As a former secretary, I've always been a big fan of learning shortcut keys
and my monitor frequently looks like a daisy with all my latest post-it notes
stuck to it to remind me of the latest ones I want to remember to use and learn.
I wrote another article awhile back for Computor Companion Magazine, called
Nothin'
Up My Sleeves, which you might want to read if you like finding shortcut
commands. I've also written an article explaining the steps to customizing toolbars
and menus, if you need to know how to do that. See Customized
Toolbars and Menus.
More recently, however, I'm learning how vital shortcut keystrokes are to blind
or disabled users who are unable to use a mouse to click menu selections. They
need to use keyboard shortcuts. To learn the steps to take to apply a shortcut
to your keyboard, be sure to check out this month's Microsoft
Word Forms vs Blind User article.
Another thing I know is that, not only are help files hard for blind users
to access in most software, but finding a shortcut in Word is a pain in the
butt! In Word, like most applications, you can hit the F1 key for Help, then
type in the term SHORTCUTS and you'll soon find a list of all available shortcuts
for whatever program you're using. But when someone asks me for a shortcut that
I don't often use or can't remember off hand, I find it extremely frustrating
when I have to hunt through Word's shortcut list to find one, because their
organization of them isn't useful when you need to find a particular one. Humm,
now would that be found under common shortcuts? Maybe formatting? Maybe first
under tables, then formatting. Or maybe under paragraph formatting? <sigh>
So as a little gift to our Word users, I've gone through the Word files and
pulled out all the shortcuts, dumped them in a large Word table, added one click
column sorting macros and did my best, in what little time I had, to sort them
out into better categories. But since I know my preferences won't be everyone's,
you can easily change the key words to something more meaningful to you with
a search and replace. And I've also left you a Notes column that you can use
to add your own keywords for an additional quick personal preference sorting
column.
It's not perfectly organized, because I just didn't have enough time this month,
so you will still find some possible duplicates, since I copied them directly
from the Help files and several shortcuts are located under multiple categories.
But I didn't want to hold it up, so I hope you enjoy the effort and find this
version helpful. With a few touch ups on your part, you can easily refine what
I've started for you.
Click this link to download this Word shortcut table: MSWordShortcuts.zip
Note! When you first open the MSWordShortcut.doc, it will warn you once
that there is a digital signature you need to approve. This is only
to allow the simple sorting macros I've added to run. The certificate will ask
you if you trust Dian Chapman at MouseTrax. Say Yes, if you do.
(Yes, I'm trustworthy.<honest smile>) The macros are linked to a MacroButton
field code under the table headings, so you can easily click once on any heading
to sort that column, versus having to click around the standard table sort dialog.
Feel free to email me at dian@mousetrax.com
if you have any questions about it.
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