Tips & Tricks

Document Scraps

Here's a cool one. With this tip, you can stick a "scrap" of information on your Desktop. You can then take this "document scrap" and paste it into another application - without opening it up (although it doesn't work on everything).

First, you'll need to use a program that supports OLE2 drag and drop. Programs like Word, MS Paint, Wordpad, Corel WordPerfect, and most other popular programs will support this function.

OK, now, here's how to do it.

Just highlight the text you would like to copy. Drag it to your desktop (don't copy it, just highlight and drag). A "Document scrap" will be created on the desktop for you.

You can make as many of these little "scraps" as you like. They can be text or images.

Here's a picture of one:

Oh, and you may want to right-click them and re-name them too - makes it easier to figure out which one is which.

To use these document scraps, either double-click them to open, or drag them to where you would like to have them inserted into your document (again, this only works with some programs).

A really cool use for this is if you use the same text over and over. For example, maybe you have some information you occasionally e-mail to people and find it annoying to be constantly opening up your word processor and all the associated copying / pasting.

Well, if you right-click the document scrap, and select "Copy" from the resulting menu, the info in that scrap is placed on the clipboard where you can paste into your e-mail message (again, not every program supports this). I use this little trick all the time to send out info to commonly asked questions.

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