Steph: Hi, and Welcome back to HP How To For You.
I'm Steph and this is Bill.
And we bring you tips, tricks, and how-to information
every two weeks to help you get the most out of your HP products.
Bill: Today we are going to give you some productivity tips
to help you work smarter and faster with your PC.
Steph: Bill, I have to admit, my productivity levels have slipped.
Between work, and school, and all my personal projects,
I'm having a hard time keeping up.
Even my dog Frodo is having a hard time keeping up with me.
Bill: What can I do to help?
Steph: Well, for starters, you could walk my dog.
Mow my lawn.
I'm going to need you to play with my cats.
And also do my math homework.
Bill: The sum of the square root of any two sides of an
isosceles triangle is equal to the square root of the remaining side.
Oh joy, oh rapture! I've got a brain!
Or I could help you set-up your PC so that you can
work smarter and faster with some productivity tips.
Steph: I'll make you cookies.
Bill: Tempting, but no.
Steph: Fine. While I'm enjoying this cookie, what types of PC tips
can you give me and everyone else who needs a little help in life?
No homework, no cookie.
Bill: No productivity tips then.
Bill: One of the easiest and most basic productivity tips
for using your PC are keyboard shortcuts.
Keyboard shortcuts are a combination of keys used together to complete a task.
Like Control + C for copy, Control + Z to undo an action, things like that.
Checking out Microsoft's list of short cuts can be very daunting because there's so many.
There's some for apps, there's some for Windows, there's some for Internet Explorer.
But the best thing to do is to look and see what kind of shortcuts
there are and if they can apply to what you do all the time.
I have a few that I use all the time.
So here's some of those.
The first one is Windows + E.
And Windows + E opens up file explorer.
And file explorer is used to look at all your files so if
you need to open a file that you use a lot, you can go and find it there.
The next one that I use a lot is Windows + S.
Windows + S opens up the Search function in Windows 10.
And you can type in a search for a file or a web page
or anything you want to find on your PC.
The next one is really cool, and has a little bit of advanced features in Windows 10.
It's the Windows + the Tab key.
The Windows + Tab opens up Task view.
And Task view gives you the ability to add a
new virtual desktop like we talked about in episode 1.
Steph: I remember that.
Bill: There's a bunch on new ones that I'm getting used to
especially with Windows 10 launch.
With the snapping windows, and the virtual desktops that we showed in our first episode.
The Windows plus and arrow key can move windows around and I really like that one.
See you press the Windows key and then the right arrow key
will snap it over to the right side of the screen.
Which is pretty cool, you don't have to drag and drop.
Steph: That's cool.
Bill: There are a bunch of them.
But my favorite by far is Control + Enter.
Let's say you want to go to a website, say HP.
All you have to do is type in HP in the address bar,
Control + Enter, and you're there.
It puts the www dot and the dot com onto the address.
So you get www dot HP dot com.
It takes you there, so anything you want to do, anywhere you want to go,
just type it in, Control + Enter, and you're there.
And the last one that I use a lot is Windows + L.
And Windows + L locks the PC so that you can stand up and walk away, and recharge.
Steph: That's so awesome!
I had no idea that there were so many shortcuts!
Ok, give me more.
Bill: Have you customized your start menu or your task bar yet?
Steph: That's what you're here for.
Bill: Well, let's do that then.
So one of the really cool things is to add an application to your start menu.
And to do that, you can click on the start menu, All Apps,
and then find the application that you want to add.
And in this case, we're going to scroll down to Windows Accessories,
and let's add Notepad to the start menu.
Steph: Cool!
Bill: Now if you don't like clicking on the start menu to get to those,
you can add it to the task bar.
That same process, you can click on Paint, and add that to your task bar down here.
So now, all you have to do is click on the task bar to launch your application.
Steph: That's awesome.
What if I want to take something off of the task bar or the start menu.
Bill: It's as easy as right-clicking on the item you want to remove, and Unpin from Start.
That easy.
Steph: Awesome, thank you.
So I bet you have a couple more up your sleeve.
Bill: Let's do one more productivity tip for today.
Notifications.
Have you set up notifications yet?
Steph: Oh, so my PC can notify me when you finish my math homework?
Or when it's time to take the cookies out of the oven?
Bill: Still not doing your math homework.
But let's talk about notifications.
Notifications you can find by clicking on the start menu.
And then select Settings.
And right here where it says System Display, notifications, apps, power, click on that.
And here's your notifications and actions.
What you can look at here are Show me tips about Windows,
you can show application notifications, Show notifications on a lock screen.
So if you lock your PC, you can still have your notifications pop up
and say here's an email message, or somebody is calling you on your computer, things like that.
So it's really, really cool.
And very helpful.
So all of those tips should help you with your productivity,
and give you time to mow your lawn.
Steph: Mowing my lawn is great, but it won't help me with my math homework.
All of these tips are awesome for productivity though.
It'll help me work faster and smarter and have a little more time for myself,
but I still need help with my math homework.
Bill: I'm really good at math, so here's a little math equation for you to figure out.
If I walk Frodo every other day for 30 minutes, how many cookies will you give me?
Steph: Ok, if you walk Frodo every other day for 30 minutes, that's three times a week.
So I will give you three cookies.
Not including weekends.
If you walk him more, I'll give you more cookies.
Bill: I'll think about it.
Steph: Oh, fine.
Bill: But good job on the math homework.
Steph: Thank you.
Steph: And that's a wrap.
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