Q: How can I use my keyboard more efficiently? More specifically, how can I delete items more efficiently?
A: There are loads of keyboard shortcuts that make you more efficient when using a personal computer. For instance, many users delete text the hard way – character by character. Fortunately, there are many editing shortcuts, such as the following:
[Ctrl]+[Backspace]
Pressing [Backspace] deletes the characters to the left of the insertion point, one at a time. When you need to delete an entire word, press [Ctrl]+[Backspace]. This shortcut deletes text to the left of the insertion point one word at a time instead of one character at a time. For instance, to delete the last four words in a paragraph, including the ending period character, you’d hold down [Ctrl] and press [Backspace] five times. (Word counts a punctuation mark as a word.)
[Ctrl]+[Delete]
Pressing [Delete] removes the characters to the right of the insertion point, one character at a time. To delete several characters to the right, at once, press [Ctrl]+[Delete]. This combo deletes all the characters to the right of the insertion point in the current word. For instance, to remove cut in the word shortcut, you’d position the insertion point between the t and the c, and press [Ctrl]+[Delete].
[Ctrl]+[Shift]+[Home] then [Delete]
I use this key combination so often that I forget that others aren’t aware of it. Let’s say you received an email that you want to forward to some friends. You want to be courteous and remove all the junk above the content (such as the previous sender’s email address and all the dozens of email addresses it was sent to) and all the junk below the content (such as the original sender’s name or a personal note. Place your cursor at the beginning of the content, then press your [Ctrl]+[Shift] keys and then touch the [Home] key. This selects everything ABOVE the cursor. Press [Delete] and all that top junk is gone.
[Ctrl]+[Shift]+[End] then [Delete]
Same as above, but place your cursor at the end of the content. Now, press your [Ctrl]+[Shift] keys and then touch the [End] key. This selects everything BELOW the cursor. Press [Delete] and all the bottom junk is gone.
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