A browser question: any idea how I'm doing this?

In My Humble Opinion
1

This question is completely motivated by curiosity. It is a puzzle, not a problem.

The browser is Chrome. I have used it for a long time and sometimes do various things on it by rote. What I usually do for some applications that I use a lot is press the first letter of the URL and then press Enter (assuming I use it often enough that it comes up from the first letter alone) to go to that URL. As for this site, I press “B” and Enter and come to boards.straightdope etc. I do this in a new tab.

Sometimes instead of continuing in the new tab, I find myself in another instance of Chrome, another window, if you will. I generally don’t notice this for a while, sometimes not until I am about to close the tab, because the on-screen experience is the same up to that point. So I have no idea what keystroke or other action I have done to get a different result. In general, I don’t have more than a few tabs open at a time, usually only 2 or 3.

To repeat, this is a puzzle not a problem, and I am driven to ask only by curiosity not necessity.

2

Go to the link you want and press Ctrl+Enter to open in a new tab or just Enter to open in the same tab. You can use Shift+Enter to open it in a new window.

Is this what your are accidentally doing?

3

Thanks, I guess that’s possible, although I tried it just now and it was hard for me to see how I was doing it accidentally – that’s a pretty major fat-finger keystroke. At least I can pay closer attention to that specific combination in the future. Thanks again.

4

I am used to a right click on a link bringing up a menu and “Open Link in a new tab” is on top. Lately, and only on Fox News, as soon as you right click a link the new tab springs up on top. The menu comes up also but I don’t need it. I don’t know if I changed something or if the Fox News page has some secret coding for it.