Microsoft ponders a dedicated Office key for keyboards

[HEXUS]

Firm is surveying people who have been experimenting with such a peripheral.

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[Tabbykatze]

I don't think my hands ever really touch that area of the keyboard, sometimes i forget there is actually a right ctrl/alt!

[huggi]

I don't really see a point for it. Maybe business-focused keyboards can utilise it but even that's stretching it IMO.

[blokeinkent]

I'm quite a heavy Office user across the whole suite but I can't see the point in a dedicated key. I also use a compact keyboard and have a Function key on the right side as well.

Pretty much eveything you'd want to do can be achieved in context popups, or in either shift or alt combo's, or function key combo's.

That's been good enough for years so why invent something that's not needed?

[winactive]

You could put copy and paste on the Office key and it would be new to some people...

Office & S would be Send/Share, makes sense or Office & E might be email.

They need to poll some really bang average bods and ask them what comes to mind with each letter.

Or not bother with the keys as most people want touch or voice.

[mark_a_scott]

Hazarding a guess, the combination would open applications:

O, Outlook
T, Teams
W, Word
X, Excel
P, Powerpoint
D, Delve
N, oneNote
Y, Yammer
and L, ?

[cheesemp]

...
and L, ?

Some new combined launcher? Either way I've got shortcuts for Excel and Word on my task bar. This doesn't look like it'll be any easier to use...

[LSG501]

Hazarding a guess, the combination would open applications:

O, Outlook
T, Teams
W, Word
X, Excel
P, Powerpoint
D, Delve
N, oneNote
Y, Yammer
and L, ?

You forgot things like access, publisher, project, visio, skype... they all kind of fall under the office banner.... not sure how they'll manage ones with the same start letter.

L could be linkedin or even microsoft learn.

If we go into their education side of things there's likely some we haven't thought of too.

EDIT: Don't see a need for it personally though but I can kind of see the idea of a 'quick launch key' where a mini menu of your own chosen programs could go but then it would kind of be the same as pinned to taskbar (something I don't use as I prefer a little toolbar with shortcuts as the icons are smaller). Like others I don't actually use that side of the keyboard much, especially the alt gr and 'right click' menu button.

[Ttaskmaster]

I never use the Windows key (it has a physical Off switch on my G19) and only use the Menu key at work. Office key would see absolutely no use.

[Friesiansam]

Yet another solution to a problem nobody has.

[Corky34]

I never use the Windows key (it has a physical Off switch on my G19) and only use the Menu key at work. Office key would see absolutely no use.

I was going to say something similar, adding an Office key seems pointless as i would guess it will be treated the same way as the Windows key, i thought most people disabled that or didn't even know what it does.

[Saracen999]

I was going to say something similar, adding an Office key seems pointless as i would guess it will be treated the same way as the Windows key, i thought most people disabled that or didn't even know what it does.

Me too.

Essentially, I've been doing the things I need to do, the way I do them, for so long that it's second nature and muscke memory, and I've no wish to learn a new way unless there js a BIG payback in productivity.

For instance, that's one reason MS dumping the Start menu annoyed me so intensely. I had mine set up how it suited me, and have had for years .... well, decades I guess. That would include starting a given application with up to a dozen different parameters, such a data directory to use, or command-line switches.

That said, while it's of no interest to me, others may well not be so set in their ways.

[kompukare]

I've had specific Office keyboard shortcuts for years.
For instance, Alt-Shift-W for Word, or Alt-Shift-X for Excel.
Using AutoHotKeys.
Set it once, then you can have all your favourite normal keyboard shortcuts on just about any machine.

[Ironbuket]

A steam key would be more useful, or maybe a stop stealing my data key

[ilh]

I use that area all the time:
Win key+L for locking my machine one handed
Ctrl+Backspace(/Delete) to delete a word, +cursor keys to move words, +Home/End to move to the start/end of files.
Shift+Delete to delete a whole line, +Home/End to select to the start/end of a line
Ctrl+Shift+cursor keys to select words.
Etc...

A right Windows key replacement would get in the way of my one handed locking shortcut.

[Xlucine]

I genuinely hadn't noticed that there was a second windows key on my keyboard before. Huh.

Anyway, we already have quick access to office programs. Just press windows and then the first letter of the office program you want (or the first few letters, if you have another commonly used program with the same initial), then enter