Mouseless Google Reader

Ha-choo! If you’re not already using Google Reader, go get it, load your OPML, and try this: ‘?’. Excuse me; sorry for sneezing all over you.

After spending a few years in the blogosphere using unsatisfying readers, I made the move to Google Reader a couple months ago. It just had so much to offer. And I continued to discover more and more compelling features/capabilities: search, ease of subscription, speed, etc. But this one just blew me away, and I had to sneeze about it: Shortcut keys. Lots of ‘em. Once you’re subscribed to a couple hundred feeds you find yourself spending as much time mousing around as reading.

You can find the comprehensive list by just typing ‘?’. Many of these could be useful, but that’s a lot to remember. Here’s a minimal list to get you moving through your feeds quickly, avoiding a sore mouse wrist:

• n/p — next/previous (don’t open)
• o — open message
• [space] — scroll down
• [shift]-[space] — scroll back
• [shift]-n/p — next/previous (feeds)
• [shift]-o — open highlighted feed
• A — mark all as read
• v — view post on actual site
• ? — pop-up help

Simply put, all you really need to survive mouselessly is n/p/o. While navigating feeds, hold down shift and use n/p/o; while navigating posts, let go of shift and use n/p/o. A is also essential. And v is pretty nice for quickly visiting an actual site to see the blog and bookmark it.

(After writing this I discovered LifeHacker already covered this a while back. But in case you’re looking for KISS, I hope this helps!)

Tags: kiss, optimization, sneeze