We all know some keyboard shortcuts that we use from day to day. For example, to copy an item we can use Ctrl + C while to paste an item we can use Ctrl + V and so on. These keyboard shortcuts make your life easy and perform the intended task at once which would have taken multiple mouse clicks otherwise. But how many of us know all the keyboard shortcuts? This is where KeyRocket comes in. It is a simple application that you can use to learn new keyboard shortcuts in Windows and Microsoft Office.
KeyRocket is a free Windows application that helps you learn keyboard shortcuts easily. It keeps an eye on your computer activity and recommends keyboard shortcuts for a task that you have performed using your mouse. It supports keyboard shortcuts for Windows Explorer and Microsoft Office products. Suppose you are using Microsoft Word and want to make text bold, then you can do so by selecting the target text and clicking on the B icon in the taskbar or ribbonbar. KeyRocket observes this and pops up a floating window with the suggestion that you can make text bold using the Ctrl + B shortcut key. According to the Veodin website, it can help you learn over 1600 shortcuts and sequences for the Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook).
You can download it from the Veodin website. The download is available in two editions – personal edition which is free for non-commercial use and the commercial edition which costs around $5 per month. The installer itself downloads around 12 megabytes of more data from the internet before you can install it. It installs an icon in the system tray (notification area) of Windows. Now if you do something using your mouse, then you should see a popup window in the lower-right corner of your screen showing you an equivalent keyboard shortcut.
KeyRocket is a smart application and makes learning keyboard shorcuts fun. It also observes when you actually use a previously suggested keyboard shortcut and congratulates you on learning that shortcut. The progress bar at the bottom of the popup window increases every time you use a recommended shortcut. It indicates how often you are using that shortcut and also your learning level. It also shows you facebook and twitter buttons so you can share your keyboard shortcut learning experience with your friends and family on these social networking sites.
If you are one of those restless souls who just do not want to wait for all the keyboard shortcuts popup windows to be shown gradually and learn at the slow pace, then you can choose to view all the keyboard shortcuts for Windows Explorer, Microsoft Excel, Word, Outlook and Powerpoint through the Shortcut Browser. To open the Shortcut Browser, you can use the keyboard shortcut Win + K. Alternatively, you can open it by clicking on the notification area icon and selecting Shortcuts Browser.
In the Shortcuts Browser, you can select keyboard shortcuts list for each of the supported products from the drop-down menu on top-left. For each shortcut, you can set the Notify state to Auto which leaves the notification decisions on KeyRocket, On which always shows notifications for the shortcut or Off which turns off notifications for that shortcut.
You may think that you know all the keyboard shortcuts you would ever use, but once you start using KeyRocket you would kick yourself after finding keyboard shortcuts for almost every task. For example, I had no idea there was a shortcut for inserting tables in Microsoft Word documents. If you want to master keyboard shortcuts in Windows Explorer and Microsoft Office or just want to save your time by learning useful keyboard shortcuts, then you should try KeyRocket.
You can download KeyRocket from : http://www.veodin.com/keyrocket/.