Vincent Laforet’s Blog

THIS BLOG HAS FOUND A NEW HOME–TO READ THE MOST CURRENT VERSION OF THIS POST AND TO LEAVE COMMENTS PLEASE GO TO:

http://blog.vincentlaforet.com/2008/08/02/tech-tips/

I’m about to leave my son and wife for more than 20 days – so I’m not going to spend too much time behind the keyboard before I leave – will be doing plenty of that in Beijing.     So here is a series of very basic – but incredibly useful – keystrokes that I use daily.   Thanks to my friend at Apple (A.G.) for these little nuggets of geek wisdom he shared with me a little over 2 years ago…

First – click anywhere on the desktop to make sure you’re in the Finder…

Apple + Shift + A  = will open your Applications folder – then type the first letter of the app you want to launch… and then Apple + O  to launch it…

Apple + Shift + U = will open the Utilities folder

Apple + W = closes the current window

Apple + Option + W = closes all open windows

Apple + Delete = will drag whatever you have selected into the trash

Apple + Shift + Delete = will empty the trash

Lastly – a true time saver:

Apple + Spacebar … then type in the first few letters of the app (or a document) you want to launch – once it pops up hit – Return/Enter – and off you go….

Obviously this only works for a Mac…  needless to say I won’t be giving any Windows/PC Tips in this blog – sorry – nothing personal.  Just never been a Windows guy.

The less time you spend behind the computer – the more time you spend doing important stuff… hopefully these tips will help you achieve that – speaking of which… gotta go.

p.s.: for 101 tips and key shortcuts to Photoshop from Deke McClellan check this out – the video is transcribed here.  Nod to Chase for pointing this out a few weeks ago.