ARCHIVED: For Windows, what are some useful keyboard commands?
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Before mice were commonplace, people controlled their computers entirely with keyboard commands. Keyboard commands are still available for most functions, including saving your work, exiting, and restarting Windows.
Opening menus, navigating dialog boxes, and executing commands
- Each menu along the top of any application window has one letter
underlined (usually the first letter). To open that menu, hold down
the
Alt
key and press the indicated letter. You can also press and releaseAlt
and then navigate the menus with the arrow keys. - The
Ctrl-Esc
or the Windows key, which is located between theCtrl
andAlt
keys on the bottom left corner of your keyboard. Then simply use the arrow keys to navigate through the menus. button at the lower left of the screen is a special
case. To open the menu, press - Within the menu, all of the possible commands also have underlined letters. Once the menu is open, you can execute a command by pressing the letter alone. Another option is to use the arrow keys.
- To cycle through fields or options in a dialog box or window, press
the
Tab
key. To move backward, pressShift-Tab
. - To turn on options or make a checkbox selection, use the Spacebar.
- The
Enter
key can activate default command buttons in dialog boxes, such as and . - The arrow keys move one increment in the direction the arrow is pointing.
Saving your work and exiting your application
In most Windows applications, the keyboard command for s
, and the command
for is x
. For example, to open
the menu and then save a document, press
Alt-f
, and then press s
.
Once you select and execute a command from the menu, the menu will automatically close. So after you've saved your work, you'll have to re-open the menu to exit.
Restarting Windows
- To open the
Ctrl-Esc
or the Windows key. menu, press - To shut down, press
u
. - If
Shut down
is not selected, select it by using the arrow keys. Then move to the button by pressing theTab
key. - To activate the
Enter
. button, press
This is document ahnc in the Knowledge Base.
Last modified on 2018-01-18 12:35:08.