Rearranging Sentences (using copy/paste from keyboard)

LaceWing

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The only way I know to do this is drag the mouse over the sentence, right-click to bring up a context menu, click to select cut, move the mouse, right-click again, click to select paste.

Six moves. How tedious. Is there a quicker way?
 
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kurzon

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There's a half-dozen ways to select, cut and paste, but since I'm very keyboard oriented I'll write out how I do it.

1. My cursor is somewhere on the screen. I spot the thing I want to change.

2. I move to the left of the thing I want to change using whichever is appropriate of these keyboard commands:

- Up, Down, Left and Right arrows to move by one line or character.
- Ctrl-Up Arrow - next paragraph up.
- Ctrl-Down Arrow - next paragraph down.
- Ctrl-Right Arrow - next word right.
- Ctrl-Left Arrow - next word left.
- End - end of line. (Ctrl-End = end of document)
- Home - beginning of line. (Ctrl-Home = beginning of document)

Once I've reached the beginning of whatever I want to highlight, I hold down the Shift key and then use the above commands to move - holding down Shift means it will select whatever I move over.

Ctrl-C = copy to clipboard
Ctrl-X = cut to clipboard
Ctrl-V = paste from clipboard

If you prefer to use the mouse to select, use the mouse to select, but I have never been able to cut and paste as quickly using the mouse as I can using these keyboard shortcuts.
 

LaceWing

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Thank you, kurzon.

It might not take me all that long to learn this; in the olden emacs days, there was no such thing as a mouse.

I do wish there were a sentence-oriented command. Wouldn't it be nice to position anywhere in a sentence and use a command key operation to cut it? And commands to move by sentence and not just line?
 

kurzon

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Hm - I know you can double-click a word to select the whole word, but I don't recollect off-hand a sentence-based command. You can also select a whole line by clicking to the left of the line (in the margin).
 
maestrowork

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Just drag and drop. Click select - drag mouse - release. Then drag and drop where you want it to be. Four movements. Not so bad. Unfortunately, there's no way around the "select" part so you still have to click to select, but no more "cut/paste."
 
maestrowork

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kurzon said:
Hm - I know you can double-click a word to select the whole word, but I don't recollect off-hand a sentence-based command. You can also select a whole line by clicking to the left of the line (in the margin).
Click to expand...

Triple clicks, I think, select the whole sentence or paragraph.

YMMV depending on the Word Processor, of course.
 

LaceWing

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Just drag and drop. Click select - drag mouse - release. Then drag and drop where you want it to be. Four movements. Not so bad. Unfortunately, there's no way around the "select" part so you still have to click to select, but no more "cut/paste."
Click to expand...

Bingo. Highlight the text to be moved, and release the mouse button; click within the highlighed text and hold while moving the cursor to the new position; release button again; undo twice to return it to the original position.

Thanks, Ray!
 
maestrowork

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In addition, if you hold down the shift or control (on the Mac it's Alt/Option) key while you drag, you copy that block of text instead of moving.
 

LaceWing

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Now, that would be useful, too. I like to copy a paragraph and work on the copy with the original for reference. Thanks again.
 
ejket

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maestrowork said:
In addition, if you hold down the shift or control (on the Mac it's Alt/Option) key while you drag, you copy that block of text instead of moving.
Click to expand...
This stuff is nice to know, since I'm using my Mac a lot these days. On Linux, you can just select with the mouse, click the spot for the text to go, and paste with the middle mouse button. The worst thing about these tricks is needing to remember what OS you're using when you're deep in the throes of working.
 

kurzon

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Matera the Mad said:
What I love about drag-n-drop is the frequency of drag-n-OOPS, like when the drop-point is too close to the top of the page anditstartsscrollingfranticallytothesky-- :eek:
Click to expand...

That's one of the reasons I don't use it - the other reason being I am a mouse minimalist (particularly when working on my laptop).

MS Word does give people a bunch of different options, so they can choose which one works best for them (or just get confused by toomanyoptions).
 
backslashbaby

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kurzon said:
There's a half-dozen ways to select, cut and paste, but since I'm very keyboard oriented I'll write out how I do it.

1. My cursor is somewhere on the screen. I spot the thing I want to change.

2. I move to the left of the thing I want to change using whichever is appropriate of these keyboard commands:

- Up, Down, Left and Right arrows to move by one line or character.
- Ctrl-Up Arrow - next paragraph up.
- Ctrl-Down Arrow - next paragraph down.
- Ctrl-Right Arrow - next word right.
- Ctrl-Left Arrow - next word left.
- End - end of line. (Ctrl-End = end of document)
- Home - beginning of line. (Ctrl-Home = beginning of document)

Once I've reached the beginning of whatever I want to highlight, I hold down the Shift key and then use the above commands to move - holding down Shift means it will select whatever I move over.

Ctrl-C = copy to clipboard
Ctrl-X = cut to clipboard
Ctrl-V = paste from clipboard

If you prefer to use the mouse to select, use the mouse to select, but I have never been able to cut and paste as quickly using the mouse as I can using these keyboard shortcuts.
Click to expand...

Very nice! I'll add a few to yours:


  • Shift+Page Up/Page Down: Select one screen's height of text
  • Shift+Home/End: Select all the text from the current caret position to the beginning or end of the current line. (Mac users, try Cmd+Shift+Left/Right arrow.)
  • Ctrl+Shift+Home/End (same as kurzon mentioned but compare to above entry): Select all the text from the current caret position to the beginning or end of the document. (Mac users, Cmd+Shift+Up/Down arrow should do the trick.)
  • Ctrl+A: Select the entire document (Swap Cmd with Ctrl if you're on a Mac.)
http://lifehacker.com/5321432/how-to-highlight-text-like-a-keyboard-ninja
 
kuwisdelu

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blacbird said:
I long for the good old days, when if you made a mistake, you had to go get a whole new slab of stone and start chiseling all over again.
Click to expand...

Ink-Pen-Paper said:
We didn't have rock when I started writing. We had to use primordial clay to make tablets.
Click to expand...

What amuses me here is that clay is easier, since if you write while it's still wet, you can still erase.
 
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