How2NotFail

I don’t know about you, but I love moving quickly between applications when I’m working. Now, I don’t have any statistics to back this up- but if I did they would indicate that 5-10% of the average computer user’s time is wasted looking for icons and programs. Most applications, especially popular ones (ex. Adobe Products) come with a handy run command that you can use to launch the application.

So, here’s how ya do it:

Hold down the windows key on your keyboard and hit R. This will bring up the RUN window. Next you can enter in the name / alias of the program you’d like to start. Keep in mind it doesn’t work with all programs, and sometimes the alias is not very intuitive.

Here’s a list of some of the more common ones that I use:

- photoshop
- illustrator
- firefox
- iexplore (Internet Explorer)
- cmd (Command Prompt)
- notepad
- calc (Windows Calculator)
- msmsgs (Some Older Version of MSN Messenger)
- msconfig (Windows System Configuration)
- outlook
- excel
- winword (Microsoft Office Word)
- groove
- mspaint (Microsoft Paint)

Even if you don’t know the alias, just try out the name of the program to see if that particular app will open for you. There are many others that you can use to impress your friends or coworkers, with a quick shortcut 1-2 maneuver of the keyboard. Once it’s in your blood, you’ll hate using the mouse to start programs the old and slow way.