Keyboard Shortcuts

The shortcut examples in this paragraph are for Internet Explorer, but you should be able to use the same process on most any program to find the keyboard shortcuts for it. A lot of you will be using Internet Explorer to view this page.

Most windows programs have keyboard shortcuts that allow you to do the same things with keystrokes on your keyboard that you do with your mouse. The toolbar or menu bar at the top of a program screen shows the things you can do. In Internet Explorer the menu bar is sometimes hidden. You can see it by holding down the Alt key and then pressing the F key. I made mine visible all the time by pressing Alt and holding it down then the V key. (Alt+V) Let those keys up then tap the T key, and finally tap the M key.

You can also make the menu bar visible in Internet Explorer by tapping the F10 Key.

Once you have the menu bar visible, you can identify the shortcuts by the letter that is underlined in them. The F in File is underlined. So if you do Alt+F, and let those keys up, the file menu will be shown. To do any action shown in the file menu just tap the underlined letter for that action. In Internet Explorer you might want to open a new window. Tapping the N key will do this because N is underlined. You can also use the arrow keys to make your selection. You could do Alt+F then when the file menu is open, tap the down and up arrow keys until you have the action you want selected then tap the Enter key. Once you have one of the menus open you can also use the left and right arrow keys to move through the different menus like File, Edit, View, Favorites, Tools and Help.

You can also do things in the menus without opening the menus. Do Altl+F. Look in the file menu. At the right of some of the actions you can take there are shortcuts spelled out like Cntrl+T for new tab, Cntrl+N for new window, Cntrl+P for print. If you can remember these shortcuts, you can use them without even opening the menus.

Three Ways to Print the Page While Surfing the Net Without Using the Mouse.

• Tap the Alt key, making sure the menu is active by seeing File bumped out or selected with a rectangle around it, tap the f key, tap the p. Try it you can just cancel the print when the printers dialog box pops up or tap your enter key to print. You can cancel the print by tapping the tab key until you see the cancel button selected and then tap your enter key. If you don't have the Menu Bar visible all the time, you'll have to do the Alt+F then p keys. You can also do the F10 key.
• With the Menus closed, hold down the Cntrl key and tap the p key. Try it out.
• Tap the Alt or the F10 key and make sure the File menu bumps out or is activated. Tap the down arrow key until you see print selected. Tap the Enter key. You can just cancel the print job.

Three Ways to Open a New Web Page While Surfing the Net Without Using the Mouse.

• Tap the Alt or the F10 key, making sure the menu is active by seeing File bumped out or selected with a rectangle around it, tap the F tap the N. Again if your menu bar is hidden you'll have to do the Alt+F then N keys or the F10 key.
• With the Menus closed, hold down the Cntrl key and tap the N key. Try it out.
• Do the F10 or Alt key to activate menus File will be selected by default. Use the down arrow key to select Print then hit enter. Note you can just use the arrow keys to navigate the whole menu.

Scrolling Web Pages With Up and Down Arrow Keys

You can scroll up and down in web page using the up and down arrow keys. I like that better than dragging the scroll bar sometimes. If you happen to be going in and out of the menus, you might have to hit the Alt key again to deselect the menus. If the web page is wider than your web browsers screen you can use the left and right arrow keys to move your view left or right. You can also use the space bar but it always scrolls down.

Selecting text in a text editor or word processor program.

Use the arrow keys to move your cursor up, down, left and right while in text editors or word processor programs until you are where you want to start selecting text.

Hold the Shift key down and then tap the left or right arrow keys to select text one character at a time or hold the Shift key down and the left or right arrow key down to select while scrolling text. You can also use the Shift key and up and down arrows to select whole lines of text moving up and down the page while using text editors and word processors.

You can select a whole line by locating the cursor at the beginning of the line holding the shift key down and hitting the End key. You can also locate the cursor at the end of a line and hold the shift key down and hit the Home key.

Cntrl+A will select everything on a page.

You can of course use the mouse and left click on text and drag the mouse to select but it sometimes selects what you don't want if you move up or down a little while dragging. The keyboard methods will give you more control.

Selecting Text in a Web Page

To select text from a web page you must move the mouse pointer over the text to be selected until it changes to a cursor then holding the left mouse button down, drag the cursor across the characters highlighting them. You can also click somewhere in the text and hold the Cntrl key down and tap the a key to select the whole page. Note that if the text appears on a picture in a web page you won't be able to select this text.

Copy, Paste, Cut, Undo, and Select All

Once you have some text selected you can copy or cut and then paste it from one location to another in the same text document or into a different one.

• Ctrl + a will select or highlight everything on the page.
• Ctrl + c will copy all selected text to the clipboard.
• Ctrl + v will paste copied text into your document.
• Ctrl + x will cut selected text and pictures from the document and copy them to the clipboard for later pasting.
• Ctrl + z will undo your last action. This is handy if you delete something and notice that you shouldn't have and want it back.
• ctrl + (the + key) In most web browsers enlarges the screen each tim you tap the ctrl key and + key at the same time. Handy for reading small print or those captcha symbols that you have to type in for security on some web sites.
• ctrl + (the - key) In most web browsers makes the screen smaller. Good for after you have enlarged the screen and want to put it back to normal.

Another great keyboard shortcut is the Print Screen key. Hitting this key copies what ever is on your computer screen to the clipboard. Once you have your screen copied to the clip board you can open a program such as Microsoft Paint, create a new document and paste what was on the screen into a picture which you can edit from there. That is how i get most of my screenshots

Alt + Tab Lets you choose from any of the programs you have open to work on. Just hold the Alt button down and hit Tab until you see the one you want selected and then release.

When you see a shortcut like Ctrl + F4 to close the current window in a multiple document programs or interfaces like Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint that lets you open several instances of the program to work on different pages all at the same time, it means you type and hold the Ctrl key then type and hold the F4 until the current instance of that program closes.

Alt + F4 Closes the program you are in or those message boxes that pop up on some websites and emails asking you if you would like to make it your home page or if you would like to install their toolbar. Sometimes it doesn't work but it usually does. Sometimes these message boxes are saying they will do what you want them to and yet what they do is not what you would want them to do so i always close them without clicking my mouse on them as they can be set up to take action by clicking on them. Also very handy for closing programs one after another when your getting ready to shut your computer off.

F1 opens help i most programs.

Esc Cancels the current task. Sometimes you will have a program trying to do something and not being able to do it slowing your computer down. Some websites have music and animated gifs that flash and make noise and if you would still like to view the page but not have all the hoopla then Esc will stop these annoyances. You can also click the Stop button while on a site to end these things or stop a page from loading the rest of the way if it is taking to long.

Ctrl + Alt + Delete Once will display the Windows Task Manager where you can select and stop applications and look at the different processes running on your computer. If you do these buttons 3 times in a row it will restart your computer. Sometimes you won't have a choice and have to restart your computer this way but it's better to go to Start, Shut Down, choose Restart and click Ok if you can, as sometimes Ctrl + Alt + Delete causes open files to get corrupted as they sometime shutdown without closing.

Ctrl + Esc Is the same as clicking the Start button.

Windows Key, looks like 4 pains of glass: Displays Start menu and has a slew of shortcuts related to it if you look up windows key in the help file for windows. Holding down the Cntrl key and then tapping the Esc key also opens the Start menu. You can shut your computer down without using the mouse. In Windows 98 S.E. Tap the Windows key. Note the underlined letters in the start menu. The u is underlined in the word Shut down. Tapping the u on the keyboard will bring up the Shut Down dialog box. In the Shut down dialog box the s is underlined for the Shut Down option. If the Shut Down selection isn't already selected you can tap the s key to select it. Next just tap the Enter key and your computer will shut down. The OK button is selected in this dialog box by default so when you tap the Enter key, it is the same as clicking the OK button. If you want to make a different selection than OK, tap the Tab key then use your left and right arrow keys to select Cancel, Restart or OK In Windows XP, tap the Windows Key. The u in the words Turn Off is underlined. Tap the u. The Turn Off dialog box appears. The u in the Turn Off option is underlined. Tapping the u key will shut down the computer. Windows vista: Tap the Windows key, tap the right arrow key 2 times then tap the down arrow key until Shut Down is selected, then tap the Enter key. You can open programs without using the mouse. Tap the Windows key Tap the p key because it is the letter underlined in the All Programs option. Next use your arrow keys to make your selection followed by the Enter key.

Note you can also use the arrow keys to navigate and select tasks after pressing the Windows key.

Application Key, looks like a list on a piece of paper: Gives you the same menu options as right clicking in a program will do.

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