For your profession · 117 tips
For developers and everyone who lives in an editor, a terminal and code review. Shortcuts, automation, AI assistants and routines that remove context switching instead of adding it.
Recommended start
Three in-depth guides that cover most of what eats your day. The rest gets easy after that.
An explainer with prompts: what it means to let AI run in a loop, what's true in the hype, what's overblown, and how to safely try your first loop.
AI · 15 minA guide with prompts: why a chatbot silently gets math wrong, how a persistent DuckDB skill lets you query CSV or Excel in plain words — and check results.
AI · 27 minA complete guide with prompts: how connectors get added, what Buffer, Canva, Notion, or Supabase can really do — and two honest ways to bring in Gemini.
AI · 27 minEverything for you
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In-depth guide · 15 min
An explainer with prompts: what it means to let AI run in a loop, what's true in the hype, what's overblown, and how to safely try your first loop.
In-depth guide · 27 min
A guide with prompts: why a chatbot silently gets math wrong, how a persistent DuckDB skill lets you query CSV or Excel in plain words — and check results.
In-depth guide · 27 min
A complete guide with prompts: how connectors get added, what Buffer, Canva, Notion, or Supabase can really do — and two honest ways to bring in Gemini.
In-depth guide · 23 min
A guide with prompts: why the agent writes a different script every time, when to move from chat to a file, scheduled runs, and catching silent breaks.
In-depth guide · 26 min
A guide with prompts: a website without hiring a developer — from scaffolding through git as a safety net to a domain and Vercel. Proven on this site.
In-depth guide · 20 min
A guide with prompts: installation, the first half hour, five typical tasks from folder cleanup to reports, and safety rules. It's how this site is made.
In-depth guide · 18 min
A complete guide with prompts for orchestrating subagents: when one agent isn't enough, splitting work into batches, and checking results with a script.
In-depth guide · 20 min
A complete guide with prompts: connect AI to Notion or a notes folder, ask questions in your own words, and have the archive fill itself in every week.
In-depth guide · 21 min
A complete guide with prompts: one visual identity, one command — a style prompt, an AI-written script, batch generation, WebP compression, a safe API key.
In-depth guide · 21 min
A complete guide with prompts: what MCP is and why it's the USB-C of AI, connecting mail, calendar, or Notion, and least-privilege permission setup.
In-depth guide · 18 min
A fair comparison of three camps across eight criteria — from capture speed to price. With a comparison table, a pick for your situation, and an exit plan.
In-depth guide · 21 min
A complete guide with prompts: three levels of assistance and when to use each, tests and refactoring, unfamiliar codebases, and agent-mode guardrails.
Describe in plain words what you want to match, and AI returns a regular expression with a part-by-part explanation and test cases. For Sheets, editors, and bulk edits.
Testing a spreadsheet, a form, or a mailing? Have AI generate fifty fictional rows with names and amounts instead of copying real data.
One file has both a bug fix and an unrelated cleanup? git add -p walks through the changes chunk by chunk and asks what belongs in the commit.
A forgotten file or a typo in the message doesn't need a new commit. --amend rewrites the last one, as if the mistake never happened.
Files from your system and editor don't belong in every project's .gitignore. Set up a global ignore file instead — it applies to every repository.
Bad reset, deleted branch, a rebase gone wrong? git reflog shows the history of everywhere HEAD has been — and lost commits can be brought back.
An urgent fix comes in and your code is half-finished? git stash tucks it away in a drawer, git stash pop brings it back. No half-baked commits.
API response as one unreadable line of mush? jq formats it, colors it, and pulls out exactly the field you're looking for.
A cable that falls behind the desk every time you unplug it is a daily micro-frustration. An office clip and a few reusable cable ties end it for good.
Google Calendar and Outlook can both show a second time axis next to your own. Plan a meeting across time zones by looking, not by doing math in your head.
Cmd+Option+C
Need the exact path to a file for the terminal, a script, or an email to IT? Finder can copy it with one shortcut — it's just well hidden.
Cmd
The icons in your Mac's menu bar aren't nailed down — hold Cmd and drag them elsewhere, or drag one downward to remove it entirely.
Option+→
Option plus an arrow key jumps by word, Cmd jumps to the start and end of a line. Switchers from Windows type on a Mac with the handbrake on until they learn these.
You might already own a second monitor — your iPad. Sidecar turns it into a wireless Mac display in two clicks, even on the road.
A hidden option in Accessibility changes how you use the trackpad — drag windows and files with a light three-finger touch, no holding down and no thumb fatigue.
Move the cursor past the edge of your Mac's screen — and it shows up on the iPad. One keyboard, one mouse, two devices, zero setup.
A monitor rotated 90° shows a full document page, a long email, or code without endless scrolling. Windows and Mac both handle it right in settings.
With an external monitor and keyboard, a laptop can run closed and save desk space. Just change one setting for what closing the lid does.
Plenty of monitors and laptops run at 60 Hz even though the hardware can do more. One setting, and scrolling suddenly feels buttery smooth.
Before a meeting or a coworker pulls you away, write one sentence: what you're doing and what the next step is. Coming back then takes seconds, not a quarter hour.
After 20 minutes at a screen, look at something 20 feet away for 20 seconds. The eye muscles relax and you skip the dry, burning eyes come evening.
A work laptop and your own computer on one desk doesn't have to mean two keyboards. A USB switch flips between them with a single button.
Need to get files onto another device on the same network? Python turns any folder into a downloadable web page.
Holding an arrow key or Backspace repeats at a speed you can configure. Two sliders almost nobody ever touches — and typing instantly feels snappier.
Read a message on your phone at the bus stop and now there's no trace of it at work? Alt+click puts it back among the unread. And Esc, the opposite way, clears a whole channel.
Slack has a conversation with just you — a private space for notes, links, and half-written messages, synced between your computer and phone.
The file ~/.ssh/config remembers addresses, usernames, ports, and keys for you. Connecting to a server shrinks down to two words.
One command uploads your public key to a server — from then on you log in without a password, faster and more securely.
Jumping between two directories? You don't have to type the full paths back and forth — “cd -” always jumps to the previous folder.
Ctrl+R
You don't have to fish a long command from last week out with the up arrow. Ctrl+R searches history for any fragment and autocompletes the whole thing.
Ctrl+W
A typo at the start of a long command isn't a reason to hold down Backspace. Ctrl+W deletes a word, Ctrl+U a line, Ctrl+A jumps to the start.
Open the current folder from the terminal in your graphical file manager with one command: “open .” on a Mac, “explorer.exe .” on Windows and in WSL.
Dragging a file from File Explorer or Finder into a terminal window inserts its full path — correctly quoted, without a single typo.
Forgot sudo? Don't retype the command: “sudo !!” reruns it with admin rights. And “!$” inserts the last argument from the previous line.
Ctrl+F5
Broken layout, an old version, a button that doesn't respond — Ctrl+F5 forces the browser to download the page again, from scratch.
Edge and Firefox can move your tabs into a column on the side. Twenty tabs with readable titles instead of a row of nameless little teeth.
Alt+↓
Alt+up/down arrow moves a line or block to a new spot, Shift+Alt+arrow duplicates it. No more juggling Ctrl+X and Ctrl+V.
F2
Renaming a symbol with F2 changes a function or variable everywhere it's used, across files. Smarter than find and replace.
Hold Alt and drag with the mouse — Word selects a rectangle of text across lines. Perfect for deleting a column of characters that a normal selection can't grab.
Clicking a running app's taskbar icon just brings it to the front. Shift+click opens a new window, Ctrl+Shift+click launches it as admin — three tricks in one icon.
A long export, a recording, or a presentation — and Windows puts the computer to sleep in the middle of it. Awake from PowerToys keeps it up for an hour, two, or until you say otherwise.
Win+Shift+C
What's the exact color of the client's logo? Win+Shift+C from PowerToys reads the color from anywhere on screen and copies its code to the clipboard.
Replace text across all filenames, add a date, number them. PowerRename from PowerToys renames whole batches at once — with a preview before anything actually happens.
A terminal opened exactly in the folder you're looking at: just type cmd or powershell into Explorer's address bar and press Enter.
Ctrl+Shift+C
No need to describe to a colleague where a file lives. Ctrl+Shift+C in File Explorer copies the complete path — just paste it into chat or a dialog.
Win+Ctrl+Shift+B
The display freezes or turns black after connecting a monitor, but the computer is still running. Win+Ctrl+Shift+B restarts the graphics driver — the picture comes back and you lose nothing.
Win+`
Windows Terminal has a mode like an old game console: Win+` slides it down over the top half of the screen, press it again to hide it. Always at hand, never in the way.
No more hunting for installers across the web: winget install installs a program from a verified source, and winget upgrade --all updates everything at once.
Win+V
Windows can remember everything you copy. Just press Win+V instead of Ctrl+V.
Win+1
Open apps pinned to the taskbar by their position number. No more hunting with the mouse.
Shift+End
Shift + End selects text from the cursor to the end of the line, Shift + Home to the start. No dragging with the mouse.
Win+L
The fastest security habit there is. One keypress and nobody can see what you're working on.
mouse wheel
Clicking the wheel opens a link in a new tab and closes a tab without hunting for the little X.
Lights, do-not-disturb, a timer, and music with a single command. A ritual that tells your brain “it's work time now.”
The trick isn't standing all day — it's alternating positions, plus a bit of movement that fits into your work without interrupting it.
ANC headphones solve two problems at once: ambient noise, and coworkers who can't tell you don't want to be disturbed.
Monitor, keyboard, network, charging — all through a single USB-C cable. Connecting your laptop stops being a five-minute ritual.
A neck that hurts from a monitor set too low. A stand or arm for a few dollars fixes years of discomfort.
Long commands, build sequences, switching environments — all of it belongs in aliases and scripts. Ten characters instead of eighty.
“Fix bug” tells you nothing six months later. One sentence about the reason for a change saves an hour of git blame archaeology.
Coding needs 2+ uninterrupted hours — one meeting in the middle kills the whole morning. Protect your blocks as a team.
Ctrl+D
Ctrl+D in VS Code selects the next occurrence of a word — and you type in all of them at once. Small refactors without find and replace.
The Shortcuts app can do automations: arriving at the office turns on Do Not Disturb, opening Instagram starts a timer.
A faster Spotlight with clipboard history, window management, text snippets, and thousands of extensions. Free at its core.
Ctrl+K
VS Code, Figma, Slack, Notion, browsers — they all open a “jump to anything” box. Learn it once and use it in every app you touch daily.
One place where you dump notes, ideas, and links all day long. Sort it out in the evening — or don't; search will still find it.
Double square brackets create a link to another note — and backlinks show you where it's referenced from.
Ctrl+P
Ctrl+P finds every command — switching modes, inserting a template, exporting. No need to memorize shortcuts.
Backticks turn text into code, three of them make a code block. A readable message saves time on both ends.
Operators narrow a search to a specific person, channel, and time period — instead of scrolling through history.
A notification schedule automatically quiets Slack outside working hours. It leaves you alone in the evening — and shows colleagues when you're reachable.
Ctrl+K
The quick switcher finds a channel, a message, or a person in a few keystrokes. Slack's single most important shortcut.
Picture-in-picture keeps a video (a call, a tutorial) in the corner of your screen while you work elsewhere.
Two profiles means two sets of bookmarks, logins, history, and extensions. No more signing out and mixing work with personal.
Middle-clicking a link opens it in a new background tab. Middle-clicking a tab closes it — no need to hit the tiny X.
Type @tabs, @history, or @bookmarks into Chrome's address bar — and you're searching only open tabs, history, or bookmarks.
Ctrl+Shift+N
Incognito mode is useful well beyond privacy — a second account, testing a site without cache, lending your computer to a coworker.
Teach your address bar to search specific sites directly — Wikipedia, Maps, your internal wiki. One letter, a space, your query.
Ctrl+L
Jumping to the address bar is the foundation of fast browsing — start typing an address or a search right away.
Ctrl+Shift+T
Reopens the last closed tab — and pressing it again brings back the ones before it. Works for whole closed windows too.
Ctrl+Tab
Ctrl+Tab moves through tabs in order, Ctrl+1 through 8 jumps to a specific position, and Ctrl+9 jumps to the last tab.
Alt+Space
The system window menu can move a window with arrow keys — a lifesaver when a window ends up off-screen after unplugging a monitor.
Win+V
Clipboard history (Win+V) can sync through your Microsoft account — copy something on your work PC, paste it on your laptop.
Windows can reopen the apps that were running before a restart. An overnight update doesn't have to mean rebuilding your workspace in the morning.
Win+Shift+→
Win+Shift+arrow throws the active window onto the neighboring monitor — with its size and position preserved.
Win+Z
Hover over the maximize button (or press Win+Z) and pick where the window belongs — halves, thirds, a grid.
Ctrl+Shift+Esc
Ctrl+Shift+Esc opens Task Manager directly — no detour through Ctrl+Alt+Delete. Kill a frozen app in a few seconds.
A free tool from Microsoft that splits your monitor into zones — windows snap into them on their own. A must on a wide monitor.
Alt+Space
Alt+Space opens a bar that launches apps, finds files, does math, and converts units. The Start menu can retire.
Win+X
Right-click the Start button (or press Win+X) to open a menu with Device Manager, Settings, Terminal — all two keystrokes away.
Ctrl+Space
Ctrl+Space switches between two keyboard layouts. A must for developers and anyone writing in more than one language.
Win+Ctrl+→
Win+Ctrl+D creates a new desktop, Win+Ctrl+arrows switch between them. Slack on one, focused work on the other.
Esc
Enter confirms the blue button, Esc means Cancel — and Space checks a box. Handle dialogs without ever touching the mouse.
Newer macOS versions support window snapping — drag a window to the edge, or hold Option over the green button for instant layouts.
Cmd+Option+D
Cmd+Option+D hides the Dock. On a laptop that gets you a noticeable strip of extra screen — the Dock slides out only when you want it.
Cmd+Option+L
Finder has shortcuts for the folders you use most — Cmd+Shift+D for Desktop, Cmd+Option+L for Downloads, and more.
Assign actions to the corners of your screen — flicking into a corner shows the desktop, starts the screensaver, or locks the screen.
Ctrl+→
Ctrl+arrows switch between virtual desktops. One for focused work, one for mail and chat — and distractions disappear from view.
Option
Hold Option and click Wi-Fi, sound, or an app menu — expanded options appear that you'd otherwise never see.
Cmd+Shift+G
You don't have to click through the folder structure. Cmd+Shift+G in Finder opens a field where you just type the path.
Cmd+Option+V
The Mac has no Ctrl+X for files — instead, copy with Cmd+C and paste with Option: the file moves instead of copying.
Cmd+Shift+.
Cmd+Shift+period in Finder toggles hidden-file visibility. Handy for configs, backups, and cleaning up your drive.
Cmd+Tab
The app switcher can do more than it looks — quit apps, hide them, or switch between windows without ever letting go of the keys.
Cmd+Shift+4
Cmd+Shift+4 turns your cursor into a crosshair. Select an area and the shot lands on the desktop — or straight in the clipboard.
Cmd+Space
Cmd+Space opens Spotlight — the fastest way to launch anything on a Mac. You can practically stop using the Dock.