Why YSK: I had this experience this morning. I was raging because the “alt + tab” shortcut had changed on my work computer when it worked fine yesterday. Now it opened the task view, but wouldn’t switch windows unless I clicked on a different program.

I figured either windows had rolled out some new “feature” or the IT department had changed something without telling anyone. I kept trying different google searches but couldn’t find anyone talking about my specific issue. Tried restarting, changing “multitasking” settings, editing the registry.

Finally some old post prompted me to try “windows + tab” and that worked. I discovered the windows and alt tab had been switched. So I tried a different keyboard and it worked fine. Finally I learned that my main keyboard has a “Windows” layout and a “Mac” layout, and somehow I had accidentally switched them.

So I wasted a bunch of time, got upset and was mentally blaming others when the issue was on my end. And one sign I could have used to realize that was that apparently in the whole world of internet search results I was the only one experiencing the issue.