Under Control: Keyboard Shortcuts

Contributed by Jay Schroyer

Let's say you were writing an advertising proposal for a local business in Microsoft® Word and you had to keep typing the title of a newspaper that you are recommending for advertising insertion over and over again. Before you type the name, you move your cursor to the top of the screen, click on the "I" button for italics in the toolbar, and then type the name of the publication: "The Boston-Herald Globe Tribunal Times Newspaper." When you finish, you scroll to the top of the screen, deactivate the "I" button and continue typing. That is, of course, assuming that you have already brought the "I" button onto the taskbar and don't have to fish for it.

How much easier would writing your proposal be if you could simply highlight "The Boston-Herald Globe Tribunal Times Newspaper," press the "Control" button and the letter "C," to copy and then each time you wanted to insert "The Boston-Herald Globe Tribunal Times Newspaper," you could simply press "Control" and "V"? I'm willing to bet it would allow you more time to concentrate on what's really important: the material of your proposal and not be worried or frustrated so much with its form.

Are these buttons magic; do you have to pay Microsoft to get a list of these valuable shortcuts; or am I doomed to bouncing between my mouse and the keyboard, hunting through screen after screen of menus just to perform simple commands? All of this information isn't anything that you can't find in the Word help dialog box or even the tutorial for Windows® XP as most of these commands are universal and will work in just about any program designed by Microsoft. The following are shortcut keys that use the "Control" button in combination with another letter, and are just a sample of what's possible.

Font Effects Shortcuts
Before you begin typing the word you want to affect, simply hold down the "Control" button and use the following letter keys: "B" can be used to bold text, "I" for italics, and "U" will underline your text. When you are done and want to return to the standard default text, simply hold down "Control" and press the letter you used to activate the effect in the first place. For example, if you are done bolding, you would press "Control" and the letter "B." Now you are ready to continue in standard type.

Format and Editing Shortcuts
These format shortcuts will save you a lot of time when it comes to editing or rearranging your documents. If you need to start a new page within the document simply press "Control" and the "Enter" key to add a page break. Generally, the mouse can be used to select specific areas of text that you want to manipulate, but if you needed the entire document selected use "Control" and "A". Once you have a selection isolated, you can use these editing options: "Control+C" will copy what you have selected and "Control+V" will paste it wherever you have placed the cursor. If you don't want to copy the selection and simply want to move it to a new location, "Control+X" will cut the selection for you.

You messed up, you say? No problem; there's even shortcut keys to undo or repeat your mistakes. Let's say you pasted the wrong selection on your new page. Press "Control+Z" to undo any previous action including typing, insertion, deleting, or any other undesired change. After pressing undo, you decide that you did want that section there. Hold down "Control" and the letter "Y" to redo any action.

"Control+F" will access a global search and replace dialogue within Word when you need to replace a specific item that appears numerous times throughout the document. This is a great time-saver when multiple instances of a word or phrase would take too long to find and replace manually.

The "Page Up," "Page Down," "Home," and "End" keys are great for cruising around sentences and paragraphs within your document. The first two are especially handy when a document contains multiple pages. "Home" and "End" are a fast way to get to the beginning and ends of sentences to make quick changes.

Administrative Shortcuts
I call these last shortcuts administrative because they are generally used when dealing with the upkeep of your documents. Instead of searching through the "File" menu for your frequently used administrative commands, use the "Control" button in concert with these letters to perform numerous functions: "O" will cause the "Open File" screen to appear, "S" allows you to save the file quickly, "P" will open the "Print" dialogue screen, and "W" closes your file, although it will ask you if you want to save if any changes have been made to the document.

As I mentioned earlier, this is just a fraction of the available shortcuts in Microsoft Word. A full list can be printed from your computer via the following route: choose the "Tools" menu, then "Macro," then "Macros," in the dialogue box that says "Macros in" choose "Word Commands," scroll through the "Macro Commands" until you locate "List Commands," when it is in the dialogue box choose "Run" and then choose "OK" in the dialogue box that appears. The Word commands table will then appear as a Word document which you can print for reference.

These commands might also be helpful if for some reason there is a problem with your mouse. Most users find themselves completely helpless in the event of mouse failure. Knowing these shortcuts will reduce any down time that could result from hardware malfunction.

The more you learn about Windows and Microsoft products, the more pleasant and efficient your computer time will become. And I'm sure that learning the shortcuts will be a lot less painful than having to type "The Boston-Herald Globe Tribunal Times Newspaper," or a similar lengthy phrase, over and over again.

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