Computer Tips, Tricks, Shortcuts

  1. Bring back a closed tab
  2. Undo to fix those little mistakes
  3. Easily extract images from a Word (.docx) file
  4. Delete an entire word
  5. Making sub and superscript text
  6. Move cursor to beginning of the next or previous word
  7. Expand your text to full page width in Microsoft Word
  8. Minimize all windows
  9. Close the current program
  10. Launch programs with your own hotkey combination
  11. Scroll through webpages with the spacebar
  12. Zoom In, Reset Zoom
Bring back a closed tab

Accidentally closed a tab? Simply press Ctrl + Shift + T to reopen the most recently closed tab and get back to what you were doing (Cmd + Shift + T on Macs).

Undo to fix those little mistakes

Did you know you can undo almost any action with Ctrl + Z? It’s the ultimate hot key. I’m sure you knew about it already, but undo doesn't just apply to typing. If you accidentally delete or move a file, you can hit Ctrl + Z to bring it back to where it was (Ctrl + Y will redo whatever you undid).

Easily extract images from a Word (.docx) file

Change the file extension from .docx to .zip, extract the file, the pictures will be in one of the folders. My images were in the ‘media’ folder under the ‘word’ folder.

Delete an entire word

Instead of deleting a single letter, pressing Ctrl + Backspace will delete the entire word behind the cursor. This makes deleting text quicker if you screw up a whole word.

Making sub and superscript text

If you need to make sub or superscript text, press Ctrl + = for subscript and Ctrl + Shift + = for superscript.

Move cursor to beginning of the next or previous word

Moving the cursor around manually while typing is a great way to make your work take longer than it needs to. To speed up the process, move the cursor around with keyboard shortcuts. To move it to the beginning of the previous word, use Ctrl + Left Arrow. To move it to the beginning of the next word, use Ctrl + Right Arrow. In macOS you can do the same using the Option key. To select words/paragraphs as you're going, hold Shift + Ctrl + Arrow (up or down will select entire bodies of text).

Expand your text to full page width in Microsoft Word

By default Word leaves a lot of unused space toward the margins. Head to View > Zoom > and choose Text Width > OK. Now whatever you're writing should fill out most of the Word page.

Minimize all windows

Sometimes you have a bunch of stuff running, and you want it all to go away so you can get to the desktop. Simply pressing Windows key + D will minimize everything you have up, which will save you some time pressing the minimize button for each window. It should be noted that Windows + M offers similar functionality, but there is no undoing, so Windows + D is the more favorable approach since you can repeat the command and get your windows back again without having to go and maximize each.

Want to close the current window or tab? Pressing Ctrl + W can do that.

Close the current program

Typing Alt + F4 will close the program that is running. This is useful as it saves you time mousing over the "X" and clicking. People will often use this as a joke, telling you to press Alt + F4 to fix a problem. Don't fall for it unless you want to close what you are doing.

Launch programs with your own hotkey combination

Right click the shortcut to any application in Windows, head into the properties and in the shortcut tab you should see a "shortcut key" field where you can type your preferred launch combo. Also of note, if you click the "advanced" options in the shortcut tab, you can set it to run as an Administrator, which is particularly useful for creating a shortcut to an elevated Command Prompt. This could be set to launch with the keys Ctrl + Alt + Numpad 1 for example.

Scroll through webpages with the spacebar

Tapping the spacebar on a website will scroll down in full page chunks and hitting shift + space will take you back up.

Zoom In, Reset Zoom

Use the browser magnifier to adjust a website for more comfortable reading. Ctrl/Cmd + (plus/minus sign) does the trick. To reset to the default zoom level use Ctrl + 0.

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