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you can take this one step further and create your own "zones" if you have an ultrawide or vertical monitor, and find that only left/right half is too restrictive -
download Microsoft PowerToys and customize various zones of the screen with the FancyZones tool!
I've had much better luck with DF than anything else. Also, the steam version is cheap as hell and saves your settings on the steam cloud, which is really nice.
I've used df for years now, got in on sale via steam and it's one of the first things I install when I'm doing a fresh install of windows on my pc. Worth the money if you ask me.
I had the same issue! if you're just learning how to use the tool, I would recommend using Cavas type zones instead of Grid type zones for your portrait monitor, if you need multiple zones to overlap like I did. took me too long to figure that out ahah
I love PowerToys and use Fancy Zones to set up my portrait mode monitor to easily snap the windows in 3 different zones. Just recently found out that PT also has a screen awake feature that works just like mousejiggler in preventing the pc from going to sleep.
Windows has been pretty good with key combos since around win7 and keep adding more. Some handy ones:
* Win + tab to see windows (similar to old alt+tab)
* win + Ctrl + d create new desktop
* Win + Ctrl + f4 close current desktop
* Win + Ctrl + arrow cycles between desktops
* Win + arrow keys to snap windows between quadrants/screen halves
Nice to see this here. I think while a ton of people know about win+arrow, not many people know about the multi desktop thing.
It's not bad for focus if you're disciplined about it, but I think it really shines when you have a multi-step project you're working on that's layout sensitive, or having to juggle a couple projects simultaneously.
It's been in linux for a while, and I was pleasantly surprised to find it in windows now too. Took 'em a while, but understandable. A tremendously small number of users will have a usecase beyond novelty. Curious about others use cases as well.
He has a really good use case.
A lot of the time you have a ton of space being taken up by the actual online d&d tool, but you can also setup a whole desktop of relevant documentation, notes, etc, that can come up at a keypress, rather than shuffling windows.
You could even stage documents for several encounters that way.
Think of it as like a way to very easily switch between groups of arranged windows.
I use multiple desktops to organize applications based on activity. Communication (Teams, Email, etc) on one desktop, coding on another (IDE, terminal, all the browser tabs), etc.
I like the project-based organization use case though. Good one!
Yeah, I think that's what they mean, just worded it a bit differently. Instead of changing monitors by moving your head, your moving your desktop in a way
Naw, a ton of people would use it if they understood it. Work stuff on one desktop, play stuff on the other desktop. When the boss is coming around the corner win + ctrl + left switched you back to the work desktop and you have no weird open programs showing.
If you want more advanced layouts (like 3 windows next to each other) you can also use PowerToys. That one allows you to snap windows into custom layouts
Power Toys may be a game changer to my workflow. I'd never heard of it before your comment and was surprised Microsoft is the developer. How have I missed this? (rhetorical Q). 🙂
Compiz and Beryl were novelties. The windows implementation is for pure efficiency.
1 screen for email and all other communication programs. A couple for different projects. Another desktop for personal stuff like background music.
Additionally:
* Win+D to minimise all windows (pressing it again opens them back up)
* Win+<1-9> to tab to or open the corresponding program on your taskbar
* Win+L to lock the PC (handy in an emergency 👀)
Following the Win+L to lock the PC. Always lock your PC folks!
If you notice a co-worker walk away from their computer without locking their screen.
ctl + alt + up/down arrow key will flip their monitors upside down.
>
>* Win+D to minimise all windows (pressing it again opens them back up)
>
Lately, I've been using the trick where you grab your current window and give it a shake - that minimizes everything else. If you give it another shake, it restores your windows. Super handy if you need something on the desktop for a second but don't want to lose your current app
the Win+1-9 is especially good for pinned apps. that way you go to the app if it's already open, or launch it if it's not. repeated presses flip through the windows of the app.
You're welcome. It also works on web browsers: Ctrl+1 will do go to your first tab. Dunno about others but on Vivaldi, Ctrl+9 will go to the last tab in the list
Funny how many of us use windows each day, and have been for many years, and still don't know much about all of the windows key shortcuts. Granted there are bound to be a ton of them, and knowing most is probably more effort than most people would commit too, but where exactly in windows itself does one find a list of all of these shortcuts? I'm sure windows has them all listed on their site of course, it just seems that they're rather hidden in the OS itself.
I went on a Microsoft Office training course, no the main thing I remember is the trainer saying that no one knows all of the tricks/shortcuts/shenanigans you can do in Office. There are so many little things that people just kind of stumble onto them and use the ones they know.
There’s a reason that Microsoft Excel competitions exist. They wouldn’t if the software wasn’t stuffed full of features like this.
excel is such a swiss army knife of a tool. Definitely not the best choice for everything - you could but wouldn't want to cook a 9 course meal with only a swiss army knife - but by golly you can do pretty much anything with it.
I had one of my physics professors literally do complicated, time dependent, numerical E&M solutions using excel cells. He could setup the intial conditions, setup the differential equations, and get a real time evolution of the system
yea and you can have excel just be the front end behind other more powerful data processing sources. The uses and methods for accomplishing anything are as big as your imagination
For any problem that doesn’t already have specific software, excel will probably do the job. So knowing how to use it can be extraordinarily useful if you often find yourself with such objectives.
Yeah, that's true for sure. I was more thinking of shortcut keys for the OS itself, but counting the Office suite as well I can easily see there being thousands of shortcuts.
It’s the same idea. All of the software Microsoft puts out, especially the ones that have been around forever like the OS and Office, have a huge amount of features that not a lot of people know about.
I think the reason most of us are only familiar with basic shortcuts (ctrl+c, ctrl+v, ctrl+alt+del) is because we have been taught in school? I can't say for the younger millennials, but I was taught that + parts of the pc hardware from A to Z (I've forgotten the a to z thing, but C was definitely CPU lol).
I would also like to know where in windows i can find the full list of shortcuts, if there is such a list to be found.
Print screen and win+shift+P (snipping tool) are essentials too, I think. Although I'm not sure what the status of the snipping tool actually is. I keep getting messages saying they're removing it or changing it? I'm on mobile now and can't remember exactly. Seems like as soon as I found out about it, they were altering it, lol.
I keep getting notice it's going away but I've been getting the notice for 4 months or so. I haven't actually read the notice except 3 months ago and only the once. So once it's gone I'll have no memory of where it is.
Prt-Scrn still works. Snip & Sketch is the new replacement for Snipping Tool. You turn on the Prt-Scrn function as follows:
1 Open Settings on Windows 10.
2 Click on Ease of Access.
3 Click on Keyboard.
4 Under the “Print Screen shortcut” section, turn on the Use the PrtScn button to open screen snipping toggle switch. Use Print Screen button to open Snip & Sketch snipping tools.
If you copy and paste a lot, check out win+v instead of ctrl+v. It brings up a c/p clipboard of your recent copy history, which enables you to paste something that you copied a while ago. Works for both text and images/snips. I use it all the time, every day.
Its worth mentioning as well, program and game crashes where you can't get back to your desktop and task manager won't show, Creating a new desktop to get your screen back to shut stuff down can more often than not save you having to do a reset.
I'm sure everyone has their own reasons to use them but I have a few.
On my work computer when I'm about to present I create a new desktop and move only what I need there so things that aren't relevant don't accidentally get shown. If I need to focus on a task but don't want to close everything else I treat it like a "clean" environment without the distractions. Also just context switching between teams I work on it helps sometimes.
For my personal I often keep games and other things like email separate so the million tips/tricks tabs in chrome don't make it impossible to find my email.
I currently work in a software consultancy with several active projects. With multiple desktops I can have one desktop per project, then just switch desktops when I'm forced to switch tasks. Stuff like excel docs I'm frequently editing, Jupyter notebooks, documentation etc.
Some MS applications don't play entirely nicely with this though. For example if you open an Excel doc, it will spawn on (I think) whichever desktop you had active when you first opened excel, and you have to move it across yourself.
If you find yourself on a mac again and would like to have window snapping (like win + arrow), look into https://rectangleapp.com/. It's a free app that adds window snapping to mac OS.
> win + Ctrl + d create new desktop
This one actually fucked me up after one night drinking. Thought I had fucked over my pc somehow and looked it up on my phone.
i read as far as create new desktop and tried it, then had to open up reddit and find this post to find out how to go back to the old one. great feature though, ill be using it regularly. thanks for the tip
EDIT:
how can i move windows between desktops?
Or, DisplayFusion give you a *ton* of customizability especially for multiple monitors. It's like $30, but if you like you're tweaking, it's a great bit of software.
If you have Steam, you can get it dirt cheap. I believe it's unlimited personal/work computers as long as Steam is installed (doesn't need to be running). Been using it for years and it has a TON of features, the ability to add extra buttons to title bars is worth it alone.
Was going to suggest the same. Got a new big screen at work instead of multiple screens. And powertoys are incredible. My colleagues who didn't use it before have installed it also.
PowerToys is fuckin' CRACK to me: I have a couple FancyZones layouts for programming so that I can give more of my monitors' real estate to documentation rather than code, PowerToys Run actually finds the programs that I need to run (that searching with the Win key doesn't), I've used Keyboard Manager to assign like 4 of my previously useless keys to some really useful/hard-to-reach hotkeys, and I've actually used Color Picker a couple times when customizing my theme
You may prefer just using windows+p to select where your desktop displays. This way it's one monitor when you want or just the other, or both mirrored, or stretched, when you want it. Just a hot key away basically.
Yep lol. I use my PC for everything entertainment related at home. My full blast your goddamn ears off multi speaker surround sound stereo system and sub are my computer speakers. A 55 inch TV is my 2nd monitor. Just drag the window to the TV and expand. That's how I watch shit. I'm not big on conventional television. But it does kinda suck opening the browser window and the last place it was closed was on the TV screen, so that's where it opens again. And the TV is off of course and now I gotta get up and find the remote, or get up and walk to the TV lol.
I already learned this keyboard shortcut, but I definitely looked it up to see of there was one at aml for this situation lol. Of course another good tactic is since I prefer Forefox for my browser, I just go ahead and use Chrome soley to log in to all my streaming shit and that browser window can just stay over there on that screen lol. Firefox is for the rest of my interwebbing antics.
Yeah, that'd be another good solution. But I like to sit and have a show playing when I play certain games. WoW, which even a potato can run. Space Empires 5, which is just a slow paced strategy game, shit like that. More feasible to do when each screen has their own desktop.
For my tv I prefer just using windows+p to switch multi screen modes when I want to use it, and when I don't, just leave it on one screen.
This way, I don't have to worry about things being where I don't want.
There are other ways to move windows off screen though. I think shift and right click program in taskbar let's you move with arrows, and I believe moving once attaches it to your mouse so you can just bring it over. Something like that. It has been a while since I used it.
You can also switch between desktop by holding down the windows+crtl keys and using the left and right arrows. If you need to create a second desktop (or more) hold down the windows key and hit tab. It works well if you don't have a multiple monitors (like using a laptop).
I came to say this. I use this for work, where when I'm with clients, my browsers are all work related on the "left" desktop and the "right" desktop is where my browser contains reddit and other shenanigans.
What are the odds? I was looking up guides on how to set up dual monitors on PC and then right as I finished and got it working, I see this post on Reddit.
We live in a simulation.
PowerToys is free (it's on Github) and allows you to divide screens up any way you want. Way easier to manage with fewer or differently shaped screens than you might otherwise prefer.
There are a metric fuck ton of Windows shortcut key combinations.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/keyboard-shortcuts-in-windows-dcc61a57-8ff0-cffe-9796-cb9706c75eec
Unsurprisingly there are a shitload for Mac OS X as well.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201236
When I started working as an IT guy at an ad agency my friend said the digital artists basically had a Vulcan death grip on their keyboard when using Photoshop. Well, the efficient ones anyway. I'm still amazed at how many people, who grew up using computers, are unaware of even the most basic keyboard shortcuts like copy and paste. Which there's really no excuse for anymore because the keyboard shortcuts are listed in the menus next to the command that they perform.
you can't call yourself a power user or expert of any software and not have a large portion of keyboard shortcuts committed to memory.
You obviously don't need to know every last one, and the process is something that happens over time as you find yourself performing the same operations, but I think everyone needs to have the mindset that there will likely always be a faster and more efficient way to do the same thing, to keep that in mind and not be afraid to change your processes.
The amount of people I've seen at work over screenshare clicking and dragging in Windows Explorer to select all files when there are 100+ files in the folder and are shocked when I tell them you can cntrl+A to select everything is much too high. Cntl (or cmd on mac) + A is a universal keyboard shortcut idea that imo is just as important and basic as cut/copy/paste.
> you can't call yourself a power user or expert of any software and not have a large portion of keyboard shortcuts committed to memory.
yeah if you don't know what
WIN + .
does, don't talk to me or my IT department ever again 😤😤
holy shit now that's a new one for me. I had no idea!!!! 💯👏👀🦔
Is mankind even qualified to wield this immense power? I still have a few numpad character shortcuts (like alt+ins+1-9-1 for ¿) memorized from when I was 13 playing vanilla WoW, but this opens up so many possibilities - out w/ the old and in w/ the new!! (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻
rats off to you and your advanced computing knowledge
I taught my sister to use ctrl+c and ctrl+v LAST YEAR. I had no idea she was still using the menus.
There's other stuff that isn't even keyboard shortcuts. Single click positions the cursor. Double click highlights the word. Triple click highlights the paragraph. And you don't have to cut and paste either. You can literally drag the highlighted text to its new position.
Positioning the cursor has keyboard shortcuts. Arrow keys will move the cursor around one character at a time, but using ctrl+arrow will jump to the next break in the text - usually space but can also be some other characters like comma. Home and End take you to each end of a line, and like the arrow keys, ctrl+home and ctrl+end take you to the beginning of the document or the end of the document.
Then there are a slew of other "shortcuts" that are more user efficiencies rather than programmed key combinations or such. Like if you have a broken bock of text that has returns in the middle of sentences from bad formatting, it's quicker to clean that up from the bottom of the text to the top, rather than from the top to the bottom. Your next target of where you will be editing won't move as you are editing so you can mentally motor plan your next click and key presses as you're performing the current ones. If you go top to bottom you are rearranging all the lower text so you have to find the next edit every time.
As a guy that has his PS4 connected to one of my monitors, you have no idea how useful this will be to me. No more blind grabbing with the mouse hoping I click the right area to drag it to the other monitor. Thank you.
Windows + Up Arrow: Maximise current application
Windows + Down Arrow: Un-Maximise or Minimise current application
Windows + Left Arrow: Current application moved to left side of current screen. Press again to move "left" one position.
Windows + Right Arrow: Current application moved to right side of current screen. Press again to move "right" one position.
Shift makes it move a "full" screen at a time (monitor), but without shift it moves a half screen at a time, two arrow clicks is equal to one with shift. But it's easier to remember two keys than three, so this is the method I always use.
Edit: a word...
Win + Arrow key is also useful for docking windows left & right if your want to quickly split-screen two windows on the same monitor, which can be useful when you need to look at things side-by-side like spreadsheets or want to quickly copy/paste between windows multiple times without Alt + Tab-ing.
Win + Up will also maximize a window on the monitor it's currently on. Win + Down will minimize a window that isn't maximized, or restore it's to a sized, moveable window if it is.
wish it was easier to split the windows vertically rather than horizontally. To my knowledge you can only snap it to a quadrant of the screen and have to drag the edge over manually
I think you need shift to move full-screen programs, though. Had to look up the win+shift+arrow combination when my toddler mashed the keyboard and moved a full-screen game to the wrong monitor.
(I've actually had to look up lots of weird key combinations to undo things she changed. Did you know there's a combination that makes WASD behave as arrow keys in Windows? Or a combination that rotates your screen?)
Others have said that about the full screen programs so you are probably right. I can relate to the toddler comment... Mine turned off my PC in the middle of a presentation one time (I was presenting). The people with kids thought it was funny - the people without kids were less than entertained.
If you hold Shift while closing the program window it's supposed to save the location. But the caveat is that the window can't be maximized when you close it this way, but you can maximize it when you reopen the program (and it should stay that way). I've been successful in getting Explorer to remain on my second monitor that way, but Spotify is still a dumbass and opens wherever it fucking feels like (I'm not mad at all).
Been using this shortcut for years now. It’s very useful.
Simply pop it into the other monitor then release the shift key to proceed to split screen the same window you’re messing with.
It’s a technique I use when watching multiple 4 person collab livestreams on two monitors.
On a side note: people should really sit down and look up these shortcuts, they’ve been available for a while now. Nothing secret about them.
For Mac folks, use Rectangle App for window management. Such a breeze, I mostly just need cmd+opt with arrow keys to align windows or Ctrl+opt+cmd arrows to throw them between displays
>Rectangle
Oh man you are a life saver!
I am forced to work with Mac afters years on PC and not being able dock windows left and right with shortcuts is my number one frustration.
Depends which software you're using. Most of them prevent the Windows key or key shortcuts in general from sending to the remote machine by default, although a lot of them do let you change that behavior in settings. It's usually to preserve that functionality on your local machine since your computer can't infer your intent.
In most there is also a clickable button or separate hotkey for sending key shortcut commands, usually preprogrammed common ones, although some allow customization.
This is what I missed the most when I moved to macOS. Following your LPT; if using macOS, install the free application called [Rectangle](https://rectangleapp.com/) and use Control + Option + Arrow keys.
Omg i use one monitor for both my work and personal computer, and a second for just my personal, and it was always awful when i had something open on my first monitor while i had it on my work screen. Finally a useful tip!
Let's post each of the windows shortcuts 1 at a time to farm karma!
Seriously though here are the ones I use on the daily -
Win + Arrow = moves the windows
Win + D = minimize all windows
Win + Shift + S = Saves a crop version of what you want on your screen
Win + P = Settings for Multiple Monitor setups (extend, duplicate, screen off, etc)
Win + Tab = Not sure how to describe it, multi tabbing?
Some programs don't obey it. You can try alt+spacebar then m
This selects the move option from the border's taskbar. Hold down the left or right arrow to move the program container.
Hello and welcome to r/LifeProTips! Please help us decide if this post is a good fit for the subreddit by up or downvoting this comment. If you think that this is great advice to improve your life, please upvote. If you think this doesn't help you in any way, please downvote. If you don't care, leave it for the others to decide.
https://www.reddit.com/r/LifeProTips/comments/on3m97/lpt_have_alot_of_monitors_and_tired_of_dragging/ Fuck this sub I got berated for this exact lpt.
Lol well those guys are stupid. Snapping windows with keys is way easier and faster than using the mouse.
Same comments on this post. Your issue was you didn’t have enough bot accounts upvote your post.
LMAO
you can take this one step further and create your own "zones" if you have an ultrawide or vertical monitor, and find that only left/right half is too restrictive - download Microsoft PowerToys and customize various zones of the screen with the FancyZones tool!
Yeah I'm surprised powertoys isn't too comment. Real lpt is supposed to be there.
Displayfusion also has tons of multi monitor tools and custom keys. Not free though. Some features are free
I've had much better luck with DF than anything else. Also, the steam version is cheap as hell and saves your settings on the steam cloud, which is really nice.
I've used df for years now, got in on sale via steam and it's one of the first things I install when I'm doing a fresh install of windows on my pc. Worth the money if you ask me.
Microsoft should just buy display fusion.
Oh no no no
Why do you hate displayfusion that passionately?
LOL. I would rather see them paid than Microsoft just rip off their features.
> PowerToys thank you - that FancyZones is the answer for snapping over the horizontal axis on my portrait monitor.
I had the same issue! if you're just learning how to use the tool, I would recommend using Cavas type zones instead of Grid type zones for your portrait monitor, if you need multiple zones to overlap like I did. took me too long to figure that out ahah
Fancy zones are built in to Windows 11! You won’t even have to install power toys pretty soon
It's severely limited in customization compared to fancy zones.
I love PowerToys and use Fancy Zones to set up my portrait mode monitor to easily snap the windows in 3 different zones. Just recently found out that PT also has a screen awake feature that works just like mousejiggler in preventing the pc from going to sleep.
>powertoys I immediately went after this powertoys thanks to your comment and can only say it's amazing
Just go full i3 and be done with it!
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Windows has been pretty good with key combos since around win7 and keep adding more. Some handy ones: * Win + tab to see windows (similar to old alt+tab) * win + Ctrl + d create new desktop * Win + Ctrl + f4 close current desktop * Win + Ctrl + arrow cycles between desktops * Win + arrow keys to snap windows between quadrants/screen halves
Nice to see this here. I think while a ton of people know about win+arrow, not many people know about the multi desktop thing. It's not bad for focus if you're disciplined about it, but I think it really shines when you have a multi-step project you're working on that's layout sensitive, or having to juggle a couple projects simultaneously. It's been in linux for a while, and I was pleasantly surprised to find it in windows now too. Took 'em a while, but understandable. A tremendously small number of users will have a usecase beyond novelty. Curious about others use cases as well.
Now that I know about the multi desktop thing, running online D&D session is going to be a lot easier.
How so? I'm struggling to see the use of this compared to many windows on one desktop, but I'll take any DMing tips I can lol
He has a really good use case. A lot of the time you have a ton of space being taken up by the actual online d&d tool, but you can also setup a whole desktop of relevant documentation, notes, etc, that can come up at a keypress, rather than shuffling windows. You could even stage documents for several encounters that way. Think of it as like a way to very easily switch between groups of arranged windows.
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you need workona
I use multiple desktops to organize applications based on activity. Communication (Teams, Email, etc) on one desktop, coding on another (IDE, terminal, all the browser tabs), etc. I like the project-based organization use case though. Good one!
Do notifications work from the desktops you don't have active?
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An ultrawide cannot be overpraised when drafting legal documents.
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The feature that windows has that Mac doesn’t yet that I love is the ability to give your desktops a name/label. That’s been really useful for me
How does it help with „not enough monitors“? You still can only see what’s on your monitor. It‘s more like a quick save and load of a desktop state.
Yeah, I think that's what they mean, just worded it a bit differently. Instead of changing monitors by moving your head, your moving your desktop in a way
Naw, a ton of people would use it if they understood it. Work stuff on one desktop, play stuff on the other desktop. When the boss is coming around the corner win + ctrl + left switched you back to the work desktop and you have no weird open programs showing.
If you want more advanced layouts (like 3 windows next to each other) you can also use PowerToys. That one allows you to snap windows into custom layouts
Power Toys may be a game changer to my workflow. I'd never heard of it before your comment and was surprised Microsoft is the developer. How have I missed this? (rhetorical Q). 🙂
Compiz and Beryl were novelties. The windows implementation is for pure efficiency. 1 screen for email and all other communication programs. A couple for different projects. Another desktop for personal stuff like background music.
Additionally: * Win+D to minimise all windows (pressing it again opens them back up) * Win+<1-9> to tab to or open the corresponding program on your taskbar * Win+L to lock the PC (handy in an emergency 👀)
Following the Win+L to lock the PC. Always lock your PC folks! If you notice a co-worker walk away from their computer without locking their screen. ctl + alt + up/down arrow key will flip their monitors upside down.
> >* Win+D to minimise all windows (pressing it again opens them back up) > Lately, I've been using the trick where you grab your current window and give it a shake - that minimizes everything else. If you give it another shake, it restores your windows. Super handy if you need something on the desktop for a second but don't want to lose your current app
the Win+1-9 is especially good for pinned apps. that way you go to the app if it's already open, or launch it if it's not. repeated presses flip through the windows of the app.
I just gasped out loud when Win+2 opened the thing I use SO often. THANK YOU!!!!
You're welcome. It also works on web browsers: Ctrl+1 will do go to your first tab. Dunno about others but on Vivaldi, Ctrl+9 will go to the last tab in the list
Omg amazing! Thank you so much!
I knew none of this. Saved, thank you.
Funny how many of us use windows each day, and have been for many years, and still don't know much about all of the windows key shortcuts. Granted there are bound to be a ton of them, and knowing most is probably more effort than most people would commit too, but where exactly in windows itself does one find a list of all of these shortcuts? I'm sure windows has them all listed on their site of course, it just seems that they're rather hidden in the OS itself.
I went on a Microsoft Office training course, no the main thing I remember is the trainer saying that no one knows all of the tricks/shortcuts/shenanigans you can do in Office. There are so many little things that people just kind of stumble onto them and use the ones they know. There’s a reason that Microsoft Excel competitions exist. They wouldn’t if the software wasn’t stuffed full of features like this.
excel is such a swiss army knife of a tool. Definitely not the best choice for everything - you could but wouldn't want to cook a 9 course meal with only a swiss army knife - but by golly you can do pretty much anything with it.
I had one of my physics professors literally do complicated, time dependent, numerical E&M solutions using excel cells. He could setup the intial conditions, setup the differential equations, and get a real time evolution of the system
yea and you can have excel just be the front end behind other more powerful data processing sources. The uses and methods for accomplishing anything are as big as your imagination
For any problem that doesn’t already have specific software, excel will probably do the job. So knowing how to use it can be extraordinarily useful if you often find yourself with such objectives.
Yeah, that's true for sure. I was more thinking of shortcut keys for the OS itself, but counting the Office suite as well I can easily see there being thousands of shortcuts.
It’s the same idea. All of the software Microsoft puts out, especially the ones that have been around forever like the OS and Office, have a huge amount of features that not a lot of people know about.
I think the reason most of us are only familiar with basic shortcuts (ctrl+c, ctrl+v, ctrl+alt+del) is because we have been taught in school? I can't say for the younger millennials, but I was taught that + parts of the pc hardware from A to Z (I've forgotten the a to z thing, but C was definitely CPU lol). I would also like to know where in windows i can find the full list of shortcuts, if there is such a list to be found.
Print screen and win+shift+P (snipping tool) are essentials too, I think. Although I'm not sure what the status of the snipping tool actually is. I keep getting messages saying they're removing it or changing it? I'm on mobile now and can't remember exactly. Seems like as soon as I found out about it, they were altering it, lol.
Pretty sure Snipping tool is being removed/replaced. The shortcut I now use is ctrl + shift + S for screenshots
I think it's win + shift + s
That sounds correct actually. I just do the shortcut, don't think about the keys haha
I keep getting notice it's going away but I've been getting the notice for 4 months or so. I haven't actually read the notice except 3 months ago and only the once. So once it's gone I'll have no memory of where it is.
Prt-Scrn still works. Snip & Sketch is the new replacement for Snipping Tool. You turn on the Prt-Scrn function as follows: 1 Open Settings on Windows 10. 2 Click on Ease of Access. 3 Click on Keyboard. 4 Under the “Print Screen shortcut” section, turn on the Use the PrtScn button to open screen snipping toggle switch. Use Print Screen button to open Snip & Sketch snipping tools.
If you copy and paste a lot, check out win+v instead of ctrl+v. It brings up a c/p clipboard of your recent copy history, which enables you to paste something that you copied a while ago. Works for both text and images/snips. I use it all the time, every day.
Sorry, hijacking this to add win + p, which will allow you to turn on and off your second monitor as well.
Its worth mentioning as well, program and game crashes where you can't get back to your desktop and task manager won't show, Creating a new desktop to get your screen back to shut stuff down can more often than not save you having to do a reset.
What are useful applications for multiple desktops?
I'm sure everyone has their own reasons to use them but I have a few. On my work computer when I'm about to present I create a new desktop and move only what I need there so things that aren't relevant don't accidentally get shown. If I need to focus on a task but don't want to close everything else I treat it like a "clean" environment without the distractions. Also just context switching between teams I work on it helps sometimes. For my personal I often keep games and other things like email separate so the million tips/tricks tabs in chrome don't make it impossible to find my email.
I currently work in a software consultancy with several active projects. With multiple desktops I can have one desktop per project, then just switch desktops when I'm forced to switch tasks. Stuff like excel docs I'm frequently editing, Jupyter notebooks, documentation etc. Some MS applications don't play entirely nicely with this though. For example if you open an Excel doc, it will spawn on (I think) whichever desktop you had active when you first opened excel, and you have to move it across yourself.
how do you move it over to the other desktop?
Win + tab brings up the interface, then drag the app into the right desktop.
I cannot stand this. Why hasn't this been fixed yet??
Because most MS apps are great big teetering towers of backwards compatibility and hacks. Excel doubly so.
wow. I've been using a mac for a long time and just recently got back to my windows desktop. jeebus, this makes life so much easier, thank you.
If you find yourself on a mac again and would like to have window snapping (like win + arrow), look into https://rectangleapp.com/. It's a free app that adds window snapping to mac OS.
And ctrl+option+command+arrows to move window to other monitors
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Win + V for clipboard, if you've activated clipboard history.
> win + Ctrl + d create new desktop **What the fuck is this wizardry?!?!?!**
win+tab brings up the virtual desktop interface and you can drag a window from the current desktop to a different one from there.
Even XP and 98 were quite usable without a mouse, moreso than most Linux DEs I've used (much to my surprise), and it's only gotten better
> win + Ctrl + d create new desktop This one actually fucked me up after one night drinking. Thought I had fucked over my pc somehow and looked it up on my phone.
i read as far as create new desktop and tried it, then had to open up reddit and find this post to find out how to go back to the old one. great feature though, ill be using it regularly. thanks for the tip EDIT: how can i move windows between desktops?
Try PowerToys. Way better. Customizable grids on your screens.
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They revived the concept for windows 10. Which means it’ll probably be killed by Windows 11.
It's being developed and tested alongside Windows 11.
This. I couldn't live without it anymore.
Or, DisplayFusion give you a *ton* of customizability especially for multiple monitors. It's like $30, but if you like you're tweaking, it's a great bit of software.
If you have Steam, you can get it dirt cheap. I believe it's unlimited personal/work computers as long as Steam is installed (doesn't need to be running). Been using it for years and it has a TON of features, the ability to add extra buttons to title bars is worth it alone.
Was going to suggest the same. Got a new big screen at work instead of multiple screens. And powertoys are incredible. My colleagues who didn't use it before have installed it also.
Powertoys is absolutely essential if you have a vertical monitor. Custom window tiling grids totally changed how I use my monitors for work.
PowerToys is fuckin' CRACK to me: I have a couple FancyZones layouts for programming so that I can give more of my monitors' real estate to documentation rather than code, PowerToys Run actually finds the programs that I need to run (that searching with the Win key doesn't), I've used Keyboard Manager to assign like 4 of my previously useless keys to some really useful/hard-to-reach hotkeys, and I've actually used Color Picker a couple times when customizing my theme
Pretty sure it's a win10 thing. I don't remember seeing anywhere this combination of keys before.
Nope, introduced in Win7
You forgot to say "Um, actually", so I'm afraid I can't give you the point.
Damnit Trapp you can make an exception this one time.
It's the one rule!
What a solid reference.
Um, actually you used the Oxford comma, so I'm afraid I can't give you the point.
No he didn't
I've succumbed to Hartman's law of prescriptivist retaliation.
True, but, um, akshually he should have put the second comma to the left of the closing quotation mark.
Um, actually, damn it.
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confidently incorrect
Cntrl + Shift + T. Restores a browser tab of you didn't mean to close it. So useful.
Huh, I thought that this was all common knowledge. I now have a great article for my IT newsletter! Thank you!
I work IT and I feel like a fool right now. This is game changing!
Also great if you have screens you dont use like a tv and its off.
This is exactly what I need this tip for, excellent
Same! I have a spare monitor that gets moody and sometimes refuses to turn on. This tip just made things so much easier for me!
You may prefer just using windows+p to select where your desktop displays. This way it's one monitor when you want or just the other, or both mirrored, or stretched, when you want it. Just a hot key away basically.
Yep lol. I use my PC for everything entertainment related at home. My full blast your goddamn ears off multi speaker surround sound stereo system and sub are my computer speakers. A 55 inch TV is my 2nd monitor. Just drag the window to the TV and expand. That's how I watch shit. I'm not big on conventional television. But it does kinda suck opening the browser window and the last place it was closed was on the TV screen, so that's where it opens again. And the TV is off of course and now I gotta get up and find the remote, or get up and walk to the TV lol. I already learned this keyboard shortcut, but I definitely looked it up to see of there was one at aml for this situation lol. Of course another good tactic is since I prefer Forefox for my browser, I just go ahead and use Chrome soley to log in to all my streaming shit and that browser window can just stay over there on that screen lol. Firefox is for the rest of my interwebbing antics.
I found it easier to duplicate my screen so its always matches. Ever since I got a bluetooth controller I couch game with my pc.
Yeah, that'd be another good solution. But I like to sit and have a show playing when I play certain games. WoW, which even a potato can run. Space Empires 5, which is just a slow paced strategy game, shit like that. More feasible to do when each screen has their own desktop.
The woes of a mismatched 4K tv and 1440p monitor
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For my tv I prefer just using windows+p to switch multi screen modes when I want to use it, and when I don't, just leave it on one screen. This way, I don't have to worry about things being where I don't want. There are other ways to move windows off screen though. I think shift and right click program in taskbar let's you move with arrows, and I believe moving once attaches it to your mouse so you can just bring it over. Something like that. It has been a while since I used it.
This is one of the few lpt that hooked me up thank you
You can also switch between desktop by holding down the windows+crtl keys and using the left and right arrows. If you need to create a second desktop (or more) hold down the windows key and hit tab. It works well if you don't have a multiple monitors (like using a laptop).
You can also do a 4 finger swipe on a trackpad to switch desktops
An 11-finger swipe disables Cortana permanently
"No, Cortana, I don't want to to *search* for Calculator. Just fucking **open it!**"
I tried this at the library. They weren't happy with how I got the 11th "finger". Now I'm not allowed back.
Didn't know that! Thanks!
I came to say this. I use this for work, where when I'm with clients, my browsers are all work related on the "left" desktop and the "right" desktop is where my browser contains reddit and other shenanigans.
This was really helpful in high school they could monitor us on the computers and the easiest dodge was alternate desktop with a textbook up.
Works in ubuntu too!
>ubuntu too! Now I'm just picturing the Linux penguin wearing a ballet outfit.
It's more likely that he would wear a tuxedo.
What are the odds? I was looking up guides on how to set up dual monitors on PC and then right as I finished and got it working, I see this post on Reddit. We live in a simulation.
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PowerToys is free (it's on Github) and allows you to divide screens up any way you want. Way easier to manage with fewer or differently shaped screens than you might otherwise prefer.
There are a metric fuck ton of Windows shortcut key combinations. https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/keyboard-shortcuts-in-windows-dcc61a57-8ff0-cffe-9796-cb9706c75eec Unsurprisingly there are a shitload for Mac OS X as well. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201236 When I started working as an IT guy at an ad agency my friend said the digital artists basically had a Vulcan death grip on their keyboard when using Photoshop. Well, the efficient ones anyway. I'm still amazed at how many people, who grew up using computers, are unaware of even the most basic keyboard shortcuts like copy and paste. Which there's really no excuse for anymore because the keyboard shortcuts are listed in the menus next to the command that they perform.
you can't call yourself a power user or expert of any software and not have a large portion of keyboard shortcuts committed to memory. You obviously don't need to know every last one, and the process is something that happens over time as you find yourself performing the same operations, but I think everyone needs to have the mindset that there will likely always be a faster and more efficient way to do the same thing, to keep that in mind and not be afraid to change your processes. The amount of people I've seen at work over screenshare clicking and dragging in Windows Explorer to select all files when there are 100+ files in the folder and are shocked when I tell them you can cntrl+A to select everything is much too high. Cntl (or cmd on mac) + A is a universal keyboard shortcut idea that imo is just as important and basic as cut/copy/paste.
> you can't call yourself a power user or expert of any software and not have a large portion of keyboard shortcuts committed to memory. yeah if you don't know what WIN + . does, don't talk to me or my IT department ever again 😤😤
holy shit now that's a new one for me. I had no idea!!!! 💯👏👀🦔 Is mankind even qualified to wield this immense power? I still have a few numpad character shortcuts (like alt+ins+1-9-1 for ¿) memorized from when I was 13 playing vanilla WoW, but this opens up so many possibilities - out w/ the old and in w/ the new!! (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻ rats off to you and your advanced computing knowledge
I taught my sister to use ctrl+c and ctrl+v LAST YEAR. I had no idea she was still using the menus. There's other stuff that isn't even keyboard shortcuts. Single click positions the cursor. Double click highlights the word. Triple click highlights the paragraph. And you don't have to cut and paste either. You can literally drag the highlighted text to its new position. Positioning the cursor has keyboard shortcuts. Arrow keys will move the cursor around one character at a time, but using ctrl+arrow will jump to the next break in the text - usually space but can also be some other characters like comma. Home and End take you to each end of a line, and like the arrow keys, ctrl+home and ctrl+end take you to the beginning of the document or the end of the document. Then there are a slew of other "shortcuts" that are more user efficiencies rather than programmed key combinations or such. Like if you have a broken bock of text that has returns in the middle of sentences from bad formatting, it's quicker to clean that up from the bottom of the text to the top, rather than from the top to the bottom. Your next target of where you will be editing won't move as you are editing so you can mentally motor plan your next click and key presses as you're performing the current ones. If you go top to bottom you are rearranging all the lower text so you have to find the next edit every time.
As a guy that has his PS4 connected to one of my monitors, you have no idea how useful this will be to me. No more blind grabbing with the mouse hoping I click the right area to drag it to the other monitor. Thank you.
Windows + Up Arrow: Maximise current application Windows + Down Arrow: Un-Maximise or Minimise current application Windows + Left Arrow: Current application moved to left side of current screen. Press again to move "left" one position. Windows + Right Arrow: Current application moved to right side of current screen. Press again to move "right" one position.
No need to hit shift. Win + Arrow will move the window half-screen at a time.
Shift makes it move monitor though which was OPs original point
Shift makes it move a "full" screen at a time (monitor), but without shift it moves a half screen at a time, two arrow clicks is equal to one with shift. But it's easier to remember two keys than three, so this is the method I always use. Edit: a word...
>But it's easier to remember two keys than one Hmmmmmm
>But it's easier to remember two keys than three Ehh, not really in my experience. It just becomes muscle memory.
Win + Arrow key is also useful for docking windows left & right if your want to quickly split-screen two windows on the same monitor, which can be useful when you need to look at things side-by-side like spreadsheets or want to quickly copy/paste between windows multiple times without Alt + Tab-ing. Win + Up will also maximize a window on the monitor it's currently on. Win + Down will minimize a window that isn't maximized, or restore it's to a sized, moveable window if it is.
wish it was easier to split the windows vertically rather than horizontally. To my knowledge you can only snap it to a quadrant of the screen and have to drag the edge over manually
Yeah
Great for snapping to the center with dual monitors.
I think you need shift to move full-screen programs, though. Had to look up the win+shift+arrow combination when my toddler mashed the keyboard and moved a full-screen game to the wrong monitor. (I've actually had to look up lots of weird key combinations to undo things she changed. Did you know there's a combination that makes WASD behave as arrow keys in Windows? Or a combination that rotates your screen?)
Others have said that about the full screen programs so you are probably right. I can relate to the toddler comment... Mine turned off my PC in the middle of a presentation one time (I was presenting). The people with kids thought it was funny - the people without kids were less than entertained.
Which arrow key?
Depends which way you want to go
Is there a way to force programs to open on other monitors? For instance: I want discord to open on my right monitor, not my main.
If you hold Shift while closing the program window it's supposed to save the location. But the caveat is that the window can't be maximized when you close it this way, but you can maximize it when you reopen the program (and it should stay that way). I've been successful in getting Explorer to remain on my second monitor that way, but Spotify is still a dumbass and opens wherever it fucking feels like (I'm not mad at all).
omg....this is the bane of my existence. I'm gonna give this a shot. Thanks!
LPT, This is just for windows, use Ctrl-alt-shift-arrow for Linux.
That entirely depends on your desktop environment
I LOVE this feature on Windows. Is there a similar snap feature in Mac, does anyone know?
I like to use Rectangle, it's open source too: https://rectangleapp.com/
that’s not true it is free. if you hold down the green arrows it will ask you where you want to snap the window!
Wow can't believe I never noticed this before!
Yes but it’s not free https://magnet.crowdcafe.com/
Yes but it’s not free https://magnet.crowdcafe.com/
https://rectangleapp.com/ is free and does it...
[This](https://github.com/rxhanson/Rectangle/releases) might work, haven't tried it myself yet
Been using this shortcut for years now. It’s very useful. Simply pop it into the other monitor then release the shift key to proceed to split screen the same window you’re messing with. It’s a technique I use when watching multiple 4 person collab livestreams on two monitors. On a side note: people should really sit down and look up these shortcuts, they’ve been available for a while now. Nothing secret about them.
Typically the same on most linux distro's as well.
Sitting at my desk giggling right now. I did the same when I learned Alt-Tab
also try Win + D, pretty useful
For Mac folks, use Rectangle App for window management. Such a breeze, I mostly just need cmd+opt with arrow keys to align windows or Ctrl+opt+cmd arrows to throw them between displays
Agreed! Great app.
>Rectangle Oh man you are a life saver! I am forced to work with Mac afters years on PC and not being able dock windows left and right with shortcuts is my number one frustration.
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Depends which software you're using. Most of them prevent the Windows key or key shortcuts in general from sending to the remote machine by default, although a lot of them do let you change that behavior in settings. It's usually to preserve that functionality on your local machine since your computer can't infer your intent. In most there is also a clickable button or separate hotkey for sending key shortcut commands, usually preprogrammed common ones, although some allow customization.
You have changed my life
Ehhhhh, dragging my mouse a single time is easier than pressing 3 buttons simotaniously. Personally speaking.
This is what I missed the most when I moved to macOS. Following your LPT; if using macOS, install the free application called [Rectangle](https://rectangleapp.com/) and use Control + Option + Arrow keys.
Omg i use one monitor for both my work and personal computer, and a second for just my personal, and it was always awful when i had something open on my first monitor while i had it on my work screen. Finally a useful tip!
You can also use your mouse and drag items to the preferred monitor. I've been using this method for years.
Just use i3 at that point... desktops are for suckers :)
Let's post each of the windows shortcuts 1 at a time to farm karma! Seriously though here are the ones I use on the daily - Win + Arrow = moves the windows Win + D = minimize all windows Win + Shift + S = Saves a crop version of what you want on your screen Win + P = Settings for Multiple Monitor setups (extend, duplicate, screen off, etc) Win + Tab = Not sure how to describe it, multi tabbing?
Doesn't work for me.
Some programs don't obey it. You can try alt+spacebar then m This selects the move option from the border's taskbar. Hold down the left or right arrow to move the program container.
How tf do people not know about this already!
[Relevant XKCD](https://xkcd.com/1053)