Thread: Using the Print Screen Key in windows

If you utilize the Print Screen key on your keyboard regularly then you would imagine everyone would recognize how to use it since it’s so simple. Knowing how to employ the Print Screen key is not as ordinary as you may imagine. As a matter of fact there are many people who don’t yet recognize it’s there! This computer tip will illustrate you how to use the Print Screen key so you can augment your computing productivity.

The Print Screen key is utilized to copy or take a picture of what you are doing on your computer at that given moment. This is helpful if you require sending a screen shot to somebody for some technical support for instance. It’s also helpful if you want someone to observe a exacting document or file that you are working on but they don’t have the software to open it on their computer or if it’s too large to email to them.

If you press the Print Screen key it will send an image of what’s on your screen to the Windows clipboard. Then from there you can paste the image into a program for instance Word, Paintbrush, Photoshop or any other software that will permit pasting of images. The Print Screen key can be utilized in 2 ways. If you desire to obtain a picture of everything on your screen merely press the key and then copy it into your program of choice. Here is an instance of what happens when you press the key.



Notice how it captured every open window on top of the taskbar and Start Button.

If you use the key mixture of Alt+PrintScreen then it will only capture the active window which is whatever window you have up front.



Notice how this image is the similar as the open window that was ahead in the previous image. This can be utilized when you are only worried about capturing a screen shot of one particular window or program rather than all on your screen.