Tips for Tuesday: Use Shift + Delete to clear unwanted text

Ever type out a message in BBM and then think better of it? Yeah, we all have. That’s what the back button is for. Just click that, and your message vanishes into the ether. Well, that’s how it used to work. Now if you hit the back button in the middle of composing a BBM, it will automatically save your message as draft. It’ll still be sitting there when you return. There’s a new way to delete that whole message, though — and it even works in your web browser, too. The trick is simple: Shift + Delete. Click that, and your entire message is gone. Of course, once it’s gone it’s gone for good. There might be an instance where you want to hit keys that are around those two, and you might hit it by accident. That stinks. But otherwise, it’s a pretty useful function. Though I have to say, instead of Shift + Delete, holding the Delete key should be what deletes everything. It seems a bit more intuitive, don’t you think? This trick also works in text fields of the BlackBerry Browser. It’s the same deal: after you’ve entered the text, click Shift + Delete, and it will go poof. There is a distinct difference, though: when you hit Shift + Delete in the web browser, it actually cuts the text to the clipboard. So if you performed that function in error, you can just paste it back. Why it doesn’t do this with BBM I have no idea. I also have no idea why this isn’t an option in email and SMS. It seems particularly good for email in particular. Angry emails can ruin relationships, and you’ll always do best to delete them before you send them. A quick Shift + Delete would be welcome. And if you do it with BBM, why not SMS? I picked up this tip, because Michelle Haag at CrackBerry ranted about it a bit. I don’t have the same issues she did, in that I can’t imagine an instance where I accidentally hit these two keys. But I do agree that RIM should have implemented it across all native apps (and that includes Facebook and Twitter, where it would be equally useful). Still, in the few instances you can use it, Shift + Delete is highly helpful.

About the Author

Joe Pawlikowski is the Senior Editor at MobileMoo.com and has been covering the mobile industry full time since 2007. When he's not writing about the tech scene, he can be found discussing his personal love - baseball (and more specifically the New York Yankees) as well as writing on his personal blog.