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#1
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Go to desktop
Is there any key combination that does NOT involve the Windows Key
that will minimize all windows and reveal the desktop? Win+D would be the best solution of course, unless like me your keyboard does not have a Win key. |
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#2
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On 07/01/2018 2:20 PM, Nil wrote:
Is there any key combination that does NOT involve the Windows Key that will minimize all windows and reveal the desktop? Win+D would be the best solution of course, unless like me your keyboard does not have a Win key. not keyboard, but there is a taskbar setting to do this by dragging the mouse cursor down to the extreme lower right corner. Rene |
#3
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Nil wrote:
Is there any key combination that does NOT involve the Windows Key that will minimize all windows and reveal the desktop? Win+D would be the best solution of course, unless like me your keyboard does not have a Win key. If you use an Aero theme, there should be a "handle" at the right end of the Windows taskbar that you can either hover over to momentarily see the desktop (unless you disabled Aero Peek) or click on to toggle between the desktop and app windows. Alternatively, right-click on an unused spot on the Windows taskbar and select "Show the desktop". To toggle back, right-click again on the Windows taskbar and select "Show open windows". |
#4
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On 01 Jul 2018, VanguardLH wrote in
alt.windows7.general: If you use an Aero theme, there should be a "handle" at the right end of the Windows taskbar that you can either hover over to momentarily see the desktop (unless you disabled Aero Peek) or click on to toggle between the desktop and app windows. Alternatively, right-click on an unused spot on the Windows taskbar and select "Show the desktop". To toggle back, right-click again on the Windows taskbar and select "Show open windows". Yeah, I know about the little button, but I want to do it without moving from keyboard to mouse. Also, the button is inconveniently small. I didn't know about the right-click taskbar thing, though. It's not what I'm looking for, but it's maybe better than the button. Thanks. |
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On 01 Jul 2018, Rene Lamontagne wrote in
alt.windows7.general: not keyboard, but there is a taskbar setting to do this by dragging the mouse cursor down to the extreme lower right corner. I knew about the little button, but you made me realize I was wasting effort trying to carefully aim at it before clicking. Now I see I can just cram the cursor into the corner and click. I don't have to be precise about it. Thanks! I still want to do it with they keyboard, though, as I could with Win+D. |
#6
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On Sun, 01 Jul 2018 17:37:00 -0400, Nil wrote:
I still want to do it with they keyboard, though, as I could with Win+D. You could use a keyboard mapper software to map e.g. RightCtrl or RightAlt to a Win key. |
#7
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JJ wrote:
On Sun, 01 Jul 2018 17:37:00 -0400, Nil wrote: I still want to do it with they keyboard, though, as I could with Win+D. You could use a keyboard mapper software to map e.g. RightCtrl or RightAlt to a Win key. There's a few more suggestions here. https://superuser.com/questions/3334...n-old-keyboard Using something like osk.exe (On Screen Keyboard) isn't really a pleasant answer. And re-mapping has the problem of preventing something else from using the function later. Although I don't remember Scroll Lock doing anything useful, there might be situations where the LED is lit, you want to turn it off, and because you remapped Scroll Lock, now you cannot use it. A piece of tape over the LED will take care of that :-) If you were an "electronics hobbyist", you'd make a keyboard PCB with a regular keyboard controller, but only the Win key hooked up :-) Most of the chip wouldn't need to be hooked up (the 7+17 scan wires, you'd only need two of those). Paul |
#8
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Paul wrote:
If you were an "electronics hobbyist", you'd make a keyboard PCB with a regular keyboard controller, but only the Win key hooked up :-) Most of the chip wouldn't need to be hooked up (the 7+17 scan wires, you'd only need two of those). Paul https://techkeys.us/products/onekeyboard https://techkeys.us/collections/keys I can't find the cable it doesn't include on their web page for purchase. The little accessories add up. But at least someone made a one-key keyboard. Paul |
#9
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Nil wrote:
VanguardLH wrote: If you use an Aero theme, there should be a "handle" at the right end of the Windows taskbar that you can either hover over to momentarily see the desktop (unless you disabled Aero Peek) or click on to toggle between the desktop and app windows. Alternatively, right-click on an unused spot on the Windows taskbar and select "Show the desktop". To toggle back, right-click again on the Windows taskbar and select "Show open windows". Yeah, I know about the little button, but I want to do it without moving from keyboard to mouse. Also, the button is inconveniently small. I didn't know about the right-click taskbar thing, though. It's not what I'm looking for, but it's maybe better than the button. Thanks. There used to be a QuickLaunch shortcut (back when there was a Windows taskbar toolbar called Quicklaunch although you can create one by that or any other name) called Show Desktop. To have it again, load Notepad and enter the following in it: [Shell] Command=2 IconFile=explorer.exe,3 [taskbar] Command=toggleDesktop Save the file as "Show Desktop.scf" or by any filename you want but be sure the extension is scf. Move that shortcut wherever you want, like into a Windows taskbar toolbar. Alas, all it does is the same as hitting Winkey+M, and that is to minimize all windows. Clicking it again does not restore all previously open windows. New keyboards are cheap, like a couple dollars. Maybe it's time to get a keyboard with the Windows key (aka Winkey). It's similar to Mac users that just must have the Cmd key on their keyboards. How often do you use the CapsLock key? Probably very rarely. Anyone typing in all caps is considered yelling hence rude. You could remap the CapsLock key to effect the Winkey+D action of toggling windows. Maybe this remapper from Microsoft would work: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/down....aspx?id=22339 There are lots of keyboard remap tools. I found one article that has you do the registry hack to remap the CapsLock key to act like the Winkey, so you would use CapsLock+D to toggle the windows. https://superuser.com/questions/3334...n-old-keyboard You're probably safer using a remapper tool to define the keyboard layout in the registry. There is the KeyTweak tool. It's dated and I couldn't find its author had adedicated site and only found it at download sites, like: http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/...KeyTweak.shtml http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/keytweak.html I've heard of but never used the SharpKeys remapper tool. https://github.com/randyrants/sharpkeys https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=sharpkeys https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/wind...dows-xp-vista/ That last article shows how to remap a key using SharpKeys. Alas, in their tutorial on how to add a remap, I did not see Winkey listed in the visible part of the "Map this key (From key)" list. The pic only showed some of the keys that could be remapped. Key Mapper is similar in function (remap keys) but is more graphical in that you drag the keys around to remap them. You drag a key off them off the window and by dragging the key you want atop the key you want to remap. That one groups keys by category. My guess is the Winkey is under the Modifier Keys group but you'd have to search around to see if it lets you drag the Winkey in its display atop the CapsLock key or whatever you want to become the new WinKey. Hunting around for a key[board] remap[per] should let you find something you like. If none let you remap the Winkey to another key, you'll need something more robust, like AutoHotkey, but that means the software has to always be running to intercept the keyboard's scan codes. There are keyboard macro tools, like AutoIt and AutoHotkey, but they are overkill when all you want is to change the keyboard layout defined in the registry to make your keyboard look like the keys are different than what is normally associated with their scan code (each press of a key sends a scan code as well as each release of a key sends a different scan code from the hardware to the OS). Of course, with a keyboard macro tool, you can define any key combo to perform any action, so you could have some hotkey that does Ctrl+D (as long as the keyboard macro tool has the window toggle function to assign to a key combo). |
#10
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On 02 Jul 2018, VanguardLH wrote in
alt.windows7.general: New keyboards are cheap, like a couple dollars. Maybe it's time to get a keyboard with the Windows key (aka Winkey). It's similar to Mac users that just must have the Cmd key on their keyboards. I've gone through two fairly expensive modern tactile keyboards with Win keys in recent times. Both failed within a couple of years, the last one just a few days ago. I "temporarily" went back to my good ol' IBM Model M. I have 4 of these that I retrieved from the dumpster when my company threw them all out in the late '90s. Typing on it is a pleasure, like going home to mom's comfort cooking. Plus, it's unkillable. It does everything I want... except the functionality of Win+D. So, no, I'm not in the market for a cheap keyboard, Windows key or no. I'll check in to the remappers, thanks. |
#11
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On 01 Jul 2018, Paul wrote in
alt.windows7.general: There's a few more suggestions here. https://superuser.com/questions/3334...-windows-key-o n-an-old-keyboard The question asked there is exactly my question, too. I'm about to try one suggestion from there, remapping the Caps Lock key to Left Windows. There is a small utility to help do this, rather than editing the Registry directly. I rarely if ever use Caps Lock, so this might be acceptable. I was really hoping to find a built-in 2- or even 3-key combo, but I guess it doesn't exist in Windows. |
#12
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On Sun, 01 Jul 2018 17:37:00 -0400, Nil wrote:
On 01 Jul 2018, Rene Lamontagne wrote in alt.windows7.general: not keyboard, but there is a taskbar setting to do this by dragging the mouse cursor down to the extreme lower right corner. I knew about the little button, but you made me realize I was wasting effort trying to carefully aim at it before clicking. Now I see I can just cram the cursor into the corner and click. I don't have to be precise about it. Thanks! I still want to do it with they keyboard, though, as I could with Win+D. Interesting tip - thanks! |
#13
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On Mon, 02 Jul 2018 03:10:20 -0400, Nil wrote:
I'll check in to the remappers, thanks. KeyTweak seems to do the job even on Win10 although written for earlier systems. |
#14
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Nil explained :
Is there any key combination that does NOT involve the Windows Key that will minimize all windows and reveal the desktop? Win+D would be the best solution of course, unless like me your keyboard does not have a Win key. Maybe this one will help? WinHotKey Use this simple, yet powerful application to assign a custom combination of keys for a large variety of tasks in order to eliminate repetition from your work http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/...inHotKey.shtml -- Zo "Ladies, leave your clothes here and spend the afternoon having a good time." -- A sign in a laundry in Rome. |
#15
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On 07/01/2018 09:45 PM, Paul wrote:
[snip] Using something like osk.exe (On Screen Keyboard) isn't really a pleasant answer. And re-mapping has the problem of preventing something else from using the function later. Although I don't remember Scroll Lock doing anything useful, there might be situations where the LED is lit, you want to turn it off, and because you remapped Scroll Lock, now you cannot use it. A piece of tape over the LED will take care of that :-) I have a couple of KVM switches and both can be controlled by the keyboard. ScrollLock - ScrollLock - # where # is 1 or 2 to select the device. Also, I once had a DOS screen buffer program that used Scroll Lock to access the buffer. [snip] -- Mark Lloyd http://notstupid.us/ "Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company." [Mark Twain] |
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