You could, for instance, have a space dedicated to your web browser and your word processor that you’d use for taking notes on your module website. Spaces lets you build alternate desktops that you populate with different applications. Once you’re back in the required application you can step through each open window in that application by typing Alt-` (the grave accent character) as illustrated below.Ĭlick on any of the open windows to make it the active one. You get a display of the icons of all the open applications and can step between them, pressing Alt-Tab or click with your mouse on the icon you need. On a Mac the same Alt-Tab command steps you through your applications rather than every window that’s open. If you like using keyboard shortcuts you can find more in the official guide to Keyboard shortcuts in Windows (includes Windows 10).

Confusingly, however, this omits so-called desktop apps which are those that pre-date Windows 8 such as Word and Excel, so its usefulness is limited. In Windows 8 the same Win-Tab command displays your recently active apps at the left of the screen. When you expose the window you want, let go of Alt and that window becomes your active window. If you keep pressing Win-Tab the front window flips to the back giving you a clear view of the second window, and so on.

It gives a much larger depiction of each window and suits some people better.