When Should You Use the RIGHT Mouse Button?

Many people ask me when is the appropriate time to click the RIGHT mouse button. My short answer is to try it everywhere. The RIGHT mouse button (or secondary mouse button) provides quick access to many common functions via a pop up menu. And those functions change depending on what program you are using and where you are in that program.

For example, in almost any application, if you click the RIGHT mouse button, you will have access to cut, copy, and paste. If you are in email, or the Internet or a word processing program any you need to copy some text to another area, first highlight it then RIGHT click on it to quickly get to the Copy function.

In Internet Explorer, RIGHT clicking gives you access to some commonly used functions like Back, Print, and Select All. RIGHT click on a picture or photo in Internet Explorer and you will have choices like Save, Print and Set as Desktop wallpaper.

RIGHT Click in Word and you can jump straight to the font formatting menu, paragraph formatting menu and the ability to number or bullet a list. Select some text and then RIGHT click on it and Word gives you instant access to synonyms for that word. If you work with tables (and you should), RIGHT clicking in a table lets you customize the borders, the height of a row and the width of a column, insert rows or columns, merge cells and more.

You get the picture, RIGHT clicking in any application gives you quick access to some commonly used functions. Get in the habit of RIGHT clicking in different situations to learn what types of functions you can access more quickly.

One quick tip for our left handed readers. You can reverse the 'polarity' of the mouse in the Control Panel, so that the RIGHT mouse button is your primary button and the LEFT mouse button becomes your secondary button that will invoke the little menus we talked about in this tip.

Go to your Control Panel via the Start button and double-click the mouse icon. Depending on the brand of mouse you are using look for the 'buttons' tab and you will either get the option to reverse the buttons or you can set the function of each of the buttons to perform the action you want.

Go ahead, don't be afraid to use the RIGHT mouse button...or as I like to refer to it...the forgotten button. You will be pleasantly surprised at how many functions you can access this way and will be even more surprised how much you use it once you get the hang of it.

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