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Comment by tonylemesmer | Hacker News Reader

My favourite find of the past 12 months is Ctrl+L which gives the address bar focus so you can begin typing.

i am stunned that folks didn't know about this since i've been using this shortcut hundreds of times a day for at least 20 years. i guess the moral of the story is that browser vendors really need to make it easier to discover the useful features that are buried in documentation

F6 works too, and you can press it again to unfocus it (TIL)

> and you can press it again to unfocus it

That is useful! Wonder why Ctrl-l and alt-d don't work like that?

Alt-d is, AFAIK, equivalent to a menubar shortcut (like Alt-f) that just happens to go to not quite a menu. None of the others close on repeat, so it doesn't either. UX consistency, though maybe the sort that doesn't matter as much as usual.

In Windows' File Explorer, F6 cycles focus between window sub-regions, while Alt+D sends you unconditionally to the address bar independent of where the focus is. So maybe there is a parallel here.

Welcome to the club!

The day I knew about it and till know I don’t think I ever clicked in search bar to search.

This shortcut is very helpful!

In similar context, Ctrl+w for closing tab.

Also ctrl-shift-t to undo close tab

Some browser-based editors will helpfully offer Vim bindings for editing, without exhaustively emulating all bindings. Of course, once in the flow of editing, I type Ctrl+W to delete a word, and voila, the tab closes!

Alt F4 is for duplicating the window with all of its tabs. /s

Kids, never learn keyboard shortcuts from strangers in the internet

It may take a while, be patient!

Ctrl+F4, Ctrl+W close tab Alt+F4 close window Ctrl+(Shift+?)+Q close browser entirely Ctrl+Shift+T undo close tab Ctrl+Shift+N undo close window Ctrl+N new window Ctrl+Shift+P new private window Ctrl+B toggle bookmarks bar Ctrl+Shift+B open library (bookmarks window) Ctrl+H open history in side pane Ctrl+Shift+H open library (history window) Ctrl+G, F3 find again Ctrl+Shift+G, Shift+F3 find previous Ctrl+Shift+V paste as plain text Ctrl+Shift-Z redo Alt+Entry in address bar opens address in new tab

Don't forget about Ctrl-Enter which converts <word> to http://www.<word>.com

One finger over, and you've got Ctrl+K to focus search bar (if you have it enabled. Becomes default-search-engine-search in the address bar, if not).

Huh, didn't know about Ctrl+L, I've always used Alt+D for address bar focus.

wow - now we have 3 shortcuts for the same thing!

Alt-d is superior, since it's a left-hand shortcut!

Even though the keys _are_ there I have no muscle memory for the modifiers on my right hand.

I'd almost forgotten about Ctrl-L. I used to use it all the time on Celeron work computers with IE, because I could open the browser, type Ctrl-L and an address, and press Enter before the toolbar finished drawing. I wouldn't even see what I had typed appear before the page I requested started loading! Think I also used it with Windows Explorer, after the IE integration…

While doing a search in search engine you can use `/` to go to the search bar, this also works in YouTube.

In Firefox use this for quick find on the page

I dislike shortcuts with special characters, as its availability depends on the keyboard layout. It's quite common that the shortcut doesn't work when you have to use modifier keys to invoke it.

Some vendors make an effort to support non-US layouts, others not so much (e.g Adobe, and recently Microsoft).

As a shortcut junkie, I've even changed the OS keyboard layout to enable more shortcuts to work, and memorising the location of special characters by feel. But that's not exactly an intuitive UX.

As some examples of shortcut keys that usually brings me dread are: /, ~, [, ], ;, |

I much prefer shortcuts in the form of "ctrl + letter"

FYI, CTRL+L actually works in a lot of contexts. Chrome, Windows Explorer, Dolphin, Slack, and probably many others!

I'm using alt+d what I like about that shortcut is that's on the left side and the keys are close to each other.

It's not possible to focus back which is a bummer.

You can use F6 to focus the address bar. With it focused F6 will return focus to web content.

Alt D (from IE) also works. Ctrl L is Netscape legacy.

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