Windows Keyboard Shortcut of the Day

Alt+Spacebar, N: Minimize an application

Posted in Windows, Applications, Menus by estephen on March 21st, 2007

If you click on the icon in the upper left of an application (at the beginning of the title bar), a little menu opens, which is called the System menu:

[Image: Application system menu]

The keyboard method of opening this menu is Alt+Spacebar. Then you can press N to Minimize the application, or X to Maximize, or any of the other underlined letters.

So, to minimize any application: Press Alt+Spacebar then N.

8 Responses to 'Alt+Spacebar, N: Minimize an application'

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  1. Jim said,

    on March 22nd, 2007 at 7:55 am

    I just discovered that on my terminal running XP Home, Cntrl + Alt + an arrow key will change the orientation of the display. (e.g. Cntrl + Alt + the down arrow will cause the screen to display upside down)

    But, this does not work on my terminals running XP Pro. Is this a legitimate shortcut, a quirk of XP Home or a setting?

  2. estephen said,

    on March 22nd, 2007 at 7:40 pm

    It’s not an official Windows shortcut. My bet is that on your machine running XP Home, you have some software installed that came with either your monitor or your video card (or such software was preinstalled by the vendor of your computer). Check to see if you have an icon in the system tray (in the lower right) that has a name such as “Rotate” or “Orientation” and if you right-click on it, you can learn more about it. Then you can either change the shortcut keys or disable them (if that’s what yhou want to do), or have that same software installed on your XP Pro terminals if you want them to support the same shortcuts.

  3. Amanjeev said,

    on April 17th, 2007 at 5:20 am

    I am working on linux right now and this works here too. I always used to wonder how the hell one accesses that part. ALT + Spacebar - good to know.

    Thanks.

  4. Jackson said,

    on September 5th, 2007 at 8:16 am

    Oh gosh, now it’s not such a pain to minimize Windows update!

    Thanks so much.

  5. kay said,

    on May 22nd, 2008 at 4:14 pm

    it doesn’t always work

  6. estephen said,

    on June 19th, 2008 at 12:30 am

    kay, can you let me know where it hasn’t worked for you? It really should work for every Windows application that has an icon in the title bar.

  7. George said,

    on July 8th, 2008 at 1:19 pm

    I tried with an appl. calls Glovia and did not work.
    Pressing Atl+Space Bar shows an small screen. Then holding still Alt+Space bar I pressed N. Nothing happen. If I do the same in Firefox it works. Thnks

  8. estephen said,

    on July 10th, 2008 at 11:47 am

    Sorry George — never heard of Glovia, but apparently it uses non-standard keys. Contact the folks who make Glovia and tell them to get with the program!

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