So you are a hotshot who doesn’t need to use a mouse!  Fair enough, power users tend to find they can do tasks quicker by using shortcut keys.  Shortcut keys are combinations of keystrokes on your keyboard that can make the program do a certain task.

The new Ribbon UI in Word 2007, Excel 2007, and PowerPoint 2007 is easier to use with a mouse, but if you want to use your keyboard shortcuts, there is a quick, easy, and visual way to find out what you need to press.

All you need to do, is hit the “Alt” key.  Simple as that.  By pressing the “Alt” button in Word 2007, the keyboard shortcuts appear on top of all the different sections of the Ribbon.

For example, (looking at the screenshot), to open the file menu, all I need to do is hit “ALT+F”.  If I want to save my file, which happens to be one of the Quick Access Toolbar buttons, I could hit “Alt+1″.  To change to the Insert Tab in the Word 2007 ribbon, I could hit “Alt+N”

As soon as you go to another tab in the ribbon, if you hit “Alt” again, you can see all the shortcuts for each piece of functionality on that tab.

So there you have it - all you need to do is remember “Alt” is your shortcut to keyboard shortcuts in Word 2007! (and Excel 2007, PowerPoint 2007 etc etc).

’till next time!

TNP

tags: office 2007, shortcuts, tips, tutorial, word 2007

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