Windows 10. Absolute Beginner’s Guide (2016)

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• Right-click and drag—A cousin to the click and drag is the right-click and drag. Just as the right-click displays a menu with commands specific to the item you click, so does the right-click and drag. Windows recognizes the item you are dragging and pops up a menu relevant to the item and the destination of your drag. Right-click and drag can also be used to select a group of items that are next to one another.

Using the Keyboard in Windows 10

Windows 10 includes an onscreen keyboard that appears when you need it. This section is dedicated to the physical keyboard. You can read about the Touch keyboard in a bit, in the section “Using the Touch Keyboard.”

The keyboard is an important tool for interacting with Windows 10, but its role is for more than entering text and punctuation. You can use a large number of key shortcuts to issue commands to Windows 10. A keyboard shortcut (or key combination) refers to two keys (or more) pressed simultaneously to issue a specific command, such as Windows Key+F to use the Search tool. Some of the newer key combinations in Windows 10 use the Windows key as the first key in the combination. Keep in mind when using keyboard shortcuts that you should always press the Windows key slightly before pressing the second key.

Table 2.1 lists some useful key combinations you can use with Windows 10.

TABLE 2.1 Windows Keyboard Shortcuts

There are of course dozens—if not hundreds—of keyboard shortcuts you can use to simplify your life. Many software makers integrate keyboard shortcuts into their interfaces; therefore, a key combination can differ from one application to another. Certain combinations have become standard, and a quick Internet search will present a very long list of results. Rather than try to memorize all of them, try to learn a few that really help you. They will quickly become second nature. Once you get those down, you can add more gradually.

In Table 2.2 I offer my top 10 keyboard shortcuts.

TABLE 2.2 Favorite Keyboard Shortcuts

Using Touch in Windows 10

The touch interface was introduced in Windows 8, and its implementation has become more polished in Windows 10. In previous versions of Windows, you could use a stylus, a mouse, and the keyboard to work with Windows, such as to sketch and trace. With Windows 10, you can use your finger or another touch device to completely interact with Windows and issue commands. A number of hardware manufacturers have brought mobile devices to market to take advantage of the new Windows touch interfaces, including Microsoft with its own popular Surface brand of tablets. Here are some of the devices that leverage the new touch capabilities:

• Tablets

• Laptops with touchscreens

• Touch-sensitive displays

• Phones

Whereas you use the word click to specify the action you take with a mouse to interact with Windows, touch-specific commands generally use the word gesture because it’s a word that describes just about any action you take with your touch device. Here is a list of the gestures used with Windows 10, including some tidbits on how the gesture works:

• Swipe—The swipe is a short movement with your finger or fingers across the screen of the device. The fingers are on the screen only for a short period of time. A direction is usually given when you are instructed to swipe, such as Swipe Down from the top of the screen.

• Tap—It doesn’t get any easier than this gesture. To tap, just touch your finger to the screen.

• Tap and hold—The tap-and-hold action is the touch equivalent of the mouse right-click. You usually press and hold a specific item, such as a file or folder. This action is used predominantly to display a special menu that contains commands relevant to the item you pressed and held. You can tell you pressed long enough by the appearance of the small square symbol at the point on the screen where you held.

• Pinch and stretch—Use the pinch gesture and the stretch gesture to zoom into an image (stretch) or to shrink an image (pinch). To pinch, place two fingers on the display separated a bit over the image you want to change. While keeping contact with the screen, slowly draw both fingers together as if you were softly pinching a baby’s cheek. You can stop drawing your fingers together when you are happy with the results of the pinch, such as reducing the size of an image.

To stretch, place two fingers on the display slightly touching one another over the image you want to affect. While keeping contact with the screen, slowly draw both fingers apart. You can stop drawing your fingers apart when you are happy with the new size of the image.

Using the Touch Keyboard

Windows 10 displays an onscreen touch-friendly keyboard when it detects that one is necessary, as shown in Figure 2.2. As you type letters, predictive text will present words you can select rather than typing the entire word. The keyboard can display letters, numbers, symbols, and emoticons. To toggle these keyboards, use the &123 key and the emoticon key. Windows 10 includes a deep emoticon library, as shown in Figure 2.3.

FIGURE 2.2 Windows displays the Touch keyboard automatically when it believes you need it.

FIGURE 2.3 The Touch keyboard offers an extensive library of emoticons.

There are two conditions that, together, let Windows 10 know that a touch keyboard is needed:

• You use a touch device, such as a tablet or a touch screen. (Windows 10 can detect it.)

• You are on a screen requiring text input and no physical keyboard is detected.

You can choose between three keyboard layout modes. To choose the keyboard mode, tap the main language key at the bottom-right corner of the Touch keyboard (refer to Figure 2.2), and then tap the tile for the keyboard mode you need (see Figure 2.4):

• Regular Keyboard

• Split Keyboard (sometimes referred to as a thumb keyboard)

• Handwriting Recognition

FIGURE 2.4 Change the layout modes for the Touch keyboard.

While the Touch keyboard normally appears when needed, you occasionally might find that the keyboard does not display automatically. If you do not see the Touch keyboard while using a touchscreen device, follow these steps:

1. Select the keyboard icon on the taskbar to manually invoke the Touch keyboard (refer to Figure 2.2).

2. If you do not see a keyboard icon on the taskbar, select and hold the taskbar until the context menu appears as shown in Figure 2.5. Make sure that the option Show Touch Keyboard Button is checked.

FIGURE 2.5 The Touch keyboard icon will not appear on the Taskbar if it’s not enabled.

3. Enable Tablet mode by swiping in from the right on your touchscreen (or by selecting the Action Center icon on the taskbar) to reveal the Action Center. Locate the Tablet Mode tile in the bottom section of the Action Center pane (see Figure 2.6). Select it to enable Tablet mode. Windows will now expect touch interaction rather than keyboard and mouse input. (For more information about the Action Center, see Chapter 6, “Finding Your Way Around the Windows Desktop.”)

FIGURE 2.6 Make sure your touchscreen device is in Tablet mode when looking for the Touch keyboard.