WinHotKey

[Thorin]

You know how you can push Win+L to lock your computer, or Win+E to open Windows Explorer, along with various other shortcut keys?  I found this neat tool that lets you create new shortcut keys in Windows:

WinHotKey
It's freeware!

So far I've added the following keyboard shortcuts:

Win + Shift + C starts Chrome
Win + Shift + F starts Firefox
Win + Shift + I starts Internet Explorer
Win + Shift + L starts Calculator
Win + Shift + N starts Notepad++
Win + Shift + F10 starts GoogleTalk (GoogleTalk will display if minimized to system tray)
Win + Shift + F11 starts Windows Live Messenger (Windows Live Messenger will display if minimized to system tray)
Win + Shift + F12 starts Skype (Skype will display if minimized to system tray)

I'm running Windows 7 on my work machine (where this is installed), so I've got the Win + Left, Win + Right, and Win + Up combinations to size windows (left side half the screen, right side half the screen, maximized, respectively).  But I didn't have a good keyboard shortcut method for my most popular method, and was thus pinning icons on the taskbar.  I didn't really like the pinning and used Taskbar Tweaker to alter my taskbar.

These are some of my most commonly-started programs; at first I also made a shortcut for Outlook, but every time I used it a new instance of Outlook would start.  So Outlook is pinned to the taskbar and accessible with Win + 2.  Same with Windows Media Player.

There are other programs I use all day long (Visual Studio, for instance), but I start these up when I start up my computer and they pretty much stay running the whole time, so they're just pinned to the Start menu for (nearly as) easy access.