Alt-Tab

v.

To switch from one running computer program to another. (From the Alt-Tab key combination that cycles through running programs in Windows.)

Example Citations:

On a recent morning I was toiling away, when my PC began talking — not something I normally expect when I'm working in Microsoft Excel. I heard voices, then music. I Alt-Tabbed through my running apps until I came to the AIM client with my active buddy list. Running in the top of the window was a roughly 240-by-120 video of the trailer for a new Ben Affleck movie.

— Lance Ulanoff, "Why AIM Will Eventually Fail," PC Magazine, January 14, 2004

You know the feeling. You're typing along, and all of a sudden you have to look something up. Most word processors these days have adequate (even good) spell-checking dictionaries and thesauri. But if you need an encyclopedia or an atlas — or anything else that isn't built into the program itself, for that matter — switching over can be tedious at best. By the time you've Alt-Tabbed out to Program Manager, found the right icon, and brought that trusty multimedia encyclopedia to life, there's a 50-50 chance you've forgotten what you wanted to look up in the first place.

— Woody Leonhard, Vincent Chen, "The well-tempered CD clavier variations," PC-Computing, September, 1994

Earliest Citation:

If Alt-Tabbing between programs produces hard disc activity, you may need to add one or two more megabytes or not load so many programs at once.

— Jack Schofield, "Window on a world of PC possibilities," The Guardian (London, England), April 23, 1992

Related Words:

Ctrl-Alt-Delete

Wintel

Categories:

Hardware

Programming and Software

Verbed Nouns