Steps
- Look at and read the entire open window. Do not get tunnel vision on one portion of the window.
- Review the entire menu bar or menu bars.
- Click on File, noting that it relates to actions for handling files. Actions such as Open, Close, Save, and so on. Edit, Insert, Format are all items related to those actions.
- Tools is a catch-all menu for actions that don?t comfortably fit elsewhere.
- Windows is for handling windows tiling, switching between, and creating new windows and so on.
- Click the right mouse button while the arrow is touching any menu bar and in most Microsoft and other applications a pop-up menu appears so you can open other menu bars or close others.
- Help is the online documentation for the application and is the best source of information about the application and how to use it.
- Key combinations that make your work faster and more efficient. Common shortcuts are;
- Hold the Ctrl down and press A, that selects all
- Hold the Ctrl down and press S, that saves the document
- Hold the Ctrl down and press Z, that is Undo
- Select text or a picture. Then the keys X, C and V are important. In order they are Cut, Copy and Paste. Anytime you have repetition on a page these keys are life savers and it is when the mouse and the keyboard are used together; the mouse is used to select and Ctrl and C to copy then the mouse is clicked on a new area and Ctrl and V to paste.
Tips
- Learning any commercial application is easy as there is a standard and convention that is followed in the design of applications, so learn one and you have a flattened learning curve on the others.
- Smart workers use the mouse and the keyboard together to become a power user.
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