If you are anything like me, you often have a lot of windows open on your computer at any given time. Documents, websites, chat applications, social networking applications, and more are often constantly in use. Alt-tabbing around all your open windows to find the window you need can be annoying and time consuming. Windows 10 has had a feature to help with this for quite some time, but I haven't seen much coverage of the feature. Multiple desktops allow you to organize your tasks by group, then easily navigate between those groups. Find out more about how this works below.
What are multiple desktops and what can you do with them?
Simply put, multiple desktops allow you to split all your open tasks into groups. You might choose to have all your social applications on one desktop, while work documents, websites, sources, etc. are inn another. You can even split web browser tabs into different desktops. This is especially useful for professionals and students, but anyone can make use of it.
So How Does It Work?
The process of using multiple desktops is simple. First, create a new desktop with ctrl+shift+d. Then, press shift+tab to open task view. Move between open windows with the left and right arrows. When you find a window which you want to move to a different desktop, either right click on it or press the applications key/context menu shortcut. In NVDA, you can do this with either shift+f10, or by pressing nvda+shift+m to focus the mouse and shift+right bracket to right click. Press down arrow until you hear "move to," and press right arrow to open the submenu. Press enter on the checkbox with the name of the desktop you want to move the window to. If you wish to exit task view without moving any windows, simply press escape.
After organizing your open windows, when alt-tabbing around a particular desktop, you will see only the windows in that desktop. This makes navigation much faster and makes it much easier to find a specific window. Press win+ctrl+left or right arrows to move between desktops. To close a desktop, press win+ctrl+f4. The open windows in that desktop will then be moved to the previous desktop in the list. For example, if you close desktop2 with a notepad window in it, that window will then be on desktop1.
renaming desktops
In the May 2020 windows 10 update, Microsoft added the ability to rename your desktops, so that when navigating between them, you hear more specific context than simply desktop 1, desktop 2, etc. There are two ways to rename a desktop. The easiest is to rename it as it is created. Just after creating a new (empty) desktop, press win+tab to open task view. You will see a list of all your open desktops. Move between them with the left and right arrows. Right click on a desktop and select "rename" to rename it.
You can also rename a desktop from anywhere. Press win+tab to open task view. Press tab twice to hear a list of all your virtual desktops. Follow the steps above to rename the desktop. Note that doing it this way sometimes causes screen readers to get stuck on the calendar and apps in task view, however.
keyboard shortcuts Quick reference
- win+ctrl+d: new virtual desktop.
- Windows+Ctrl+Left or Right Arrow: Switch to the previous or next virtual desktop.
- Win+ctrl+f4: close current virtual desktop
- win+tab: open task view
This is a wonderful shortcut for students, professionals, or anyone who consistently needs to move between many windows. It seems that new keyboard shortcuts will be added in the coming years to make moving apps between desktops even easier. But even as is, I have found this a hugely useful time saver.
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Tangela Mahaffey is a barely reformed English Major currently residing in Colorado. She reads entirely too many fantasy books and takes almost nothing seriously, including herself. She loves technology, music, writing, puns, and cats. She can be reached on twitter @tmmahaff
