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Word, Word Word...the bird is the Word

First of all, I want to extend an ammendment to last week's letter on website creation. For those who would like to know a little more about how to create their own site by using notepad, want a little more control or just want to see how things work for basic webpages, I put together a text file in text format as well as MS Word format. The text document can be found by clicking here or download the MS Word document by clicking here. Enjoy!

This edition is dedicated to all those who, when working with word processors, use the mouse to click on the U for underlining, or use the mouse for I or B or italicising or Bolding. Then there's all those other things you could be using the keyboard for instead of that time-wasting mouse. The mouse has its place, to be sure, but not when there is a simple way to use the keyboard. By the time you practice these, you will wonder what that elliptical thing to the right (or to the left for some) of the keyboard is doing there. "Oh, that thing they used to call a mouse. Yes, how quaint is that!" Just kidding, but only a little.

One of the most important keys on your keyboard is the F1 key. It usually brings up a Help window. If you need help with the program, press F1. F1 is your friend. It doesn't have all the answers, but it's got enough to keep you busy asking for a while.

Before we get into the deep waters of keyboard shortcuts in word processors, there are some shortcuts you can use that will work in virtually any program that uses text. This includes e-mails and instant messaging programs. They will be referred as "global shortcuts," since they work globally. If you open up a document right now, press the arrow keys on your keyboard. You can see that using them moves the cursor to the left, right, up and down. Now, hold the CTRL/control key down and use the arrow keys. That lets you move from word to word instead of one character at a time. This is one of the functions many people use so often, it would drive them batty to not have it as a function. Let go of the control key and hold down SHIFT while using your arrow keys. Notice how SHIFT lets you highlight the characters in the direction you use with your arrow keys. If you're wondering, "Great, but can't we just highlight words at a time instead of just characters?" So glad you asked. Hold down CONTROL and SHIFT at the same time, then use your right or left arrow keys. You can even use the arrow up and down if, say, you want to highlight an entire paragraph. Play around with these functions if you were not aware of them already. They really offer great flexibility, speed and control.

Highlighting is a way of marking something we've already typed. What if you want to have an affect on words as you type them? The commands are pretty straight forward, so you won't see too many paragraphs on this matter. However, it is important to note that when these commands are used to change words, to apply them is as simple as this: When you are about to type the word(s) you want affected, use the command. When the last character you want affected is typed, use the command again to disable. For example, when typing this, I would have pressed Control-B to bold the letters, then when I was finished, I would have pressed control-B after the comma. Having said that, here is a list of commands that are used with a fair degree of regularity. There may be quite a few here, so you can print them out for future reference. Focus on the ones you think will apply to your situation and remember: use them OFTEN. In no time, you'll just "know" what keys do what without even thinking about it:

Command	Result
Control-A(global command)	Selects entire document/all text
Control-B	Bold
Control-C(global)	Copies text into the clipboard so you can paste it elsewhere
Control-D	Brings options to change the font type, style, colour, size and a plethora of other options.
Control-E	Centers current paragraph
Control-F	Find/Replace text
Control-I	Italics
Control-J	Justifies current paragraph
Control-L	LEFT-aligns the paragraph
Control-M	Intends the paragraph from the left. Very handy for quick indentations. If you do this by accident, there are ways to undo. Keep reading!
Control-N	Create new document
Control-O	Open a document
Control-P	PRINT! This will give you options just prior to printing. Same as going to File>Print
Control-Q	REMOVES paragraph formatting.
Control-R	RIGHT-align a paragraph
Control-S	SAVES the document overtop of the previous version. If you haven't saved the document yet, a dialogue will appear and let you name the document. Pressing F12 would bring up the "Save As..." option
Control-T	Created a hanging indenT!(Control-Shift T reduces a hanging indent)
Control-U	Underline
Control-V(global)	Paste from clipboard (anything you have previously Copied, be it a picture or text
Control-W	Closes the document. If you haven't saved it since making changes, you will be asked if you want to save the changes. You can use cancel if you change your mind or used W by accident
Control-X(global)	CUTS the selected material. Instead of just copying, this removes what you've highlighted but keeps it in the clipboard so you can PASTE it elsewhere. Very handy for moving paragraphs and such
Control-Y	Repeats the last action you did. This includes typing, formatting; whatever you last did.
Control-Z(global)	UNDO. The saviour of mistakes! (unless you saved over a document and lost that entire document. Then you need backups (unless you use Novell Netware. Then you can recover the document with such ease, you'll laugh until you cry)
Control-shift-8	Show all non-printing characters (spaces, tabs, paragraphs, etc)
Home key	Brings you to the beginning of a line, or in the case of cells, the beginning of a cell.
Alt-Home	Brings the cursor to the first cell on the row
Control-Home	Brings the cursor to the beginning of a document

There are many more commands, but they are of the more advanced variety, involve a lot of alt+control+f-keys and require a bit of creative dexterity. If you'd like more, let me know and I'll e-mail you a large list of commands. If you thought these were a lot, I'd suggest acclimating to these commands first, then looking for more punishment.

Also, don't forget to use the Alt + underscored letters for the menus. For example, Alt-F for File, Alt-E for Edit, and so forth. Within those menus, there are more underscored letters. Just type the letter that is underscored to use that command. For example, I use Alt-F-S in a split second to save a document, though I COULD use Control-S to save. Same effect, I just prefer Alt-F-S. (And alt-f-x to Exit the program, though I could use Alt-F4 to close the program as well)

Next week, we'll talk about something many people have heard about and more people will hear about soon enough: Linux. What does it mean to you? Should you consider it? Why are people talking about it? And is that pronounced like Linnix or Lie-nix?

If you have any comments, questions or concerns about this newsletter, feel free to e-mail me at sean@beggs.ca.