Tips & Tricks
A variety of tips aimed at making your work a little more streamlined - questions / suggestions welcome
🦘Jump to: Browser tips | Computer tips
BROWSER TIPS top
Capture text from images (via a browser extension)
Cookie removal (site specific instead of all of your cookies)
Default browser (set to your favourite browser)
Extensions (how to install browser extensions)
Browser extensions - how to install top / browser tips
Browser extensions can add extra functionality to your browser (e.g. see Capture text from images)
- Go to the Chrome Web Store (note - extensions for the Edge browser can also be added from here - see below)
- Using the search box (top right), search for - as an example - copy plain text
- A number of results will come up. Click on the Copy Plain Text one
- Here - if you wish - you can view screenshots, read the Overview and Reviews. Click on Add to Chrome (top right) and then Add Extension
- The extension icon will appear briefly, & then be hidden in the Chrome extensions icon (top right) which looks like a jigsaw piece
(and a similar icon in Edge) - Click on the "jigsaw" icon (as in 5), and then click on the pin icon to the right of Copy Plain Text to make it permanently visible
- You have now added an extension to Chrome. Now when you select some text in Chrome you can right click and select Copy as plain text to paste into elsewhere without formatting
- The process is essentially the same when using the Edge browser, as it is compatible with Chrome extensions. Edge has it's own Web Store which can also be used
- Extension not useful? To remove it just right click on its icon and select Remove from Chrome (or Edge)
Capture text from images (OCR) top / browser tips
- This uses a browser extension. If you are not sure how to install, go to Browser extensions - how to install
- The extension to install is called OCR - Image Reader
- Now, when you are in your browser and there is some text you would like to extract from an image, figures, video, banner, PowerPoint (if the web version) etc, click on the icon for the extension, use the cross hairs to select which area you wish to capture, and then the text will appear in a box at the bottom right and you can use Copy Text to capture it
- If you wish to use this with PDFs, the the Edge browser is a better option as it has a built in PDF reader which OCR Image Reader is compatible with
Default browser top / browser tips
Some staff may have Internet Explorer as their default browser. To change to a more modern browser follow these steps:
- Tap the Windows key to bring focus to the search box (bottom right)
- Type default and click on "Default apps" which will appear
- On the resulting screen, click on Web Browser and choose Microsoft Edge or Chrome to make this your default browser
- Before the URL in the address bar, you will see either a slider icon (Chrome) or a lock (Edge)
- Click on the slider or lock icon and then on Cookies and site data
- Then click on Manage on-device site data (Chrome) or Cookies (Edge)
- Delete all the Cookies for the site (Chrome) or navigate via the arrows to the Cookie level and click remove (Edge). In both cases, remove all Cookies
- Refresh the page in question (Ctrl R or use the Refresh icon) and with any luck the issue may be resolved
COMPUTER TIPS top
Clipboard history (reuse previously copied content)
Text too small? (easily adjust to make bigger or smaller)
Clipboard history - reuse previously copied content top / computer tips
1. To view and paste items you previously copied (beyond the last item), hold down the Win key (Win is the Windows key at bottom right between Ctrl and Alt) and tap V
2. This will show you the last 25 items you have copied. For a selected item, use Enter to paste, Delete to delete, and the up and down arrow keys to navigate the list
3. If you have some copied text or an image that you frequently use, click the three horizontal dots to the right of the text and click on Pin to retain between sessions
Don't see this when you press Win V? Tap the Windows key to bring the focus to the search box (bottom left of your screen) and search for clipboard settings. On the resulting screen, ensure that the Clipboard History option is enabled
Text too small? top / computer tips
1. While holding down the Ctrl key, use your mouse scroll wheel to quickly increase or decrease text size. This is the most generally useful approach as further below
2. Alternatively, again while holding down the Ctrl key, press the + or - keys to increase or reduce the text size
3. To quickly get back to the default display, just press Ctrl 0 (ie zero)
The first approach works on websites, Word, Excel, Outlook etc whereas the second approach is limited to websites.
Handy when your computer-strained, ageing eyes finds text a bit hard to read ...
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