I often help my mother navigate and use very basic (to me) computer technology.

As great as the technology for cutting and pasting is, it’s a pain to highlight, right-click, select ‘cut’, then place the cursor where you want, right-click and then select ‘paste’.

Thank God for the keyboard shortcuts ctrl-C/ctrl-V (command-C/command-V on the Mac); saves anywhere from one to five seconds, and that adds up to major time savings and less repetitive stress.

Turns out there are scores, if not hundreds of such tricks and shortcuts that could improve our productivity or just enhance our computing experience.

Google search bar is so much more

For example, did you know that the google search bar (or url navigation bar in your browser) functions as a calculator?

I didn’t.

Now I don’t have to waste precious seconds in opening a calculator or excel to do any calculations.

Did you know that the same google search bar can also serve as a flight locator?  If you want to know if your brother’s flight is on time, just type in the airline and flight number e.g. Delta 837 and presto you get the flight status.  No more going to any flight tracking website and then looking for where to enter your flight query.

More tips that you can use

David Pogue the tech columnist has a few of these gems for in this TED talk.  Most likely you’ll know many of them already, but if you get even one that is new it could be a meaningful enhancement to your daily computing experience.

All in the name of revisiting your daily practices to see which practices can be tossed, improved or replaced to make your life easier.   Enjoy.