There’s also a way to see a notification in your Task Bar if you turn on Num Lock. If you’d like to receive an audible alert when you push the Num Lock key, follow this guide to make your computer play a sound when you type the Num Lock key, so you’ll know if you pressed it by accident. Now that you know about the Num Lock key, you can easily turn it off if you ever accidentally find yourself typing numbers again. For example, Google “lenovo laptop numlock key location,” and you will find information about the Num Lock key on various ThinkPad laptops.
If you have trouble locating your Num Lock key, try searching for a combination of your manufacturer name + “laptop” + “numlock key location” on Google, and you might find a websites with instructions specific to your laptop. For example, this YouTube video shows the location of the Num Lock key and its indicator light on a Sony VAIO notebook keyboard. Some laptops may require you to hold down a Function key (commonly labeled “Fn”) while pushing Num Lock to toggle it on or off.Īlso, some laptop keyboards may have an indicator light showing whether Num Lock is turned on or off. In this case, the Num Lock key doubles as the F12 key, and it defaults to being Num Lock. Look for a small key that says some variation of “Num Lock,” “NumLk,” or even a small lock symbol with a number 1 inside.įor example, here is the Num Lock key’s location on an Acer laptop. Its location can vary wildly by laptop manufacturer, but it is usually located in the upper-right corner of the keyboard. The first step to turning off Num Lock is to find the Num Lock key on your laptop’s keyboard. In this case, you’re typing numbers instead of letters because the Num Lock key is turned on. Your laptop will most likely look different than this, but many manufacturers use some variation of using keys on the right side of the keyboard as a numeric keypad with Num Lock.Īs a result, if you hit the Num Lock key by accident on a laptop, you might have a problem that looks like this. When you push them, they register as the symbol highlit in the red circle.
When you press the Num Lock key (seen here highlit in a red rectangle), 15 of the keys switch modes into a simulated numeric keypad.
Here is an example a keyboard made by Acer for a Windows 10 laptop. Instead of changing cursor keys into numbers, it converts a section of the QWERTY letters on the keyboard into a virtual numeric keypad. Most laptops don’t have dedicated numeric keypads, so Num Lock works differently on them. What’s Different About Num Lock on a Laptop? With Num Lock turned off, the keypad registers as cursor keys (like up and down arrow) and some editing keys (such as Home and Insert).
With Num Lock turned on, the numeric keypad on a desktop PC works like an adding machine keypad with numbers and symbols (such as *, /, and +) that represent mathematical operations. Here is an example of a typical numeric keypad location on a desktop keyboard. To switch modes between them, IBM introduced the Num Lock key. To save room on the keyboard, IBM decided to make keys on the numeric keypad do double duty as both number keys and cursor keys. In the Excel Scroll-lock Fix prompt window, click OK.Num Lock, short for “number lock,” is a feature of PC keyboards dating back to the very first IBM PC in 1981.Click the Run button near the top-left of the AppleScript window. Double-click the Excel-ScrollLock.applescript file, opening an AppleScript window.Save the text file with a file name of Excel-ScrollLock.applescript and save it to a location where you can easily access it.set returnedItems to (display dialog "Press OK to send scroll lock keypress to Microsoft Excel or press Quit" with title "Excel Scroll-lock Fix" buttons In your AppleScript document, these should be written as one long line. One side effect of these new shortcuts is that the Alt + left/right arrows. In the script below, some lines wrap around to the next line. In addition you can combine any of the above shortcuts with Shift or Ctrl or both, to select text or move the cursor in various ways in text editors and word processors.