International Keyboard Shortcut Day
Did you know that International Keyboard Shortcut Day is the first Wednesday in November? Considering I just made that up, I’ll bet you didn’t. But I hereby proclaim it so.
Mission
IKSD was created to spread awareness that you can become more efficient by knowing and practicing keyboard shortcuts.
How to Celebrate
From 2:30PM to 3:30PM your local time on the first Wednesday in November, do no use your mouse for any computer activity. There are three levels of participation:
Novice: You’re intrigued by the promise of efficiency, but skeptical the investment will pay off. To observe the day, you’ll move your mouse to the opposite side of your keyboard for that one hour.
Journeyman: You’ve already learned quite a few shortcuts and you just need the discipline to apply them. To observe the day, you’ll use the keyboard in every program except in your browser for that one hour.
Fanatic: You don’t need any convincing that this is the greatest thing since electronic spreadsheets. To observe the day, you will disconnect your mouse for that one hour.
History
I thought of this on my way to work this morning when I (finally) started listening to Chandoo’s shortcut podcast.
Committing to one hour of keyboard only computing is an investment. As with any investment, there will be costs up front. This will be the most unproductive hour of your year. Everything will take longer than it should as you struggle to find the keyboard way of doing things. But it will pay off. During that hour you will learn one shortcut that will stick and it will pay dividends for rest of your life.
Don’t forget to tell your friends.