Androidapps tips
Open apps with a Shortcut
You can open apps in the Shelf ( a.k.a dock or toolbar ) easily through simple shortcuts. Just press Alt + 1 to open the first app on the shelf from the left. Similarly Alt + 2 for the second app, Alt + 3 for the third app, etc. So if you have placed Chrome as the first app in the Shelf, you can just access Chrome by just typing Alt + 1 every time.
Navigate between Chrome Tabs much fastly
We can navigate between the chrome tabs with the shortcut Control + Tab, which is already popular. But there is another lesser-known way to navigate even faster. You can just swipe with three fingers on the trackpad from left to right and right to left and change the tabs. It may take time to use it when needed, but after using it for a few days, it will make the navigation much easier and faster. But make sure you are not using two fingers, that may take you to the previous page or the next page which is not you wanted.
Know every shortcut on Chromebook easily
There are a lot of Shortcuts in the Chromebook and you can access all the shortcuts just by clicking Control + Alt + ? on your Chromebook. It will show you all the shortcuts possible on the Chromebook in different sub-sections for you to search easily.
Get back the missing Caps Lock
On Chromebooks, Caps Lock is replaced with the Seach button. But we still can access the Caps Lock by pressing the alt + Search shortcut or remap it from the settings. Go to Settings and click on Keyboard in the device section. In front of the search option, you can remap the key to different functions. Just set it to capslock and use that search button as capslock from now. Also, remember that remapping the search button to capslock will disable shortcuts with the search button like Seach + Esc to open task manager.
Dual Screen mode
Chrome OS has an option to access the dual-screen mode with a simple shortcut. Using Alt + [ on any app makes the app align to the left side of the screen and we can use Alt + ] for another app to align to the right side. And we can also toggle between them seamlessly with Alt + Tab shortcut. Also, we have the option to press Alt + = to maximize any app and press it again to get back to its previous position.
Control Notifications for individual app
While you can always block all the notification by activating do not disturb mode, but then it might also block other important notifications. Thankfully, Chromebook lets you control notifications for each app just like on the Phone. Simply, open the quick settings panel on the bottom left of the screen and click on Notifications. You can enable and disable notifications for each app easily from there.
Adjust your keyboard backlight
Some Chromebooks come with a backlight for their keyboards. You might have seen buttons to change display brightness but not the keyboard brightness. You can use the shortcut Control + Shift + brightness keys to increase or decrease the Keyboard brightness.
Kill the apps using task manager
Whenever any app hangs and stopped responding, use the shortcut Search + Esc to open task manager and we can end the process through the task manager. It’s just like pressing Control + Alt + Delete in Windows.
Use your Android phone to unlock Chromebook
Most Chromebooks now are supporting tablet mode as they are already touch-enabled. But typing the password in a tablet mode is not an easy task as we need to use the Virtual Keyword. But we can change that to PIN when using in tablet mode. Open System Settings and in the ‘You and Google’ section, click on the ‘screen lock and sign-in’ option. Change the option to ‘PIN and Password’ and set the PIN. So every time, you are using the Chromebook in tablet mode, you can just press the PIN to unlock. You can connect your Android phone from the connected devices section and unlock your Chromebook when your Android phone is near it. Just like how you can use Apple Watch to unlock your iPhone.
Turn websites into Chrome apps
One thing Chrome OS still lags behind is the lack of apps. Of course, we have Android apps and Linux apps. But some of them are not well optimized to work on Chromebooks. Thankfully, you can turn most web apps to standalone Chrome apps with a simple trick. Just head over to Aplicationize website and paste the URL you want to convert into an app. And follow the instructions shown on the Aplicationize website. Google Docs, Twitter, Facebook, Wordpress are some of the apps which don’t work great with Android and are in which you can try this method for a better experience.
