The solely fixed in my life is studying how a lot I don’t know—however it may be a supply of actual delight. Take for instance Windows shortcuts. So many exist that I’m nonetheless studying new ones, a long time later. The newest one I simply stumbled throughout: If you maintain Ctrl whereas Windows Task Manager is open, it freezes the real-time updates about your open apps.

This tip comes courtesy of Jen Gentleman, a Windows engineering workforce member who tweets about these sorts of little methods. Spotted by The Verge, this keyboard shortcut works in each Windows 10 and 11, and is useful for once you’re attempting to click on on a Task Manager course of and it jumps to a special place within the listing (or momentarily disappears). Holding Ctrl stops the window from regularly refreshing. You’re nonetheless in a position to in any other case work together with the apps, like choosing them or clicking the dropdown arrow to get extra particulars. 

If you’re a grizzled veteran of Windows and are tempted to facepalm that you simply by no means found this by yourself—like by merely messing round and urgent the totally different modifier keys to see what occurred—don’t fear, I bought you lined. I already did that myself.

On the flip facet, if this occurs to be one of many first keyboard shortcuts to catch your consideration, you need to undoubtedly give extra of them a spin. They velocity up fundamental duties in Windows by loads, they usually’re fairly simple to memorize after sufficient repetition. We have a listing of what we expect are the best keyboard shortcuts, and in case you’re a Windows 11 person, you possibly can dig into Windows 11-specific keyboard shortcuts, too.

Jen Gentleman’s Twitter (now referred to as X) feed can also be dotted with much more useful suggestions. If you want me for the subsequent few hours, yow will discover me digging via them—I like seeing how different folks work, so even tidbits about how someone uses PowerToys is nice inspiration. Speaking of: If you haven’t but began utilizing PowerToys, that assortment of extra utilities additionally supercharges navigation in Windows, too!