Windows Keyboard Shortcut of the Day

Partnered with yesterday’s tip, you can delete an entire word from where the cursor is to right with Ctrl+Delete.

For example, if your cursor is like so (before “country’s”): “TiVo is the _country’s best DVR” and you press Ctrl+Delete, you’ll get “TiVo is the best DVR”.

If your cursor is in the middle of a word, such as “extra_ordinary” and you press Ctrl+Delete, you’ll be left with just “extra”.

If you’re typing (in Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, and many other text entry programs) and you use the wrong word, a quick way to delete the entire word is Ctrl+Backspace.

You need to practice this one a few times to get used to it. It’s also an easy one to forget to use, but it’s worth making the effort to get the Ctrl+Backspace habit: If you type a long word and want to erase it instantly, it’s much faster to hit Ctrl+Backspace then the Backspace key by itself several times.

As an example, if you type, “I must remember to buy a new hippopotamus_” and your cursor is right after the word hippopotamus, the entire word hippopotamus is erased and your cursor is now positioned at the end of the sentence: “I must remember to buy a new_”. Then you can type “toaster” or whatever word you actually want to type.

If you’re in the middle of a word, it only deletes the portion that’s to the left of your cursor. So if you typed “Here comes the sun_king” and move your cursor (as indicated) between the “sun” and “king” portions, then press Ctrl+Backspace, what you’re left with is “Here comes the king.”

To exit from the current application, try Alt+F4.

When you insert a CD in your computer, it will usually begin automatically playing or running a designated default program.

If you hold down the Shift key when inserting the CD, then nothing will automatically start, allowing you to use the Explorer (remember Windows key+E!) to view the files instead, if you like.

You can toggle on or off the High Contrast Mode of Windows by holding down both the Shift key and the Alt key on the left side of your keyboard then tapping the Print Screen (PrtScrn) key.

High Contrast mode will increase the font size for all windows and buttons as well as change your color scheme.

To launch Windows help, tap the Windows key plus F1.

This week we’ll cover a few more general Windows shortcuts.

Just to get this one out of the way: We’ve covered the Windows key previously. The Windows key plus the letter U runs the Windows Utility manager, which lets you control how three specific utilities work on your computer:

• The Magnifier, which can enlarge sections of the screen (making them easier to see).
• The Onscreen Keyboard, which lets you use a mouse or joystick to type keys instead of the regular keyboard.
• The Narrator, which can read aloud text on screen.

What applications do you use most frequently? What tips have you enjoyed, and what would you like to see more of?

We’ll be taking this week off and returning with new tips next week. (Busy week at work!)

Move to a cell, hit Ctrl+; and today’s date will be typed into the current cell. Press Enter to accept the date. (Note that this isn’t a formula, so if you do it today, on Friday the Thirteenth, it’ll still say 7/13/2007 tomorrow.)

Everyone knows you can copy and paste cells in Excel, but a lot of times you want to do it quickly in a specific way. Turns out there are two simple keyboard shortcuts that let you copy cells quickly.

Move your cursor to a cell that you want to copy. Suppose you want to copy it down five times. Hit Shift+Down Arrow four times to select the four cells below your current one. Then press Ctrl+D. Whatever is in the first cell is copied to fill the remaining cells. (Whatever was in those cells is overwitten.)

You can do the same thing to the right with Shift+Right Arrow and Ctrl+R.

In Excel, type a number into a cell (such as “54.1″) and press Enter. Then press Ctrl+Shift+4 (or another way to think of that is Ctrl+$). Instantly the currency format is applied to the selected cells, and your “54.1″ becomes “$54.10″.

You have quite a few other options as well:

• Ctrl+~ (Ctrl+Shift+`): General format
• Ctrl+! (Ctrl+Shift+1): Number format (with two decimal places and the thousands separator)
• Ctrl+@ (Ctrl+Shift+2): Time format
• Ctrl+# (Ctrl+Shift+3): Date format
• Ctrl+$ (Ctrl+Shift+4): Currency format
• Ctrl+% (Ctrl+Shift+5): Percentage format
• Ctrl+^ (Ctrl+Shift+6): Exponential format

Similar to yesterday’s tip, you can press Ctrl+0 to hide the column where the cursor is located. Ctrl+A, Ctrl+Shift+0 unhides all the columns in the sheet.

We’ll hit some more Excel tips this week.

In Excel, move somewhere in a row you want to hide and press Ctrl+9. The entire current row is hidden (and you don’t need to select the entire row, just have your cursor somewhere in the row).

Remember you can use Shift+Up Arrow or Shift+Down Arrow to select while moving; this way, you can select cells on several rows. Once you have cells from more than one row selected, all of those rows are hidden when you press Ctrl+9.

Next, try this: Press Ctrl+A to select the worksheet, then press Ctrl+Shift+9 — also known as Ctrl+( — to unhide all of the rows that are hidden.

We already covered pressing F5 to begin the presentation. Doubtless you know already that pressing space or page down or practically any key advances to the next slide, and that PageUp or P or Left Arrow or Up Arrow go the previous slide.

Did you know there were quite a few things you can do during a presentation too?

During the presentation, press F1 to see a list of the keystrokes available.

The most useful ones are:

• Type a number and press Enter to go to that slide. For example, typing 15, Enter jumps to slide 15.
• Press B or the period key to turn the screen black. Press it again to return to the current slide.
• Press W or the comma key to turn the screen white. Press it again to return to the current slide.
• Press Ctrl+P to get a Pen pointer, allowing you to use the mouse to draw on the slide. (These drawings are NOT saved.)
• Press E to erase the drawings (or just go to the next slide).
• Press Ctrl+A to return to the standard Arrow pointer
• Press A to hide the arrow pointer (invisible cursor)
• Press Shift+F10 for a menu of these and other options.

In PowerPoint, when you’re in the Slide Sorter or Outline views, you can press Ctrl+D to insert a slide in your presentation that’s a duplicate of the current slide.

This doesn’t work in edit mode, unfortunately; for that, you need to use the Insert menu’s Duplicate Slide command. (Get there simply by pressing Alt+I, D).

In general in PowerPoint, you can get a lot done with the Tab key and the arrows keys.

If you’re entering text, first press Esc to cancel text entering mode. Then press the Tab key; every time you press Tab, you’ll select a different object. (This is invaluable to switch between the title and the text body, for example.) When an object is selected, the arrow keys will move it.

While moving an object, it will snap to the grid unless you hold down the Ctrl key.

To insert a new slide and start typing without using the mouse, try these steps:

1. Press Ctrl+M to insert a new slide.
2. Press F6 to select the slide. (Each time you press F6 it switches between the open panes on the interface.)
3. Press Tab to select the title box. Type your title.
4. Press Esc to cancel text entry.
5. Press Tab to select the text box. Type your text.

The above keystrokes get easier with practice, and soon you can be in PowerPoint Power Typing mode!

Tap F5 in Microsoft PowerPoint and you’ll run a slideshow, from the first slide.

It’s PowerPoint week this week at the Windows Keyboard Shortcut of the Day.

Today’s tip is quite handy when entering or editing text in PowerPoint: Press Ctrl+T to bring up the Font dialog box, where you can edit the font face, style, size, color, and special effects.

(One wonders why this eminently handly tip isn’t usable in Word, Excel, or Outlook. In Word, it’s useful for the hanging indent function — but how often do you use that? In Excel, it seems to do nothing at all. In Outlook, it functions just like the Tab key, so that’s a waste.)