I love my keyboard shortcuts…why? It is the ultimate in computing productivity. I mean, seriously, if I could save a half a second every time I have to perform a specific function by simply avoiding the necessity to: stop what I’m doing, pull my right hand away from the keyboard, and then find the mouse to change a window or cut and paste… then those “ha-seconds” saved actually add up to a lot!

I don’t know if it’s because of my distant programming days or if it’s just advanced stage laziness (I believe the latter), but I think if the millions of computer users out there in this world were to save a couple seconds a day…what do you think that would do to this nations productivity quotient? I’m not going to get into the actual statistics for fear of appearing even geekier than I already probably do now… But, trust me, it’s a lot of time saved.

But there’s a lot of these shortcuts. So instead of trying to cram it all into one big post, I’m going to break it down to an on-going series of bite-size pieces so that anyone can master these shortcuts without being overwhelmed.

Today’s post is about navigating between your multiple browser tabs. Browser tabs are fairly new in the browser legacy. Prior to the browser tabs “era”, whenever you wanted to keep a webpage open and then go look at another one, you had to open a whole new window. With browser tabs, you can now keep your thoughts and online researching congruent and focused…all in one window.

Here is the problem: Let’s say you are drafting a blog post online via your browser and you needed to reference another web page you have open on another tab. Without knowing the quick keyboard shortcut, you would have to take your hands off of home base, go to your mouse or trackpad, move the pointer to the tab you wish to view, click it to view that tab, and then do the same process to get back to your half-finished blog post.

If you have any form of A.D.D. (or just have a lot on your mind…my excuse), chances are, your blog writing mojo has just gone out the window.

So here is the solution. The keyboard shortcut to browse or tab between browser tabs are:

[*Oh here’s a disclaimer… I’m only addressing Firefox and Safari users for PC and MAC. If you use IE…switch already…there are so many security issues with IE…don’t even get me started. Besides, I like Firefox because when it crashes (as all programs do…just ask Microsoft), I just re-install it and everything is A-OK.]

For MAC Firefox Users:

Next Tab: [control] + [tab]  OR  [command]+[option]+[right arrow]

Previous Tab: [control]+[shift]+[tab] or [command]+[option]+[left arrow]

Jumping To A Specific Tab: [command] + [the corresponding ordered number of the tab]
(Play with this one and you’ll see what I mean…it’s cool)

For MAC Safari User:

Next Tab: [shift] + [command] + [right arrow] or [control] + [tab] (*Noted by Dan below, Thanks!)

Previous Tab: [shift] + [command] + [left arrow] or [shift] + [control] + [tab] (*ditto)
(See why I prefer Firefox? More options! )

For PC Firefox Users:

Next Tab: [control] + [tab]  OR  [control] + [page down]

Previous Tab: [shift] + [control] + [tab] or [control] + [page up]

For PC Safari Users: …why? Safari works better on Mac anyway so don’t bother.

For PC Internet Explorer Users: Boo! (Just refer to the Firefox instructions )

And there it is! Short(cut) and Sweet! Enjoy and come back for the next in the series after you’ve mastered and integrated this shortcut into your daily web surfing activities!

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