If you’re like most people, you probably use a lot of different tools to manage your calendar. You might have a desktop calendar, an app on your phone, or even a web-based calendar. But if you want to add a new event to your calendar using just one hotkey, there’s no need to go any further than the Windows 10 operating system. To add an event to your Windows 10 calendar using just one hotkey, open the Start menu and type “cmd” (without the quotes). Then press the “Enter” key. The “cmd” keyboard shortcut will take you to the “Windows 10 Calendar” screen. On this screen, you’ll see a list of all of the currently open calendars. The first calendar that you’ll see is the Windows 10 Calendar that you opened using the “cmd” keyboard shortcut. If there’s already an event in this calendar that you want to add to your Windows 10 calendar, just click on it and then press the “Add To Calendar” button. If there’s not already an event in this calendar that you want to add to your Windows 10 calendar, then click on the “New Event” button and then press the “Enter” key. The “cmd” keyboard shortcut will take you back to the “Windows 10 Calendar” screen and will show you a list of all of the currently open events. The first event that you’ll see is the new event that was added using the “cmd” keyboard shortcut. If there’s already an event in this event that you want to add to your Windows 10 calendar, just click on it and then press the “Add To Calendar” button again.
In case you aren’t sure what we’re talking about, you can use Win+B, then Left, then Enter to pop up this calendar with the keyboard (or you can just click once on the clock). But we can get that down to a single keystroke with an AutoHotkey script.
Note: I came up with this idea after reading an article from Digital Inspiration about launching timedate.cpl with a shortcut.
Using the AutoHotkey Script
In order to use this script, you’ll need to have AutoHotkey installed. If you’d rather not do that, there’s a compiled version further down.
What we’ll do is assign the F12 key to send the keystrokes instead of having to do them manually. Create a new file named something.ahk and then paste in the following:
Save the file, and now you can double-click on it to launch it.
f12::{send, {lwin down}b{lwin up}sleep 10send, {left}sleep 10send, {enter}Return}
At this point you can use the F12 key to pop open the calendar. If you want to close the script out, there’s an icon in the system tray.
Note: You can substitute another key instead of F12 if you want. You could also add #NoTrayIcon to keep it from putting an icon into the system tray.
Using the Compiled Application
I’ve included a compiled .exe version of the script in the download that you can run if you don’t have AutoHotkey installed. Just double-click on VistaCalendarHotkey.exe to run it.
Download VistaCalendarHotkey AutoHotkey Script/Application
