Under Windows, the standard for cut and paste involves using things like
"Ctrl-V" to paste.

This doesn't work under Squeak for me (and never did that I can recall).
Basically, "Alt-V" works, but that is not what I want to use. Am I
misunderstanding something regarding preferences and such? I can't
believe other Windows users live with the "Alt" key for cut and paste.
What am I missing? What do other Windows users do?

I had kludged 2.7 to work with control keys as I epected. 

And now with 2.8, I just put in a minimal kludge (probably only OK for
Windows, and also inefficient, and may map more than desired, and
wouldn't be good for event driven things, etc.):

Add this to the beginning of:

ParagraphEditor>>dispatchOnCharacter: char with: typeAheadStream
     "pdf - added to support control-cut and paste just for windows"
     (sensor controlKeyPressed and: [sensor leftShiftDown not]) ifTrue: 
       [^self perform: (CmdActions at: char asciiValue + 96 + 1) with:
typeAheadStream].
     "leave the rest of the method alone"
     ...

Before making the above change, and while trying other things, I used
"Transcript show:" commands to trace through this method many times.
Basically, the very first clause is done for control keys, and after
that, even if you add a check for a control key to avoid doing an
action, typically some other case handles these control keys (never
producing what is desired -- especially because the ascii value of the
control characters map onto low values).

(Incidentally, glad to see SystemDictionary>>version is improved to be
more modular in 2.8. Also, good to see an improved copyright/license
permission comment regarding submissions at the end of the Welcome
window for 2.8.)

-Paul Fernhout
Kurtz-Fernhout Software 
=========================================================
Developers of custom software and educational simulations
Creators of the Garden with Insight(TM) garden simulator
http://www.kurtz-fernhout.com