International Keyboard Shortcut Day was a huge success. I expected that I would be the only one participating and I have pretty good evidence that a few other did. Therefore, we blew right through expectations and set the bar high in Year 1.
I put my mouse away at 2:30 and worked pretty much nonstop for an hour. At 3:30, I hadn’t touched my mouse once. I had actually opened a text file to record all the times that I was tempted to use my mouse and the keyboard method I used instead. But there weren’t any. I’m sure I go an hour without reaching for my mouse all the time, so it’s not so surprising that this hour was without temptation. I was really hoping to have some seemingly intractable problem so I could post my crazy keyboard gyrations, but alas.
I tweeted that I had completed my observance of the day and Twitter’s web client presented a big obstacle. I couldn’t compose and send a tweet without using the mouse. Normally I would ‘Find’ the text on the page and hit enter to activate the hyperlink, but it didn’t work in this case. The web is surely the worst for keyboard accessibility, but it was ironic that my IKSD tweet required using the mouse.
I think the benefit of going cold turkey for 1 hour once a year is that you’ll discover a keyboard method for accomplishing some task that you’ll continue to use beyond the day.
Please share your IKSD experience in the comments below. If you used your mouse at all, tell me what the situation was. If you discovered any shortcuts or other keyboard methods that were new to you, share those too. Not all keyboarding is shortcuts – nearly everything on the Ribbon is keyboard accessible, although sometimes it takes more keys than a guy likes.
Until next year, keep those fingers on home row.
