Cut or Copy?

Copy and paste

Copy-and-paste refers to the popular, simple method of reproducing text or other data from a source to a destination. It differs from cut and paste in that the original source text or data does not get deleted or removed. The popularity of this method stems from its simplicity and the ease with which users can move data between various applications visually - without resorting to permanent storage. Some aspects of Internet culture have shortened this phrase to "copypasta".^[3]

Copying often takes place in graphical user interface systems through use of the key-combinations Ctrl+C, or by using some other method, such as a context menu or a toolbar button. Once one has copied data into the area of memory referred to as the clipboard, one may paste the contents of the clipboard into a destination using the key combinations Ctrl+V, or other methods dependent on the system. Macintosh computers use the key combinations ⌘C and ⌘V.

The X Window System maintains an additional clipboard containing the most recently selected text; middle-clicking pastes the content of this "selection" clipboard into whatever the mouse pointer is on at that time.

Most terminal emulators and some other applications support the key combinations Ctrl-Insert to copy and Shift-Insert to paste. This is in accordance with the IBM Common User Access (CUA) standard.

Some programs not only copy and paste text, but also edit it during the process, such as PureText (designed by Steve Miller) which copies text from a table and removes the table during the pasting process.