Windows Keyboard Shortcut of the Day

When you start up Excel or other Office programs, they often stick a “Task Pane” up on the right, usually with the “Getting Started” heading. Annoying, isn’t it?

Switch it off one time with Ctrl+F1.

Switch it off permanently by following these steps (which you have to repeat for Excel, Word, PowerPoint, etc.): Hit Alt+T to open the Tools menu, O to select the Options command, then deselect the “Startup Task Pane” checkbox using Alt plus whatever is the underlined letter (which is different in different programs — nice consistency there, Microsoft), then press Enter for OK.

To finish the options for F9, let’s suppose you really need Excel to double-check EVERY formula to make sure the numbers are right (again, probably only useful if you’ve opened a bunch of workbooks that are huge, manually calculated, and may have been corrupted). Press Ctrl+Shift+Alt+F9 to do this:

Rechecks dependent formulas, and then calculates all formulas in all open workbooks, regardless of whether they have changed since last time or not.

I’ve done this before with a spreadsheet that had six dependent files, 60,000 rows and over 100 columns of complex formulas — it wasn’t done until after I came back from lunch.

To continue the theme from yesterday and Monday, there’s another recalculate option — mostly useful if you have a spreadsheet that seems to have been corrupted and you want to check all the formulas. Press Ctrl+Alt+F9 to do the following:

Calculates all formulas in all open workbooks, regardless of whether they have changed since last time or not.

Yesterday we learned about the F9 key and how it calculates formulas manually if you’ve switched off automatic calculation (which you’d only do if you’re working with a big spreadsheet that has lots of formulas).

The technical definition of what F9 does, per Excel, is:

Calculates formulas that have changed since the last calculation, and formulas dependent on them, in all open workbooks.

Sometimes you don’t want to recalculate in all open workbooks. Perhaps, instead, you only want to recalculate the formulas in the sheet that you’re currently working with (because you don’t want to wait for all the other worksheets to get recalculated as well). If so, then press Shift+F9.

Here’s the technical definition of Shift+F9’s functionality:

Calculates formulas that have changed since the last calculation, and formulas dependent on them, in the active worksheet.

In Excel, if you have a big spreadsheet, it can start to get slow. Really slow. At that point, you can switch off the automatic calculation of formulas.

To do so, use the Tools | Options command, switch to the Calculate tab, then select Manual. (The keyboard method to navigate there is Alt+T for the Tools menu, O for the Options command, Ctrl+Tab to switch tabs to the Calculate tab, then Alt+M to select the Manual radio button. Then press Enter to close the dialog box.)

From now on, any time you change a number or formula, the spreadsheet won’t update itself until you press F9.

By now you may have figured out the pattern: When using Word, Excel or PowerPoint, and at the moment when you have a file dialog box open, you can use the Alt key plus a number to select the buttons along the top right.

We’ve already seen three:

• Alt+1: Back (a folder)
• Alt+2: Up one level (of folders)
• Alt+3: Search the Web

But there are several more:

• Alt+4: Delete (if you have a file or folder selected)
• Alt+5: Create New Folder
• Alt+6: Views
• Alt+7: Tools (pulls down the Tools menu)

Because the buttons are in the same order, 1 through 7, it actually becomes fairly easy to remember which button to press.

Several of these, such as Alt+5, are actually useful. Whether or not you use these shortcuts depends on how often you use the buttons. Practice!

Remember, the easiest way to see this dialog box is to press F12 when using Word, Excel or PowerPoint to get the Save As dialog box, or to press Ctrl+O for the Open dialog box.

I have to admit I never use this one.

But, just suppose: You’re in Word or Excel or PowerPoint. You’ve opened up a file dialog box. It could be an Open file dialog box (by pressing Ctrl+O or using the File | Open menu, or by pressing Ctrl+F12). Or it could be a Save As file dialog box (by pressing F12, or selecting File | Save As).

And then you change your mind, and want to search the web instead. Instead of hitting Esc to cancel the file dialog box, and then pressing Ctrl+Esc to get the Start menu and then running your web browser, and then opening up a search engine, you can do all of that with one button. You could just use your mouse to hit this button, the “Search the Web” button:

Or, you could press Alt+3. When you do so, instantly the dialog box closes (with no action taken), and your web browser comes up, with a search engine displayed.

(Note to readers: If you know how to change the search engine used here from MSN Live to something else, please let me know. The standard methods don’t seem to work.)

It’s a pity this keyboard shortcut only works in Office apps and not all apps that use a file dialog box.

Similarly to yesterday’s tip, suppose you’ve opened the Save As dialog box and have looked at one or more different folders or drives, and you want to go back to the one you were just looking at. You could click on that little green “Back” button up in the top center, next to the “Save in” or “Look in” drop-down list. But instead of clicking a button, you can just type Alt+1.

Each time you press Alt+1 you’ll go back another folder until you return to the one you started out looking at.

Yesterday, I mentioned you can press the Backspace key to move up a folder when you’re working with files.

For Microsoft Office apps (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.), you can do the same thing with Alt+2.

Try it!

Suppose, for example, you’re viewing top-secret plans in Word, and want to save a copy of them on your Desktop. You’d do the following:

1. Hit F12 to get the Save As dialog box.
2. Alt+2 several times, until the Desktop is displayed. (Normally you’d instead hit Shift+Tab, then Backspace several times.)
3. Type the file name you want and press Enter.

When working with Excel, Word, or PowerPoint, you can save the current document with a new name, or in a different directory, or on a floppy disk (remember those?), by tapping the F12 key. The “Save As” dialog box appears. Then you can enter your filename and press Enter.

Not the right folder? Remember, you can move up a folder with the Backspace key, once you’ve moved focus to the file list pane — so press Shift+Tab then Backspace a few times to get to the Desktop quickly. We’ll have more tips on what you can do from this dialog box for the rest of the week.