www" or the ".com"

This works in other, safer browsers too...

 

http://www.firefox.com

[fantasticsound]

I know a lot of the typical shortcuts (all those mentioned on this page save for the quotes below). But some of you guys are killing me with useful commands!

 

Originally posted by Ken/Eleven Shadows:

I didn't know that! Thanks!

 

On Mozilla, I use to make the text larger, and to make it smaller...

I love this one already! I'm using a 21" monitor at work. With my wonderful vision (knock wood!) I can see small type, but unless I need to see more of the, "big picture," why not make it that much easier to read? Thanks, Ken!

 

Originally posted by theblue1:

Windows-key-D (in XP) minimizes all windows at once (revealing the desktop) and hitting it again pops them all back up. But if you minimize them all and then hit Alt-Tab only the last window open will reappear.

 

Holding the Alt-Tab combo for a moment will bring up the task-switcher utility.

 

Alt-F4 will close the current program group. Ctrl-F4 closes only the current window (in, say, a multi-window program.

 

Ctrl-Tab will change windows inside a multi-window application.

 

The silly thing is that there ought to be ONE place in Windows where you can look up all those shortcuts.

I have been interested in finding these commands for some time, but didn't put in the effort to determine if they existed. I will use these every day, and many times each day, at work. Thanks, the blue one! And I agree, there should be a page of shortcuts available by a.. well.. a shortcut.

 

Originally posted by deanmass:

...shift + DELETE key to bypass the recycle bin ( a bit less risky than nuking recycle.

Damn, Dean! I've just about cried over having to delete items, then delete 'em again. I think I can decide if something might need to be brought back from the recycle bin. Thanks for showing us how to make the rest of our junk just disappear.

 

These are all commands I'm committing to memory and will use all the time! THANKS, PROFUSELY!!

 

Oh, and Billster, Windows has had the capability to put the toolbar at the top since at least Win98. (I know. One of our less technically apt producers had a bad habit of moving the toolbar by accident. She finally just left it up top. )

 

I began putting mine up top with my new machine, two months ago. Now that the computer moved from window to window at something faster than a snail's pace (old computer was a 600MHz Pentium III with little RAM), I found myself constantly rolling the mouse up and down between windows, information and, especially confusing, Firefox tabs. Putting the tray at the top let me switch windows with less effort. It may seem silly, but it really has saved a lot of wear and tear on my wrists.

[Dylan]

Hitting the ESC and CTRL key will bring up the Windows Start Menu. Of course, if you have a Windows key on your keyboard then you don't need this, but most of the IBM notebooks that I've worked on didn't so this can come in handy.

[Lee Flier]

Originally posted by fantasticsound:

Originally posted by Ken/Eleven Shadows:

 

On Mozilla, I use to make the text larger, and to make it smaller...

I love this one already! I'm using a 21" monitor at work. With my wonderful vision (knock wood!) I can see small type, but unless I need to see more of the, "big picture," why not make it that much easier to read? Thanks, Ken!

In both Mozilla/Firefox and IE, you can also make screen fonts larger and smaller by holding down the key and scrolling the scroll wheel on your mouse forward or backward.

[Philip OKeefe]

I see it's your week for the brain Lee. I was just about to post that. I use Cntrl / wheel to do the same thing. Works great, and as I get older, and my close up eyesight gets worse, it's becoming a needed feature.

[Sylver]

I had to read though to see if anyone knew the Scroll thing too.

 

Apple key + and - work in OSX.

 

Right click on a link to bring up a context menu that will allow you to open a new window in Firefox and IE.

 

Scroll wheel click on a link to open it in a new tab in Firefox.

 

CTRL right and left arrows let you jump though a line word by word.

 

CTRL up and down arrows skip to the next line, then to the next paragraph when you hit the arrow a second time.

 

CTRL end and CTRL home let you jump to the beginning and end of the document.

[Philip OKeefe]

Right click on a link to bring up a context menu that will allow you to open a new window in Firefox and IE.

 

In Win XP, you can Cntrl / click on the link and it will open in a new window.

 

My only real beef with Firefox is that it doesn't remember all of my opened tabs... if I have to reboot for some reason, I have to manually reopen Craig's forum, my forum, Google, www.m-w.com , etc. (I always have multiple browser tabs and / or windows open simultaneously).

 

If I've missed something that will allow me to do this with Mozilla, please let me know.