Top 10 Chrome tips
Creating Shortcuts for a Web Page
Chrome allows you to easily create a shortcut for a web page.
- Select the URL in the address bar and drop into your desktop.
- Go to “Settings > Tools > Create application shortcuts…” and choose where you want to create a shortcut.
Zooming In, Zoom Out and View Shortcuts
- Ctrl + + to zoom out the current browser window.
- Ctrl + – to zoom in the current browser window.
- Press space bar to move page down when viewing a web page.
- Ctrl + 0 to set the page to default zoom level.
- Press Shift + Space bar to move page up.
- F11 to view the page in full screen mode.
Using Bookmarks
- Click Ctrl + D to Bookmark the current page.
- Use Ctrl + Shift + B to show or hide Bookmark bar in a page.
- Use Ctrl + Shift + D to save all the open tabs in a new Bookmark folder.
Controlling Video Play
You can control whether video and Flash contents in a page should be started automatically or play only on click.
- Go to the URL “chrome://settings/content” in your Chrome browser.
- Navigate to the “Plugin” section. Choose any option Run automatically, Click to play or Block all to decide how the videos and Flash contents should behave when a page is opened in Chrome. Learn more about controlling video plugins here.
Helpful Chrome OS Shortcuts
While there are endless keyboard shortcuts on Chrome OS, here are some crucial ones that will help you navigate through Chrome OS like a pro.
- Search for anything: Press the Search button
- Trigger Google Assistant: Search + A
- Lock your Chromebook: Search + L
- Take a Screenshot: Ctrl + Overview button (you will find it just above the 6 key)
- Delete: Alt + Backspace
- Snap Windows to left/right: Alt + ] and Alt + [
- Keyboard Cheatsheet: Ctrl + Alt + ?
Use drag and drop to get things done
There are a few things that you can get done by dragging and dropping links and files to and from Chrome.
- After downloading a file, copy it to the desktop or to any other folder by dragging them directly from Google Chrome’s downloads bar (the small bar at the bottom of the page with download progress, when you are downloading a file ).
- You can drag a file from this download bar to upload files as well. For example, you downloaded a photo your friend sent to you via email. While it is still showing on your downloads bar, open Google Drive or Dropbox (or any website that supports drag and drop to upload). Drag the file from the downloads bar directly into the upload field to start the upload.
- Drag Text To Tab Bar To Search In New Tab: Drag it to the omnibar, that is the area above the address bar next to the new tab button, to open search in a new tab.
- Drag Links To Omnibox to open them in the current tab.
- Drag Links to Tab Bar To Open In New Tab
- Drag and drop files from your computer to Chrome address bar to open with Chrome. This works with PDF files, images and HTML files.
- Drag Links to Bookmarks Bar to Add Them To Bookmark
Learn more about the sites you visit
You may not have given much thought to the little icon to the left of the Omnibox address bar, which can look like a padlock or a blank sheet of paper depending on the site you’re currently visiting. If you click once on it, you can see a wealth of information about the page you’re on, including its security credentials, the origin of the site, the permissions you’ve previously granted it (like fullscreen mode) and the existing cookies stored by the site.
Browsing History and Restoring Closed Tabs
Chrome backups all your browsing history which can be seen by using Ctrl + H. If you accidentally closed a tab and wanted to see it again use Ctrl + Shift + T to open it in a new tab. Holding Ctrl + Shift and then pressing T every time will open the last 10 closed tabs from your browsing history in a reverse order (latest opened tab will open first). Use Ctrl + Shift + Del to delete all your browsing history.
Add a Secondary Google Account Inside the Existing Profile
On Windows, you can add multiple Google accounts under a single Chrome profile, but on Chrome OS, Google creates a new profile for every new Google account. While I get the idea behind it, sometimes I just want to check my work email or access Drive files from another Google account and that’s when it becomes frustrating. Nevertheless, now Google has provided an option to add a secondary account in the existing profile itself. Here is how you can access it. Open Settings and click on your name under the “You and Google” section. Here, click on “Add Account” and enter the new Google account credentials. Enjoy!
Enable Android Apps
As most of you know, Google has brought Android app support on Chromebooks and it’s a great step towards creating a coherent Google ecosystem. You can install and use millions of Android apps directly from the Google Play Store. In case, it’s not turned on by default, you can enable Play Store from the Settings page. Click on “Apps” on the left pane and open “Google Play Store”. Here, allow various permissions and set up Play Store. That’s it. Enjoy Android apps on your Chromebook. If Play Store settings are not showing on your Chromebook then it might be in beta and you may have to change your update channel to access Play Store. I have mentioned how to change the update channel in the next section so go through those steps. Also, you can find the details about Play Store support for your Chromebook from here.
