5 ms·

In many, but not all programs on windows you can paste plain text by using ctrl+shift+v. Outlook desktop is one of the few places where this hotkey does not wo

In many, but not all programs on windows you can paste plain text by using ctrl+shift+v. Outlook desktop is one of the few places where this hotkey does not work. Before I knew there was a native hotkey combo, I created a autohotkey script that would do that and had a mini-tutorial that showed how. https://forum.digikey.com/t/add-a-digi-key-search-hotkey-everywhere-slack-excel-outlook-kicad-and-more/13405 https://forum.digikey.com/t/add-a-digi-key-search-hotkey-eve...

bryanrasmussen 5y ago
On Mac you can do shift+option+command+v to paste with formatting removed.
- tbrock 5y ago
  I think you just need to add shift, option is not necessary.
  - itcrowd 5y ago
    It's optional
  - kennywinker 5y ago
    Option was required in every app I've ever tried this in... do you somehow have different keybindings than me?
    - Foivos 5y ago
      Maybe it is related to the language of the keyboard.
    - olalonde 5y ago
      I just tried in Gmail and cmd-shift-v worked.
      - spookthesunset 5y ago
        I do command-shift-v all the time too and it works. Course maybe the places where it doesn't seem to work are the ones that require "option" too... hmm...
      - dwaite 5y ago
        Chrome does not use the system-wide key shortcut but defines their own.
    - jtbayly 5y ago
      Except Chrome, which is often where people are using gmail.
- wintermutestwin 5y ago
  Thanks so much for this - I can't imagine how much time I have wasted jumping through goofy hoops trying to change the formatting in gmail. If only there was a way to set this as the default and format pasting as the shift setting. FWIW, shift+command+v works for me...
  - olalonde 5y ago
    I used to paste to use the URL bar to paste without formatting and copy again. This is a game changer.
  - em500 5y ago
    > If only there was a way to set this as the default and format pasting as the shift setting. https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/copy-paste-text-without-formatting-mac/ https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/copy-paste-text-without-format... (MS Office requires a slightly different procedure: https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/287159/is-there-a-way-to-make-paste-as-text-only-the-default-action-in-office-2016 https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/287159/is-there-a-...)
  - bryanrasmussen 5y ago
    hah you're right, I don't know why I had that option in there, maybe snuck into my muscle memory from something else. maybe it was in one of the older macs I had to use recently, or some combination with voiceover that I was running.
- barbazoo 5y ago
  That's guitar barre chord level difficulty
- vandahm 5y ago
  That's a lot of finger gymnastics, but it's probably better than `pbpaste|pbcopy`, which is how I've been doing it all these years.
  - solveit 5y ago
    Thank you! I will now use pbpaste|pbcopy
  - SpelingBeeChamp 5y ago
    Not if you assign it a hotkey in Keyboard Maestro :) On my MacBook Pro, Command + Option + V universally executes the following AppleScript: use scripting additions do shell script "pbpaste | pbcopy" return
- antifa 5y ago
  I wish MSTeams supported ancient well established UI/UX conventions, this one most of all.
mhdhn 4y ago
It's worse in the smartphone world, at least on iOS. There isn't any notion of paste-plain-text. If I want that, eg in Mail app, I have to use the app Plain Text. It feels like crap.
ZeWaka 5y ago
It's incredibly annoying in Outlook. Every other Microsoft product I've used like Word supports the key-combo, but of course Outlook has to be different.
- TurkishPoptart 5y ago
  Fucking Microsoft. Why can't things be simple and standardized?
  - naikrovek 5y ago
    backwards compatibility. people who have been using those applications for decades do not want those shortcuts to change for any reason.
    - unbalancedevh 5y ago
      Haha, I wish they'd thought of that before they implemented the ribbon to replace the menu bar. I can't imagine how many hours of productivity were lost for people dealing with that change.
      - naikrovek 4y ago
        they did think of that... you'll be happy to know that a lot of the ribbon is going away in favor of small buttons with icons on them, and people are losing their minds over it. so no matter what Microsoft do, millions of people are gonna bitch about it and complain for years and years.
  - floxy 5y ago
    Like the reason ctrl+f in Outlook is to "forward", rather than "find". https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20140715-00/?p=503 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20140715-00/?p=50...
    - brokenmachine 5y ago
haxorito 5y ago
I’d say it’s all backwards default copy-paste should be just text and then you can go overboard with adding +shift to combination or +alt
SilasX 5y ago
Oh wow I had always gotten into the habit of copying into a simple text editor first if I wanted to strip out the formatting.
- pbhjpbhj 5y ago
  I often copy to Notepad on Windows, but careful, some characters get silently dropped.
s0rce 5y ago
I hate outlook blocking that. No idea why you would implement that not working.
hanoz 5y ago
> In many, but not all programs on windows you can paste plain text by using ctrl+shift+v. Sometimes that trick just stops working for no reason at all, then there's nothing else for it but to paste into notepad.exe and re-copy.
- jimlikeslimes 5y ago
  Just to kind of address the Outlook issue, you can also set the default paste setting to be text only. (sigh) we have to do this.
  - conductr 5y ago
    You have to consider the average user though. They have an image and 4 fonts in their signature, one of which is Comic Sans
  - rhco 5y ago
    This is one of my many peeves with Outlooks UX. You can do Ctrl+Alt+V, which gives you an option to paste unformatted, but it's much more finger-intensive than the other shortcut.
    - zinekeller 5y ago
      This is one of those rare times that you can trace it directly to Bill Gates. Another one is Ctrl+F as send and not find (https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20140715-00/?p=503 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20140715-00/?p=50...)
soheil 5y ago
Any way is to paste inside a non-textrich area like the browser address bar and then immediately copy the content again to get rid of the styling.
- jhot 5y ago
  I do this all the time. Cmd+tab into browser, cmd+t, cmd+v, cmd+a, cmd+c, cmd+w, cmd+tab to where I need to paste, cmd+v But now that I've seen you can add shift to remove formatting, I'll have to try to remember to do that instead.
  - soheil 5y ago
    I also do this sometimes: cmd+tab, cmd+l, cmd+v, cmd+a, cmd+c, cmd+z, cmd+tab Fewer pages blinking away
astolarz 5y ago
In Outlook, go to Options > Mail > Editor Options > Advanced > Cut, Copy, Paste > change the drop downs for the various scenarios to "Keep Text Only" to always strip formatting.
benhurmarcel 5y ago
On Windows I like to use this: https://stevemiller.net/puretext/ https://stevemiller.net/puretext/

bryanrasmussen 5y ago

On Mac you can do shift+option+command+v to paste with formatting removed.

tbrock 5y ago
I think you just need to add shift, option is not necessary.
- itcrowd 5y ago
  It's optional
- kennywinker 5y ago
  Option was required in every app I've ever tried this in... do you somehow have different keybindings than me?
  - Foivos 5y ago
    Maybe it is related to the language of the keyboard.
  - olalonde 5y ago
    I just tried in Gmail and cmd-shift-v worked.
    - spookthesunset 5y ago
      I do command-shift-v all the time too and it works. Course maybe the places where it doesn't seem to work are the ones that require "option" too... hmm...
    - dwaite 5y ago
      Chrome does not use the system-wide key shortcut but defines their own.
  - jtbayly 5y ago
    Except Chrome, which is often where people are using gmail.
wintermutestwin 5y ago
Thanks so much for this - I can't imagine how much time I have wasted jumping through goofy hoops trying to change the formatting in gmail. If only there was a way to set this as the default and format pasting as the shift setting. FWIW, shift+command+v works for me...
- olalonde 5y ago
  I used to paste to use the URL bar to paste without formatting and copy again. This is a game changer.
- em500 5y ago
  > If only there was a way to set this as the default and format pasting as the shift setting. https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/copy-paste-text-without-formatting-mac/ https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/copy-paste-text-without-format... (MS Office requires a slightly different procedure: https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/287159/is-there-a-way-to-make-paste-as-text-only-the-default-action-in-office-2016 https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/287159/is-there-a-...)
- bryanrasmussen 5y ago
  hah you're right, I don't know why I had that option in there, maybe snuck into my muscle memory from something else. maybe it was in one of the older macs I had to use recently, or some combination with voiceover that I was running.
barbazoo 5y ago
That's guitar barre chord level difficulty
vandahm 5y ago
That's a lot of finger gymnastics, but it's probably better than `pbpaste|pbcopy`, which is how I've been doing it all these years.
- solveit 5y ago
  Thank you! I will now use pbpaste|pbcopy
- SpelingBeeChamp 5y ago
  Not if you assign it a hotkey in Keyboard Maestro :) On my MacBook Pro, Command + Option + V universally executes the following AppleScript: use scripting additions do shell script "pbpaste | pbcopy" return
antifa 5y ago
I wish MSTeams supported ancient well established UI/UX conventions, this one most of all.

mhdhn 4y ago

It's worse in the smartphone world, at least on iOS. There isn't any notion of paste-plain-text. If I want that, eg in Mail app, I have to use the app Plain Text. It feels like crap.

ZeWaka 5y ago

It's incredibly annoying in Outlook. Every other Microsoft product I've used like Word supports the key-combo, but of course Outlook has to be different.

TurkishPoptart 5y ago
Fucking Microsoft. Why can't things be simple and standardized?
- naikrovek 5y ago
  backwards compatibility. people who have been using those applications for decades do not want those shortcuts to change for any reason.
  - unbalancedevh 5y ago
    Haha, I wish they'd thought of that before they implemented the ribbon to replace the menu bar. I can't imagine how many hours of productivity were lost for people dealing with that change.
    - naikrovek 4y ago
      they did think of that... you'll be happy to know that a lot of the ribbon is going away in favor of small buttons with icons on them, and people are losing their minds over it. so no matter what Microsoft do, millions of people are gonna bitch about it and complain for years and years.
- floxy 5y ago
  Like the reason ctrl+f in Outlook is to "forward", rather than "find". https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20140715-00/?p=503 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20140715-00/?p=50...
  - brokenmachine 5y ago

haxorito 5y ago

I’d say it’s all backwards default copy-paste should be just text and then you can go overboard with adding +shift to combination or +alt

SilasX 5y ago

Oh wow I had always gotten into the habit of copying into a simple text editor first if I wanted to strip out the formatting.

pbhjpbhj 5y ago
I often copy to Notepad on Windows, but careful, some characters get silently dropped.

s0rce 5y ago

I hate outlook blocking that. No idea why you would implement that not working.

hanoz 5y ago

> In many, but not all programs on windows you can paste plain text by using ctrl+shift+v. Sometimes that trick just stops working for no reason at all, then there's nothing else for it but to paste into notepad.exe and re-copy.

jimlikeslimes 5y ago
Just to kind of address the Outlook issue, you can also set the default paste setting to be text only. (sigh) we have to do this.
- conductr 5y ago
  You have to consider the average user though. They have an image and 4 fonts in their signature, one of which is Comic Sans
- rhco 5y ago
  This is one of my many peeves with Outlooks UX. You can do Ctrl+Alt+V, which gives you an option to paste unformatted, but it's much more finger-intensive than the other shortcut.
  - zinekeller 5y ago
    This is one of those rare times that you can trace it directly to Bill Gates. Another one is Ctrl+F as send and not find (https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20140715-00/?p=503 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20140715-00/?p=50...)

soheil 5y ago

Any way is to paste inside a non-textrich area like the browser address bar and then immediately copy the content again to get rid of the styling.

jhot 5y ago
I do this all the time. Cmd+tab into browser, cmd+t, cmd+v, cmd+a, cmd+c, cmd+w, cmd+tab to where I need to paste, cmd+v But now that I've seen you can add shift to remove formatting, I'll have to try to remember to do that instead.
- soheil 5y ago
  I also do this sometimes: cmd+tab, cmd+l, cmd+v, cmd+a, cmd+c, cmd+z, cmd+tab Fewer pages blinking away

astolarz 5y ago

In Outlook, go to Options > Mail > Editor Options > Advanced > Cut, Copy, Paste > change the drop downs for the various scenarios to "Keep Text Only" to always strip formatting.

benhurmarcel 5y ago

On Windows I like to use this: https://stevemiller.net/puretext/ https://stevemiller.net/puretext/