Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with shortcut

Can you save remote desktop connections to log in to different user accounts?

Mokusatsu — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:36:27 -0800

Is it possible (in Windows Vista Ultimate) to save remote desktop connections to the same computer but for different users? i.e. have icons in my quick launch menu which log me in with a click to user1 or user2? I have a computer which is used for several specific purposes, accessed only by remote desktop (i.e. it sits in a back room and is rarely used in person).

I want to be able to quickly access each of the individual accounts by saving an RDP file and then shortcutting to that from my quick launch bar.

So I enter the credentials for user1 and "save as" the RDP file as username1.rdp and drag it onto the quick launch bar.

Clicking on this RDP logs me in to user1's account.

Then I open remote desktop again, enter the credentials for user2 and save username2.rdp.

When I click on username2.rdp, I get instantly logged in to user2's account.

So far so good.

But if I close that and click on username1.rdp, I get logged into user2. If I manually change the credentials by opening remote desktop and enter the credentials to user 1, username1.rdp will on the next attempt log me into user1's account, as does username2.rdp.

So saving a connection doesn't save the credentials, it possibly saves the computer I'm logging into, but not the user.

Am I doing it wrong or does an RDP file just not contain credentials? Is there some way I can set it up so I can one-click log in via several icons to any one of several accounts?

How to replace the broken period key with a shortcut

omnigut — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 18:19:20 -0800

I've lost two keys, one of which is the period button. So far, for four months, I've simply been copying that are lying around, and pasting them into web browsers, word documents etc etc. The thought just struck me; is there a global shortcut for entering a period? Like, say, ctrl+opt+command+p ? And if not, can someone tell me how to do it in Firefox, excel, and word? Thanks!

Double the trouble - in Windows XP

curagea — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 15:45:47 -0800

Double the Windows problems - creating a shortcut to CMD at a specific folder, and what's up with Desktop horizontal selecting? My Google-fu failed me once again! I'm asking two questions, not entirely related to each other, but both dealing with Windows XP

1. I remember making a shortcut on my Desktop that opens a CMD window, that starts off at a specific folder. I've Googled around to find the steps for making that shortcut, with no luck. There's a similar way - tweaking the Registry to have an "Open CMD here" option when you right-click on an item - but I want an actual shortcut on my Desktop that does the same thing. This is because I don't want to open a bunch of folders just to right-click on something to open CMD - I want to get there now. Anyone know the steps (or what I'm talking about)?

2. Usually when you Shift-select items in Explorer, it selects vertically down the list. Even in thumbnail mode, it selects according to however you sort it in Details mode. So why, for the love of God, does Shift-clicking on the Desktop result in horizontal selecting, out of sort order? I see that my Desktop folders and shortcuts are sorted by name vertically, yet Shift-clicking goes horizontal. That just boggles my mind. Is there any way to change this?

Give me that old time Photoshop key command

ardgedee — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:23:03 -0800

How do I switch windows in Photoshop CS3/Mac? Photoshop does not switch between windows by hitting cmd-`, the standard Apple keystroke for 'switch between windows'.

It was at one time a standard behavior in Photoshop, and later nonstandard but could be enabled through the "Keyboard Shortcuts and Menus" item. And now it doesn't appear to be an available option. Is there a way to impose this behavior back on Photoshop?

How To Place Shortcut in root of Burn CD

cmherskovic — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 10:45:22 -0800

How do you create a shortcut in the root of a burn CD to point to a file inside a folder in that same cd? I am burning a CD that requires that the index file stay in the same folder as all the files it indexs. I want to be able to create a shortcut in the root of the CD that points to the index.htm so the person I am burning the cd for wont have to go dig for it inthe folder that contains about 300 files.

Any one know how to do this? I have tried but it never seems to work, because most people have their cd as a different drive letter.

Thanks

My Windows Won't Switch alt-tab is

watercarrier — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 09:11:29 -0800

alt - tab no longer an option How do I get my alt-tab switch between windows shortcut back?

My desktop is a mess. Help!

grumblebee — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 08:41:46 -0800

Help me stop cluttering up my (OS X) desktop. My busy job(s) lead me to create and download many files every day. I have a bad habit of saving everything to my desktop. After a while, it gets insane. I then have to spend a long time sorting and filing everything. I know I should just put things in their proper places to begin with, but does anyone know a good way to manage the clutter?

What I'd really like is some app that would let me select a bunch of files on my desktop and quickly shuttle them to a folder. I'd love to be able to do this with a keyboard shortcut. E.g., I'd like to select a group of files and press Command+Shift+D (or whatever) to send them to the documents folder. And I'd like to be able to add in the alt key if I wanted to file them in a subfolder. In my imagination, alt would bring up a text field. I'd then type the name of the subfolder. If it already exists, the files would go in there. If not, a sub-folder would be created and the files would go inside it.

If that app doesn't exist, maybe you could help me out with some good filing habits.

What is this mysterious process that hijacked my shortcut?

Optimus Chyme — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 10:11:20 -0800

What is this mysterious process that hijacked my shortcut? I was using Photoshop CS2 and entered the shortcut key for "Save for Web" (Alt+Shift+Ctrl+S) and instead of getting the Save for Web dialog, a very minimalist login box appeared. Intrigued, I brought up the Task manager, right-clicked on the "Login" entry in the list, and selected "Go To Process." The process turned out to be C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\vidifker.exe. This is on Windows XP Pro 2002 SP2.

All web searches for vidifker turn up nothing; if this is a virus or trojan, it's probably trivial for it to generate different names for itself. But then why was it so easy to find? Is it a keylogger? Commercial monitoring software? Is anyone familiar with any of this?

Ctrl+V..? No... Shift+Ctrl+V...? No.... Argh!

Bakuun — Wed, 14 May 2008 10:14:45 -0800

Is there a shortcut in Photoshop CS2/CS3 that pastes something into your current layer? Something so simple is driving me crazy! I've looked on Google, I've browsed help files, and I've asked around to thoroughly run out of resources now. I could have sworn I saw this in a tutorial some time ago, but further details escape me. Sincere apologies if I'm just not seeing something really obvious.

...It probably really is something totally simple and right in my face :[

How can I paste the number five with a keyboard shortcut?

BobsterLobster — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 03:32:15 -0800

The number five suddendly won't work on my laptop, can I program a key combination to paste it whenever I need it? Obviously, the key combination will need to work across the OS (Windows XP), and any program.
I've taken the key off, and can't see anything obvious, any ideas what may have suddenly caused this?

How can I temporarily disable the alt+tab shortcut when I'm playing games in Windows XP?

good in a vacuum — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 19:35:01 -0800

How can I temporarily disable the alt+tab shortcut when I'm playing games in Windows XP? I've done a lot of Googling and I can't seem to find an easy answer to a problem that I can't imagine is all that uncommon. Ideally, I'd like a lightweight, freeware utility that would live in the system tray and either allow me to manually enable and disable the alt+tab shortcut (and maybe the other Windows keyboard shortcuts), and/or have it disable keyboard shortcuts automatically when certain games are running. When not gaming, I use alt+tab all the time, so permanently disabling it (using the registry or what have you) is not the best option.

The only software I've found is WinLock, but it costs $20 and seems a little bloated for the simple task I'm looking for. Surely someone out there has found a solution to this issue, with all the millions of Windows gamers out there?

How to remap Windows XP keyboard shortcuts to standard Apple shortcuts

Frankieist — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 08:48:45 -0800

I'm used to the keyboard shortcuts on OS X, but I have to use a Windows PC at work. What are some ways that I can remap the keys on XP to get as close to Apple's as possible? I recently set up one of the new Apple Aluminum keyboards on my PC. The drivers are set up fine, so the default windows keyboard shortcuts work on it (Ctrl+alt+del, Command => the Windows key, etc.). I've tried searching google, but many of the options are only partial solutions, and I'm not sure how well they'll work together.

The specific keyboard mappings I'm most interested in changing are:

The ability to use Apple's accent and diacritic shortcuts (e.g. option+e for acute accent, option+c for cedilla). I find the US-International IME on Windows to be a pain.

Some of the OS X shortcuts borrowed from emacs, like Ctrl+A for beginning of line, Ctrl+E for end of line, Ctrl+K for delete to end of line.

Some other text navigation shortcuts, such as option+→ for move forward one word, option+← for move back one word.

I don't really much use the windows key, and I miss the ability to use alt as a meta key (Just using it for menus seems like a waste of a good key). Can any of this be done, or do I just have to deal with using different shortcuts at work and home?

Bookending Highlighted Text Keyboard Shortcut

backwards guitar — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 12:37:31 -0800

I need to highlight a word, hit a combination of keys which will add text I specify before and after the highlighted word. I'm running Windows XP. I'm trying to fix a bunch of php pages so they're register_globals OFF compliant. Essentially that means turning:

$something into $_GET['something']

Is there any software out there for Windows XP that will create a keyboard shortcut that allows me to highlight something and add the _GET[' to the beginning and '] to the end of the highlighted text?

Bonus points if I can setup multiple shortcuts so I can have one shortcut for _GET one for _POST, etc.

something will not always be the same, so a simple Search/Replace won't do the trick. I use Macromedia Homesite, so if it's got the capability of doing this already (seems like it'd be pretty similar to how it adds bold tags, etc.), that works too.

Help me Read AskMeFi in Google Reader

davidstandaford — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 22:38:58 -0800

Is there a keyboard shortcut that opens a Google reader item in a new firefox tab without shifting the focus (with os x, if that matters)? The list of Google Reader shortcuts is here, and none of them seem to be able to open up an item in a new tab or window without also shifting the focus away from the reader. If this doesn't come standard, does anyone know of a plugin or extension that would add this functionality? Googling turned up nothing. Thanks!

I want to add keyboard shortcuts to Mac OS X apps.

nowonmai — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 08:40:28 -0800

I want there to be keyboard shortcuts for superscript and subscript in as many as possible of the applications I use (Mac OS X 10.4). How can I make this happen? I want it to be the same shortcut in every application, so a system-wide solution would be best, and I think pretty much everything I use is Cocoa. Most essential are TextEdit, Keynote, Nisus Writer and MacJournal, but using the same keys in MS Word would be a boon. I just want it to be easy to type H₂O and NH₄OAc and Mg⁺⁺.

"My computer" is gone. I want it back.

Baud — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 02:34:45 -0800

"My Computer" icon is gone. (more inside) I just deleted the "My computer" shortcut and icon on the desktop of my WinXP machine. It's not on the trash bin (I choose to automatically delete instead and I'm now biting my fingers for choosing it)

"My computer" is still there it's just the desktop shortcut that's missing.

Of course I can try the "create a new shortcut" route but it looks like the only thing windows does not want me to create a new shortcut to is the "my computer" folder.

So, should I wave it bye bye forever or is there a way toput that Icon and shortcut back on my desktop ?

Help with Word Toolbars!

Maia — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 20:31:56 -0800

Is there anyway I can add a shortcut on the Microsoft Word toolbar which will format the selected text into a subscript or a superscript? Also, none of my settings are saved: every time I add a button for the Microsoft Equation Editor on the toolbar, it's gone the next time I open Word. Any changes to normal also disappear, as well as changing the default margin sizes. Any suggestions?

Is there a keyboard shortcut for Google Toolbar in FF 2.0?

tickingclock — Sat, 11 Nov 2006 03:32:24 -0800

Is there a keyboard shortcut that moves the keyboard cursor to the Google Toolbar in Firefox 2.0? I've been an avid user of the Google Toolbar for a long time. Recently, I upgraded to Firefox 2.0 -- and to my surprise, alt + S no longer moves my cursor to the Google Toolbar, but instead, opens the "History" menu bar.

Because I am both a creature of habit and incurably lazy, I would love to be able to use some sort of a keyboard shortcut to search using the Google Toolbar. This page suggests that alt + S is the only way to do so at the moment.

Is there a way for me to associate some keyboard shortcut with the toolbar? Alternatively, is there a way so disable to shortcut that opens the history menu? Thanks in advance!

Easy Spanish-language typing on a U.S.-type keyboard?

killdevil — Sun, 24 Sep 2006 15:39:06 -0800

Easy Spanish-language typing with a U.S. computer keyboard? How can I make typing the common accent marks encountered in Spanish (properly considered extra letters, I suppose) quick and easy on my U.S.-format keyboard? I need to write quite a bit of Spanish and typing ALT+[Unicode string] (or however one does it on a Windows-based computer) seems terribly unpleasant and time-consuming.

A quick and dirty solution is preferable to an elaborate yet elegant one. Thanks!

Switching Audio Outputs in OSX

rossination — Mon, 13 Feb 2006 01:01:26 -0800

Is there a way to quickly switch between audio outputs in OS X? I have speakers set up through a Griffin iMic, and I also have headphones that I plug into my iBook's headphone jack. Sometimes I like to be able to quickly switch from one to another. Currently I have to go to the sound preference pane choose from my options there. Obviously this isn't an enormous pain in the ass, but it would be nice if I could map it to a keystroke or something. I have Quicksilver and have fiddled with it a little, but if there is a way to make it do what I want, I can't figure it out.

Microsoft office keyboard shortcut problem?

betterton — Sun, 29 Jan 2006 09:40:13 -0800

Can you solve my frustrating microsoft office keyboard shortcut customization problem? My goal is to create keyboard shortcuts for formatting commands I frequently use. I am using microsoft power point xp on a windows xp machine. I try to follow the microsoft help instructions on how to do this (as described here), but it doesn't work. Specifically, I click "customize" in the Tools menu, click the "commands" tab, and click the command I want to customize. However, the "Modify Selection" button remains greyed out.

My attempt to search for solutions to this problem have failed. The only relevant information I found doesn't solve my problem, because I am sure that the button I am selecting is on an existing toolbar.

Any advice that can solve my problem?

staten island shortcut

alkupe — Tue, 19 Apr 2005 14:07:25 -0800

what is the shortcut through staten island btwn goethals and verrazano bridges? I keep hearing about some shortcut where you get off I-287, but i don't really want to experiment with my commute.
bonus points if you know what the hell construction they're doing on this stretch of freeway and when it will be over.

Disabling caps lock?

BigPicnic — Wed, 02 Mar 2005 09:22:08 -0800

How to require Caps Lock to be held down for a few seconds before activating? I hate caps lock. It single-handedly reduces my productivity about 30%. I hit it, I'd say, about 1 out of every 10 times I have to type an "a". Then I have to spend time retyping whatever it is I typed in caps. Ideally, I'd like a feature where you have to hold it down for a few seconds before it activates or, barring that, disable it completely. I'm using WinXP on a (sager) laptop, incidentally. ThANKS.

How do I switch between different windows of the same program in OS X using keyboard

chill — Sun, 20 Feb 2005 06:12:13 -0800

How do I switch between different windows of the same program in OS X using the keyboard? AppleKey+Tab cycles through different programs, but suppose I have a Firefox window open, plus its "Manage Bookmarks" window open, how do I switch between those two without having to hit F10, go to my trackpad, position the mouse over one of the windows and clicking?

Keyboard shorcut for toggling checkbox (firefox)

acridrabbit — Thu, 17 Feb 2005 06:43:04 -0800

Is there a keyboard shortcut in Firefox that checks or unchecks (toggles) a checkbox? If there's no built-in shortcut, can I easily program one? Is there a shortcut in IE for this? I have Googled in vain.