8 ms·

Function keys productivity trick

149 points by mxgrn 4y ago

BrandonS113 4y ago
I map the function keys to virtual desktops, but same idea. And CAPLOCK to Alfred to select apps. Super easy on Mac, and difficult to do on Linux, the main reason I don't like Linux desktops. To each their own.
awelxtr 4y ago
Windows users can do this by pressing Win+digit with open apps or apps you have pinned on the task bar. Linux Mint, as with many other windows shortcuts, has this also
- devmor 4y ago
  Yep, I've been doing this for quite some time. Like the author says, it's a genuine boost to productivity.
- thrdbndndn 4y ago
  I use shortcuts heavily, but Win+number is something I never get used to despite knowing them. They way they work when you have multiple X programs opened (say, editors, explorers..) is kinda weird and I ended up just using alt+tab, which is much easier to press anyway.
  - Configure0251 4y ago
    Microsoft's PowerToys has a shortcut guide that might help get you over that last hurdle towards using win+number effectively. Might want to give it a look.
    - myfonj 4y ago
      Taskbar Numberer [1] can do this as well (under Window 10). Startup command is start "" "<apps>\7plus-Taskbar-Numberer\64\7+ Taskbar Numberer.exe" -v2 -hidewnd [1] https://ramensoftware.com/7-taskbar-numberer https://ramensoftware.com/7-taskbar-numberer
  - layer8 4y ago
    Yes, I use them for launching "singleton" applications, and Alt+Tab for the rest.
- Springtime 4y ago
  It's superb for toggling pinned programs moment-to-moment, without needing to pay attention to UIs. On smaller-than-regular keyboards, such as 60% size, function keys already require one extra key held to activate (Fn+<number>, an upside is being closer to reach while on the home row), so they're already both equivalent in keypresses for such users.
- Arrath 4y ago
  Welp. TIL. That's handy, thank you.
- wink 4y ago
  It's ok, but unfortunately it doesn't seem to register with "multiples of the same application" open, i.e. if I have Firefox at Win-2 then it's always the first window that was opened (which is fine most of the time) but if I need the other Firefox window then it's alt-tabbing again. No, tabs don't help here, I don't have 50 Firefox windows open, but often a second.
  - awelxtr 4y ago
    Win+Ctrl+number You're welcome!
    - wink 4y ago
      Ha, thanks. Was on Linux when I wrote that so couldn't try it. Also Win+Alt+Number opens a new window of that type. Weird hand twisting aside, this could be useful :)
- Vinnl 4y ago
  I think most Linux systems have this too. GNOME definitely, for the applications pinned in the overview, and I would be very surprised if KDE didn't do this too.
trumpeta 4y ago
Another way of doing this is assign Hyper key to Caps Lock with Karabiner and then use that to set up hyper+X shortcuts to different or macros using Hammerspoon. So e.g. I have hyper+a for Alacritty, hyper+b for Browser etc.
- lewispollard 4y ago
  i3wm workspaces + bindkeys shortcuts come to mind, this is my natural workflow in i3 meta+1-9 to switch workspaces, meta+various keys to launch applications (and can configure i3 to launch them into preferred workspaces if desired)
- p2hari 4y ago
  Yep, this was the way I use it too. I had 'qmk' shortcuts but later moved to hammerspoon approach. Right now trying this set up . Andweeb's 'Ki Spoon' [1] for much efficient workflow. It is still under development 1. https://github.com/andweeb/Ki https://github.com/andweeb/Ki
- Graziano_M 4y ago
  I do the same (though I use spacehammer which is built on top of hammerspoon). It's been the biggest game changing in my keyboard-driven productivity. I don't like how it feels non-deterministic to command-tab since the order of the apps change. With a hotkey for each I know exactly what will show up when I hit the key, and better than using function keys, I don't have to move my hand from home row, plus it works when I use an external keyboard (which is most of the time).
- mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
  This is what I did in stumpwm. And I had a nice macro so I could define an app's command, what key to map to, what desktop it lives on, and whether jumping to the window or pulling it to me was the default.
- eviks 4y ago
  You can also make your Spacebar (with a tiny delay not to interfere with typing) an app-launcher key, and then you don't even need to move your poor pinky for such frequent space+r for browser space+f for file manager, etc.
hprotagonist 4y ago
~/.config/i3/config: # emacsclient set $em_daemon ~/.local/bin/em # make a quick launcher for specific things I do all the time bindsym $mod+o mode "spotlight" mode "spotlight" { ## specific files in a new emacs buffer # dired in home bindsym d exec $em_daemon ~/; mode "default" # ibuffer bindsym e exec $em_daemon --eval "(ibuffer)"; mode "default" # # guaranteed new scratch buffer bindsym s exec $em_daemon --eval '(switch-to-buffer (format-time-string "%d %b %Y %H:%M:%S"))'; mode "default" ## common binaries bindsym f exec firefox ; mode "default" bindsym h exec --no-startup-id zeal ; mode "default" bindsym j exec --no-startup-id ~/.local/share/JetBrains/Toolbox/bin/jetbrains-toolbox ; mode "default" bindsym m exec --no-startup-id mendeley ; mode "default" bindsym k exec --no-startup-id keepassxc ; mode "default" ## special launchers # ipython bindsym i exec zsh -c '$alacritty -e ~/.local/pipx/venvs/ipython/bin/ipython'; mode "default" # app switcher bindsym a exec "rofi -show window -show-icons -theme gruvbox-dark-hard.rasi"; mode "default" ## just in case we did this by mistake bindsym Escape mode "default" }
- bvrmn 4y ago
  This. It makes more sense to bind apps to homerow keys with some chain or modificator to "snipe" often-used applications instead of F-keys.
  - seanw444 4y ago
    More of a mnemonic in my case, not just homerow, but yeah launching frequented apps has never been more fluid than when I switched to my tiling WM.
    - perihelions 4y ago
      You can also get most of this configuration-free in Gnome. [Super] key switches to a spotlight context; one alphabetic letter focuses the most frequently used app with that prefix; and [Enter] key launches it without prompt.
  - 4y ago
hbn 4y ago
Can people hit their function keys without looking at the keyboard? Sure, hitting F5 to go to your terminal is less keystrokes than e.g. Cmd+tab+tab, but I can't hit anything in the function row without glancing down at my keyboard. And I put a lot of value in looking at my keyboard as little as possible
- giraffe_lady 4y ago
  Why though? I can't consistently hit it without looking, but I can hit it with barely a glance. The cost of looking at the keyboard isn't that high is it?
- chii 4y ago
  That's why the function keys are seperated into groups of 3, and you can feel which it is by feeling the gaps between them.
  - crazygringo 4y ago
    Not on a lot of keyboards. (Edit: I mean no groupings at all, not about the size of groupings.)
    - hbn 4y ago
      Including Apple's
    - Encrypt-Keeper 4y ago
      I've never seen a keyboard that does this. Just took a look around the office to confirm.
      - lkbm 4y ago
        Probably a typo—groups of 4 is (was?) standard. My Das Keyboard has this, as did all(?) the keyboards I used as a kid in the 80s and 90s.
        4y ago
mcc1ane 4y ago
So, let's say F2 does something important in an open app (e.g. "Rename file" in Explorer) - does that mean it would not work anymore? Or am I missing something obvious?
- tom_ 4y ago
  The author sounds like they are using macOS, where the F keys aren't used much.
- adam-a 4y ago
  Yeah I use F2 constantly for rename, not just in explorer but very useful in lots of apps. In Unity (the game engine) it's invaluable. Also F3 is generally "Find next" when you have a search box open. F12 and Shift-F12 do code navigation in VS and F10 and F11 are useful in the debugger. There are lots of nice things you can do with the F keys which this tip spoils.
- spinchange 4y ago
  F5 webpage refresher checking-in to say hi.
ataru 4y ago
I bind mine to virtual desktops, but I have the same applications on each desktop all time, so the workflow is quite similar.
csdvrx 4y ago
No. My function keys are used for things I do more often, like change color profiles, toggle a single app into dark mode, etc. My favorite trick is not the function keys but other "useless" keys: like Caps is remapped to be Esc (when released before another key is pressed) or Control (when used in conjunction with another key: act as a modifier), my 2 shifts and 2 alt do their normal modifier function (when used in conjunction with another key) but when used by themselves act as PageUp/PageDown Home/End Going up 2 pages up in the browser? Shift Shift. Top of the page? Alt. Bottom? The other Alt. For the Control keys, as I don't need that many I've experimented with a few remapping, but BackSpace/Delete are very handy. Going to the previous page in the browser? Alt+Control.
600frogs 4y ago
I’ve tried _so_ many different desktop workflows (including writing two custom window managers!), and I’ve finally settled for the exact same workflow - F -keys bound to my most common apps, all fullscreened. It becomes muscle memory within two weeks, and it’s faster than anything else I’ve tried by a mile. I use Thor for MacOS if anyone wants to replicate it, it’s a no-fuss version of the author’s setup. If I ever do need to see two things side-by-side, I’ve also got Rectangle for window positioning. A single cmd+caps lock+H/J/K/L for left-half/restore/maximise/right-half is all I’ve found is necessary.
- deleted 4y ago
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clord 4y ago
Would be nice to have a usb keypad and perhaps a little oled screen in each keycap to implement this… my function keys are pretty overloaded with stuff now.
- msk-lywenn 4y ago
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  - deleted 4y ago
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- default_png 4y ago
  https://www.elgato.com/en/stream-deck-plus https://www.elgato.com/en/stream-deck-plus https://stream-pi.com/ https://stream-pi.com/ https://hackaday.com/tag/stream-deck/ https://hackaday.com/tag/stream-deck/
marcosdumay 4y ago
You know, the CTRL-Fn combinations are usually mapped to virtual workspaces on Linux, what is much more powerful than applications and give you the same kind of speedup. Who organizes things around application anyway, instead of windows? Anyway, no, it's bad to remap the Fn keys. They have been used to fast intra-application navigation since they appeared, and they are still in wide use. (Does the author not use application shortcuts?) Combining them with another key is just obvious.
- chrismorgan 4y ago
  And Ctrl+Alt+F[n] to virtual terminals. I only mention this because it reminded me of one of my old laptops where Ctrl+Alt+F{1,3,5,7,9} worked, but Ctrl+Alt+F{2,4,6,8,0} didn’t, or the other way round, due to a bad keyboard matrix. That was inconvenient, because I was deliberately using three distinct X sessions at that time (personal, work, and I forget what the third was). For some reason that quite escapes me now, instead of just using every second virtual terminal, I instead added Ctrl+Alt+{1–9} mappings inside i3 to chvt {1–9}. I still occasionally have cause to pull out a second one, though mostly I use workspaces within the one session.
- deathanatos 4y ago
  > Who organizes things around application anyway, instead of windows? macOS. There's no Alt+Tab, for example: no way to switch between two arbitrary windows on the Z-stack¹. The not-equivalent that exists is ⌘+Tab, and it switches apps; the usability of it, vs. Alt+Tab, is horrendous. (It fronts stuff you don't want, covering up stuff you do want.) There are workspaces … but I have found them hard to get productive with: macOS will reorder keystrokes around workspace changes. That is, the keyboard input "abc ^→ (workspace change) def" is a race condition: typed quickly (within the animation delay), it becomes as if you typed "abcdef ^→". ¹no, ⌘+` does not count.
  - fiddlerwoaroof 4y ago
    You can use the up arrow with an application highlighted in the command-tab picker to select a particular window of the application.
default_png 4y ago
I have a Stream Deck that I set up to change the LCD's based on what the current in focus application is. I also have a button on each of the custom screens that gets me to the "Main Macro" pad. I strongly recommend them for programming. They save me so much time.
the_gipsy 4y ago
No, you're using the computer wrong. See, you should use a tiling window manager with several workspaces and shortcuts without having to look at your keyboard, e.g. Meta+4 to go to workspace 4 where you have your chat apps.
- wutbrodo 4y ago
  Ha, this was my first thought, though I've got a built-in damper on being that annoying guy who brings up tiling WMs in every workspace conversation. It is a little amusing to see such a dramatic headline supported by the extremely elementary thesis that you should have kbd shortcuts for your favorite applications. On top of that, numbered shortcuts for arbitrary apps is way worse than using Super+[arbitrary key].
- theelous3 4y ago
  Yep. Came to say this. Having say, meta+4 for "chat" is far better than having f4 for "a chat app". You arrive to your chat workspace, your works slack side by side with your favorite irc and matrix clients, all positioned and scaled perfectly every time. Adding more / fewer / swapping apps in is just a matter of invocation, and there the new configuration sits waiting. The concept is expanded greatly. Shoutout to i3 and xmonad, for my personal setups.
  - deafpolygon 4y ago
    I do this as well, but on KDE. (I flip between KDE and Sway depending on my mood)
- deleted 4y ago
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- iambateman 4y ago
  Any recommendation for Mac?
  - galoisscobi 4y ago
    As others have mentioned yabai +skhd is excellent. I think using this guide to set it all up went a long way for me: https://cbrgm.net/post/2021-05-5-setup-macos/ https://cbrgm.net/post/2021-05-5-setup-macos/ Yabai is my daily driver and I really like it.
alikrhlwirjnklj 4y ago
> You're using function keys wrong You are using computers wrong. Apple is the only one that lacks this. Windows and most linux WM have this for at least 20 years! windows you just use WIN+[1,2,3,4...] to alternate between your quick launch apps. Linux obviously you have a myriad of options. Including the top comment here now about using virtual desktops which is even better than application (but you can mix them too!) And all that while still keeping your Fkeys functionality on each application! The time I was forced to use a Mac for development was the time my productivity was lowest and frustration highest. I'm fully convinced that Macs exist only because managers (and wanna be managers) make those decisions. Not to mention i've worked on employeer provided apple, dell, hp, lenovos... macs were the only ones i had to send to IT with failing keyboards, dead screens, etc.
- nine_k 4y ago
  I'm always puzzled by the stubbornness with which Apple refuses to make window management on macOS ergonomic. They think about so many subtler points, they can't fail to notice the elephant in their room. It bothers me every time I have to use macOS. I wonder who should leave the macOS team to have this finally addressed, like Jony Ive had to leave to make the Macbook hardware reasonable again.
  - nerdix 4y ago
    I've mentioned in a previous discussion here that I believe that macOS has the worst UX of all the major OSes. And that belief is mostly because of how horrendous window management is (and Finder but that's a different discussion altogether). The lack of hotkeys for switching workspaces was one of my biggest gripes. And the culture that has formed around macOS users is to just accept it and buy numerous third apps to fix things that should be a standard feature of the OS.
commandlinefan 4y ago
I honestly had to glance down at my keyboard to see if it had function keys.
- mxgrn 4y ago
  Good one :D
froddd 4y ago
I like my hands resting near the bottom of the keyboard, so Cmd-tab is very quick as it is within reach and does not require using my eyes. To use those function keys I’d have to look at the keyboard, which feels like a waste of time. Though I’d rather have function keys back instead of the touchbar, as changing volume/brightness now requires looking at the keyboard as well as a certain precision/dexterity. Edit: formatting.
nahuel0x 4y ago
If macOS didn't added a very annoying fade-out/fade-in delay when switching Spaces, you could simply use them with maximized apps and hotkeys for switching them. Another design mistake from Apple.
- the_gipsy 4y ago
  Sounds a bit pedantic, but this was the reason I could just not use macOS as a daily driver. IIRC, there was a brief period of time where this anti-feature could be disabled by some obscure command, and the switch was instantly. But this was later gone in an update, which ultimately taught me the lesson that one should not be at the complete mercy of some OS updates.
- cyberge99 4y ago
  Is there any way to change the delay for that? I would think that tucked away somewhere under the hood there’s a setting that controls the animation duration. Being able to turn that down or off would be a boon to my productivity.
  - deleted 4y ago
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- the-printer 4y ago
  My guess is that there’s a Reduce Motion option in the accessibility preferences like on iOS.
- wmeredith 4y ago
  I must be missing something because my Mac OS does not do that. There is a slide-in/over animation, but it's nearly instant.
  - mrob 4y ago
    "Nearly instant" is a massive loss of usability compared to "instant". The quicker the transition the less disruption there is to your short term memory. If it's instant then switching between virtual desktops is almost as good as having multiple monitors. If I have to wait for even a brief animation (and MacOS's animation is painfully slow) I'm likely to forget details, which means I'll have to switch again, and risk forgetting even more.
eviks 4y ago
The function keys are too far away for such frequent operations, so it's much better to map apps to regular alpha keys (some can also have a mnemonic benefit like 'f' for File manager) with a modifier, e.g., CapsLock or even Space (though these would need to be behind a tiny delay not to interfere with typing), with a proper keyboard remapping app like Karabiner
- swah 4y ago
  Another option: https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/ https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/
iviv 4y ago
I think this workflow is interesting and the title unfortunately clickbait-ish. We can read about things we find interesting without claiming X is better.
deleted 4y ago
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SkeuomorphicBee 4y ago
In this kind of discussion people often focus solely on frequent actions, but there is one class of action that should have priority for the limited keys: the infrequent urgent. That is, tasks that don't happen that often, but when they do they are very urgent. For me the best example is the sound volume controls, I don't change sound volume nearly as often as I alternate between apps, but when I need to change the sound volume I need it right now, so that is what I'm using my F-keys for.
- albert_e 4y ago
  Agreed. Some keyboard come with dedicated volume +/-/mute keys which is great and frees up function keys. I have "screenshotting" as a frequent need -- which in some occassions is an urgent one too :) I use 3 different types of screen capture (current window, select a region, repeat last region) mapped to F6 F7 F8 on all my machines now which gets a lot of use.
  - namrog84 4y ago
    I use sharex and screenshot and region snip a lot. I have it override the screenshot key and then just ctrl and shift for region. Screen. And current windows modifications. F keys are in my opinion better used elsewhere when you can override screenshot key for screenshots. I know lots of apps that use those F keys you've overriden. https://getsharex.com/ https://getsharex.com/
- jerf 4y ago
  That is a fine use, but multimedia keys use 3-7ish (depending on how crazy you go) of the 48-ish function keys readily available. By which I mean, unmodified, SHIFT, CTRL, and ALT, and that's without counting multiple modifiers. I've got volume, mute, pause, fast forward and reverse in there but it's far from the only things I've got. (Well... technically FF, reverse, and pause are WIN-right, WIN-left, and WIN-up respectively, but same principle.) I'm not even close to using up all the function keys. I've mapped these in something like the last four window managers I use, and they've survived across probably a dozen physical keyboards now. Physical buttons for these things come and go but "WIN-Up" (or Super-Up if you prefer) has always been there. (I did use a mac with a touch bar for a bit. Was that ever a train wreck for me, as you might expect. Fortunately, people don't seem to be copying them and dumping the function keys. I'm actually perfectly happy with them being a reduced-height bar across the top, as most laptops seem to have now. They don't need to be full height.) In general, I say to anyone who makes a living on a computer... take control of your keyboard! I don't obsess on not using the mouse at all, but the keyboard can do a lot. There's a lot of keys on there, even ignoring the letter keys (which are densely enough "taken" by a lot of other things I don't tend to override them much).
willnonya 4y ago
To all of the "No, youre using computers wrong" responses all I can say is they did declare that they are a web developer...
chrismorgan 4y ago
While talking of function keys— My greatest annoyance with keyboards is that Fn keys (as found to one side of the left Ctrl/Control key; ubiquitous on laptops and common on other keyboards) are always implemented in firmware, and simply don’t do anything with most of the keys, but implement them in such a way that I can’t either. My laptop’s keyboard has one Fn key, and 82 others.¹ I can only use Fn with 20 of them—one is legitimately handled in firmware², one does nothing³, two emit combos⁴, and 16 emit distinct key codes. The remaining 62 keys? They just get passed through as though I weren’t holding down the Fn key. I really wish I could use that Fn key just as a regular additional modifier. I use Super+[hjkl] in my tiling window manager, why can’t I use Fn+[hjkl] instead if I want to? Yes, I know that shifting it all from firmware to driver would cause inconvenience in some situations. Look, perhaps we could at least begin by adding a key code for Fn when it’s tapped by itself or with any of the 62 keys. I dunno, Hyper or something (is Hyper a thing at that level? or is there some other extra modifier available?). That’s sufficiently pragmatic, right? —⁂— ¹ Asus Zephyrus G15 (2021), GA503QM. I included the power button as one of the 82 keys, as I use it that way: I have XF86PowerOff switch to a Sway/i3 mode where pressing it again shuts down, r reboots, h hibernates, &c. It’s fun being like most projectors with their “press the power button again to show you actually meant it”. But you know my favourite key on the keyboard? XF86AudioMicMute. Really not looking forward to the inevitable day when I get a laptop without one again. ² Fn+Super disables/enables the Super key. Windows things. Wish I could disable this feature, because just occasionally I accidentally trigger it, and I will never want it. ³ As far as I can tell, Fn+Space just gets swallowed. evtest on the appropriate /dev/input/event* file doesn’t show anything being emitted. ⁴ Fn+F6 = Super+Shift+S, and Fn+F9 = Super+P, because those are standard Windows shortcuts. I don’t get why they did it this way, though they’re both very common, given how much more interesting stuff they’ve done than most others. Mostly I’m just grumbling about duplicates because I already want Super+P to do something else, so now Fn+F9 is a dead weight, though I would otherwise have used it.
- sophacles 4y ago
  If you haven't already gone down the custom keyboard rabbit hole, I suspect you might like it. There's a pretty large enthusiast community out in the world, and there's a lot of ways to go custom - build your own from scratch, use a kit, use a pre-built with flashable firmware, etc. The firmwares used (e.g. QMK) allow you to build the sort of thing you're talking about into your keyboard and more.
emacs28 4y ago
The best productivity hack is to get a keyboard with programmable QMK firmware and remap the keys however/wherever you want.
yankcrime 4y ago
For the macOS folks, I prefer rcmd to accomplish the same thing with less cognitive overhead: https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/ https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/
- swah 4y ago
  I have this set-up but after alt-tabbing for 20 years its kinda hard to stop.
  - duderific 4y ago
    I haven't ever noticed a productivity hit from alt-tabbing. Many of the devs I work with use Spaces and the three-finger slide to move between apps. However this doesn't work if you're not using the trackpad or Magic Mouse. Additionally, since I'm usually just moving between a few apps (VSCode, terminal, browser, Teams) it's usually pretty easy to just alt-tab or alt-tab-tab with no loss of context.
    - swah 4y ago
      Me too - I just think that its a main factor of my left wrist pain because one does it maybe a thousand times per day...
- alin23 4y ago
  Yep, I can certainly recommend ⌘ rcmd as well! Source: am developer of the app ^_^
- the-printer 4y ago
  Came to post this. Haven’t yet tried their Hammerspoon-integrated feature but I’m interested.
tsuujin 4y ago
This kind of use case should have been what the Touch Bar supported. I was actually excited when the Touch Bar came out because I though I would finally be able to just have named buttons, even click-through menus, instead of having to memorize what f1-f12 did on a given app. Imagine if instead of “ok, f1 opens my [some application], I just need to memorize that” you could just add a button that says [some application]”. Sadly the support for the Touch Bar was pretty middling to poor.
jdlyga 4y ago
I do this using Win+1,2,3,4,etc on Windows and Gnome 3. I believe this has been a feature since Windows 7. It's one of the first features I look for when trying out a new Linux desktop environment since it's so convenient.
pxoe 4y ago
f1 key in its default 'help' function is so remarkably useless, i just remap it to Enter. and then, remap tilde to to Left and Caps Lock to Right, and you've got a neat little navigation block on the left side of the keyboard.
terminal_d 4y ago
A better "hack" for linux users: Linux supports a "digital-only" modifier called "Hyper". You can use Xmodmap to set a key as hyper on press, and set Hyper-F[X] to whatever functions you wish to. Alternatively, use a keyboard with QMK, or install a dedicated application like KMonad.
jacob019 4y ago
I remap the useless caps lock to AltGr and then customize the whole keyboard. Mostly for unicode characters, but some shortcuts too—especially those F keys. I'm using Linux and do it with xkb. Can write a blog article if anyone is interested.
- diarrhea 4y ago
  It seems adding en-dash to your repertoire might be of interest :^)
  - jacob019 4y ago
    Good call, updated and added to my layout :) Using em dash though.
kkfx 4y ago
I use the same concept in Emacs/EXWM to launch/jump/bury X11 and native buffers, + mod.+keys for extras like F5 run notmuch, C-F5 access unread tag directly, M-F5 compose a new message etc. That's why I damn HATE the disappearance of classic MANY-keys keyboards...
runjake 4y ago
I use my function keys for other things within programs. I use Alfred on macOS to quickly launch various apps and actions using the launcher hotkey plus a few chars. I don't have a problem with my workflow, and it syncs between my Macs. I am doing similar with Albert on Linux, with the goal of someday moving back to Linux full-time. At this point, I have a vast collection of workflows and snippet completions and I feel like my experience is pretty optimized for my tasks, but you do you.
williamdclt 4y ago
I can't hit Fn keys reliably without looking. Instead I mapped switching to my common programs to `fn+h/j/k/l` and other closeby keys (firefox = fn+h, vscode = fn+j, etc). My right-hand fingers are already on hjkl anyway, it's much much faster for me :)
- chrismorgan 4y ago
  Proper keyboards group in clusters F1–F4, F5–F8, F9–F12, with gaps between them. Unfortunately, this practice is regularly disregarded (even though uniformity is obviously a terrible idea), and particularly uncommon on laptop keyboards.
  - williamdclt 4y ago
    I probably still wouldn't be able to hit them accurately, I'm not a great typist :) fn+h/j/k/l isn't mapped to anything, these keys are much more accessible and switching windows is probably the thing I do most, so it seems to make sense to me
kbd 4y ago
I use Karabiner-Elements and Hammerspoon to map caps lock to a "hyper" key, so browser is hyper+b, text editor is hyper+t, terminal is hyper+s, notes/tasks (Obsidian) is hyper+k, etc.
wink 4y ago
This is not too different to how I've been using tiling window managers for the last decade. There 9 or 10 virtual desktops which are accessed with WIN+1-0. 1 is for shells, 2 is the IDE, 3/4 are browsers, 6 is administrative stuff, usually a root shell, 0 is for zoom, 5,7,8 are less defined or just "whatever doesn't fit". In addition I'm using the multi-monitor switching from xmonad in i3 (i.e. if I have [1] on the left and [2] on the right screen, when I activate [1] while on the right one, they switch places, if I activate [3], then it will replace [2] and [1] stays on the left one). It sounds very pedantic but I don't even have to think when context switching and it's made my life a lot easier. Interestingly it doesn't work as well on my private computer because (to no one's surprise) I am using many more GUI tools and do different things when not working.
frankjr 4y ago
You can do something similar (albeit less fancy) without using any 3rd party applications on macOS. 1. Open Automator.app and create a Quick action. 2. Drag "Launch Application" to the workflow and choose an application to open. Save it. 3. Open Preferences -> Shortcuts -> Services and assign a keyboard shortcut to your action. Unfortunately, macOS will not let you assign many combinations. The other annoying thing is that running the shortcut is not instantaneous, there seems to be a noticeable delay before the action executes.
mynameishere 4y ago
Is it okay to use them for what they are actually useful for? F3 = repeat search, F5 = refresh, etc, etc, all context dependent, of course, but that is a good thing. Mac people I do not understand.
- mmphosis 4y ago
  I understand. Unfortunately, we have wildly different preferences and keyboards. If I had Function keys: F1 = help, F2 = rename, F3 = repeat search, Alt+F4 = close, F5 = refresh, all context dependent, of course On a Mac: Help = help, Return = rename, Command+G = find again, Command+W = close, Command+R = Refresh, usually consistent. Maybe, one day, there will be truly customizable keyboards.
chadlavi 4y ago
All the apps I use the most are open most of the time. I can just use cmd+tab to switch between them quickly. To each their own, but this feels unnecessary to me in my own personal workflow. I've never thought to myself "boy I wish I could open one specific app, that wasn't already open, with a single keystroke"
- blueblob 4y ago
  On Windows, win+number will open the item in the number position in your bottom bar. I rarely use it for the same reason as you.
monroewalker 4y ago
Karabiner has already been mentioned here but I'll add that goku (https://github.com/yqrashawn/GokuRakuJoudo https://github.com/yqrashawn/GokuRakuJoudo) is THE way to setup Karabiner and it can be hard to overcome the extremely verbose and unergonomic default json config of Karabiner otherwise. Goku also makes it trivial to add shortcuts which are activated by quickly pressing one key while another is held. I use this for the kind of launch mode described in the OP. eg. w + e = editor (Intellij), w + r = chrome, w + f = firefox.. The drawback to these shortcuts is that they can unintentionally be activated when regularly typing since we don't always release a key before pressing the next. That's only happened seldomly for me though since "w" isn't a frequently used letter and I've set the shortcut activation window pretty low so the w + <key> key has to be pressed essentially immediately after w. Similarly, I use q + w for previous tab, q + e for next tab, and s+d to open the clipboard history from Alfred
rxhanson 4y ago
Charmstone [1] is a different take from everything mentioned here (I'm the developer). The idea is to use your spatial memory to switch/launch apps faster than anything else that I've found, with a smaller learning curve and less memorization. You can use keyboard shortcuts with the arrow keys, modifier keys + cursor movement, or a trackpad gesture. [1] https://charmstone.app https://charmstone.app
- thurn 4y ago
  Tried it out. I like this idea, but requiring two hands is a deal-breaker for me. I need to be able to switch apps while my hands are over the keyboard without needing mouse/trackpad interaction, ideally staying as close to home row as possible.
  - rxhanson 4y ago
    Thanks for trying it and for the feedback. Would you use it if you could set the keyboard shortcuts to mod+hjkl or something like that, rather than mod+arrow keys?
- xwowsersx 4y ago
  Neat idea. I just downloaded it. How can I use just the keyboard, e.g. with arrows to select one the apps in the switcher? Using the mouse is a nonstarter for me. EDIT: oh duh "display with arrow keys". Nice. Going to try this out for a while. It's definitely way faster than cmd + tabbing through my many apps.
- kybernetyk 4y ago
  Just tried it. Great tool.
wodenokoto 4y ago
I really want my keyboard brightness key back. The M-series MacBooks have Siri and … something else I don’t use instead of keyboard brightness.
- mxgrn 4y ago
  You'll still be able to do that with Fn+F1/F2.
  - wodenokoto 4y ago
    Wouldn’t that activate the F1/F2 function of the currently in-focus application (with F1 often being “help”)?
jojohack 4y ago
Alfred workflow instructions in case you don't wish to use Keyboard Maestro for this: https://ldstephens.medium.com/launch-your-favorite-mac-apps-with-keyboard-shortcuts-using-alfred-406635e2bbd4 https://ldstephens.medium.com/launch-your-favorite-mac-apps-...
david_allison 4y ago
I've recently bought an Elgato Stream Deck*[0] (programmable 15-key LED macro-pad) and would strongly recommend it. Simply: define an icon, define a shell script/app/site and press a button to execute. It natively supports 'profiles' for contextual actions if a given application is active, and 'folders', to extend the actions available given the 15 key limitation. I believe there's also a SDK + plugin infrastructure which lets you define live-updating icons, but I haven't given this a try. [0] https://www.elgato.com/en/stream-deck-mk2 https://www.elgato.com/en/stream-deck-mk2 * EDIT to differentiate from Steam Deck
- swah 4y ago
  That is cool but "too far" - just put those keys back on the keyboard instead of making the ridiculous tiny keyboards that require chording :) (If possible, I wish these dynamic F-keys would make the keyboard taller instead of wider...)
- twobitshifter 4y ago
  Unfortunate that steamdeck exists, I had to reread multiple times to figure out this wasn’t the valve gaming handheld
- ajolly 4y ago
  Love mine. There's an advanced launcher plugin for "run or raise" functionality. I've got a little script to do the same for web pages, but I have an extended it yet to search for any open tab rather than just the ones that are currently active in the top window. I deal with this by having websites specific launchers.
boomskats 4y ago
For my Gnomies, the Run-or-raise extension [0] is stellar. It does exactly what it says: you bind a key combo to a launcher command, and optionally define a windowname or wm_class query to check for the existence of the program before it's launched. If it's running it's raised, if it's not then it's run. It has options for the window behaviour after toggling, optionally minimising the programs etc. I can't rate it highly enough. It helped me finally step away from my decade-long i3wm-adhd addition, where everything else failed. [0]: https://github.com/CZ-NIC/run-or-raise https://github.com/CZ-NIC/run-or-raise
teo_zero 4y ago
I couldn't disagree more. My mental sanity depends on some fixed beliefs. One of those is that every key sequence not involving the Win key is sent to and handled by the application in focus. Including F-keys, which many applications expect, in any case. Ex: F2=edit cell, F9=recalculate in Excel. Global actions handled by the SO or DE must involve Win. Ex: Win+L lock screen. And yes, Redmond-imposed Alt-Tab is an abomination: it should have been Win+Tab since the beginning. The workflow you're proposing could be easily achieved with Win+ a carefully chosen letter. Benefits: 1. the letter is easier to remember; 2. You have 20-something free slots instead of 12 (excluding the ones that are already taken for standard actions like L for lock); 3. Most probably your fingers are already there and you have muscles memory of where the letters are; 4. Consistent, expected behavior of where keys are sent to.
- 1attice 4y ago
  Idk where you were at that era but the Win key came out half a decade after Alt-Tab. Win95 didn't even have the Win key. Goodness. Think before you post. :) A thing cannot be an abomination for not making use of a building material which would not exist for most of the decade.
  - dec0dedab0de 4y ago
    I am pretty sure I had a windows key on the windows 95 packard bell I got for christmas 95. Edit: it was the same model as this reddit thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/vintagecomputing/comments/s518wo/i_finished_the_restore_of_my_packard_bell_legend/ https://www.reddit.com/r/vintagecomputing/comments/s518wo/i_...
  - kolinko 4y ago
    Win95 had a win key! It was introduced right aling the start menu
- shhsshs 4y ago
  What about special key sequences like Ctrl+Alt+Delete on Windows, or Ctrl+Alt+F-key on most Linux distros? Or even more crazy special commands like Alt+PrintScreen+REISUB?
kazinator 4y ago
Basically, your applications are pinned to positions on a task bar, and that task bar is made of a row of physical buttons.
xalava 4y ago
Gnome assigns SUPER+NUM to the applications in the sidebar by default. You can change the applications or their order visually and the keyboard shortcut is highly accessible. It's one of the well thought features that makes me stick with it.
sigmonsays 4y ago
I just use rofi and type what I want to launch. I dont really see the need for all this.
deafpolygon 4y ago
Eh..? Don't get me wrong - if it works for you or OP, great! Keep doing it. I use Sway and KDE depending on what tickles my fancy. For application launching, I just use Alt+Space and type the first few letters of what I want. My frequent flyers get assigned to Meta+Alt+Letter. - Krunner / Rofi - Alt+Space (Meta+D was a bit contorted for me) - Meta+Enter - Konsole (KDE) / Kitty (Sway) - Meta+Shift+<1-0> - move active window to desktop - Meta+1-0 - switch to desktop #1-#10 A lot of apps use F-keys so it's not a good fit for me. When possible, I like to map custom shortcuts for various applications using F-keys.. not use it as an application launcher. For example: With Dolphin, I've gotten used to F2 for renaming (Windows holdover), F3 for split file view, F4 for terminal, F5 for refresh Kate or VS Code, I tend to map F5 to Build/Run/Debug.
- Karawebnetwork 4y ago
  He does cover this briefly: "Is it up to an app launcher such as Spotlight or Alfred?" I'd be curious as to why he finds the F keys faster. Perhaps not having to wait for the bar to appear, not having to "context switch" by thinking about the app's name and not having to type anything. He talks about how one key is his music software for example, so by simply remembering F6 it skips having to even know what the app's name is and having to potentialy pick the second of third choice of a list. "[alt space] spotif... oh damn, no [backspace] it's itun... wait no I just switched to Tidal... [backspace] So [T] [enter] oops, I just opened the Terminal..."
  - deafpolygon 4y ago
    And I respect that. But, krunner and rofi is instant for me. I guess I don't really switch between apps that much for this context switching to be a problem.
  - mxgrn 4y ago
    > I'd be curious as to why he finds the F keys faster. Simply because it's a single key press, even no modifier is needed. So, yeah, it's faster and less thinking.
    - 4y ago
motoboi 4y ago
In macOS, just CMD-<space>,t-e<enter> will give me a terminal. So many keys, you say. Well, it takes me probably 1/10 the time to hit fn-F1. Also, no extra app, Chrome is just CMD-<space>,c-h<enter>.
- soufron 4y ago
  Nope, it's not the same. It's definitely faster and smoother to use only one key.
  - motoboi 4y ago
    I swear for god that its faster for me. Muscle memory maybe?
keester 4y ago
linux user (kde, cinnamon, etc.). I have been using ctl-f1,ctl-f2, etc to switch between virtual desktops since about 2000. Each virtual desktop is labeled like 'email', 'docs', 'browser', 'editor', 'sql' etc. At each desktop I can alt-tab between a couple of apps, say IDEA and a terminal, or SquirrelSQL and a terminal. So I navigate apps by first selecting the correct desktop and then possibly alt tabbing a little bit. That works well for me and I think probably a lot of users since it's the default behavior after install.
somada141 4y ago
Personally I’ve been using a similar approach for over a decade where I have 9 desktops on my Mac most of which have fixed windows on them eg 1 for a file explorer, 2 for mail, 3 for browser, 4 and 5 for IDEs, 6 for related tooling, 7 for notes and maybe another browser window, 8 for music, and 9 for chat windows and I switch between them with Ctrl+<number>. On top of all of them desktops I can Ctrl+Space the terminal (Quake style, Warp now, used to be iTerm) and Alt+Space for Raycast (used to be Alfred). This was I rarely if ever need to Cmd+Tab since everything is fixed in place most of the time.
Jordrok 4y ago
This is exactly why I like to use a gaming keyboard with extra programmable function keys off to the left side. All the flexibility without having to override any default functionality that the standard keys might have. Edit: Also, dedicated media keys and a volume control wheel/knob are a must!
powersnail 4y ago
Is there a keyboard-oriented window manager that doesn't require memorizing what keys do what? What I envision is having one master key combination to pull up a panel or overlay of some sort, which displays which key I press next to go to a certain place, or do a certain action. So there's just one thing to memorize. Sort of like how vimium works in browser, where you press 'f', and each clickable gets a little label. (But preferably not randomly assigned) The memorizing-most-commonly-used-50-keyboard-combination thing really doesn't work for me, whether it's home row or function keys. I mean, I still have to look at the little pictures for stove knobs after years of using the same stove, and that's just four knobs.
- codethief 4y ago
  IIRC Manjaro with i3 displays a list of common key chords on the desktop: https://www.google.com/search?q=manjaro+i3&source=lnms&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=manjaro+i3&source=lnms&tbm=i... You could certainly write a short Rofi script to display them in a popup window and browse/select/execute them (via i3-msg).
- francoispon 4y ago
  i think stumpwm has some kind of "which-key" mode.... which is i think what you are looking for, and of course there is always exwm that can do *anything*
- ozaark 4y ago
  On Mac I just use CMD+space to pull up spotlight which very quickly opens anything matching what you type from there. Usually within a single keystroke after CMD+space pulls up the desired app and typically takes under a second. It does a lot of other neat things as well but I use that feature daily. Windows is similar in just pressing the windows key allows you to type the name of an app or file but in my experience is much slower and inaccurate compared to OSX. It's easier for me to remember the name of the app I want than that+the key binding with muscle memory I've then had to set.
aendruk 4y ago
My favorite function key trick is to first move the number keys into a “virtual numpad” and then move the function keys down onto the unused number row. That way the function keys are easy to reach without looking and always available without conflicting with the laptop’s media/utility keys.
- mxgrn 4y ago
  That's a great idea!
hemmert 4y ago
Looking forward to try it out! Sounds like a great thing!
roxgib 4y ago
Another solution to this problem is to get a standalone numpad and assign the keys as hotkeys. Lots of macro apps allow different functions to be assigned to specific keyboards.
- abirch 4y ago
  autohotkey is my friend. I love it when a program doesn't give you an option to remap keys
personjerry 4y ago
Or... put them on your Dock?
- mxgrn 4y ago
  Way slower and more cognitive overhead.
0rca 4y ago
For MacOS there is Hammerspoon, that provides immensely powerful scripting, but can merely open and close the apps, too. -- ~/.hammerspoon/init.lua function define_shortcut(appName, key, mod) hs.hotkey.bind(mod, key, function() hs.application.enableSpotlightForNameSearches(true) local app = hs.application.find(appName) if app and app:isFrontmost() then app:hide() else hs.application.open(appName) end end) end define_shortcut("Alacritty", "F1", {}) define_shortcut("Firefox", "F2", {})
reportgunner 4y ago
You can use Win+[number on the row key] on Windows to do this, no configuration required. The number corresponds to the position of an app on the taskbar. You can pin apps to the task bar to make sure they are always in the same position.
dredmorbius 4y ago
In the discussion of standards, standardisation, and reserving specific keystrokes for specific contexts (applications, OS / windowing system, increasing Web browser (an increasingly inadequate description), etc., we have ... an embarrassment of riches. Or something like that. The first standardisation within a GUI context I'm aware of was the Common User Access system on IBM PCs. That grew out of the early PC era within which different programs had their own idiosyncratic command-key conventions, several of which are listed in the Wikipedia article on the topic: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access> This still wasn't the first such standard. IBM already had fairly standardised function-key conventions under MVS and TSO/ISPF. The Unix world inherited emacs functions from ITS (as a set of macros over the TECO editor), vi keybindings, and a number of other conventions. Emacs commands have been incorporated into Readline, and are generally available on bash and similar shells. There was a revision of CUA under Windows (whose name / initialism I forget), as well as a set of interface guidelines for Apple's classic Macintosh, as well as MacOS / OS X). Within the Linux world, GNOME and KDE offer the HIG, Human Interface Guidelines. And various X11 window managers offer their own shortcuts and hotkeys (I've long used and extended a set for WindowMaker, for my own use, which incorporate some of the ideas in the submitted article). There's also the browser environment, in which there are often conflicts: browser-versus-OS (window manager / GUI shell), browser-versus-webapps (e.g., a site's own specific keybindings), and browser-versus-extensions, such as, say, Vimperator, which provides a vi/vim-like keybinding interface to major browsers. A key problem is that once a standard does emerge, interface conventions change, often profoundly. And independent evolved systems (e.g., Emacs, VIM, CUA, MS Windows, Apple Mac, ...) have a rather stubborn persistence measured in decades. Moving from mainframes to minis to PCs to GUIs and over the past decade to both mobile/touch- and Web-based applications, and arguably voice-based (Siri, Google, Alexa, Cortana, ...) are further confounding standards. Given that the user-base of smartphones / tablets is now roughly 10x that of desktop-based systems, design principles for smartphones seem to be driving desktop conventions, regardless of suitedness to task.

149 points by mxgrn 4y ago

I map the function keys to virtual desktops, but same idea. And CAPLOCK to Alfred to select apps. Super easy on Mac, and difficult to do on Linux, the main reason I don't like Linux desktops. To each their own.

awelxtr 4y ago

Windows users can do this by pressing Win+digit with open apps or apps you have pinned on the task bar. Linux Mint, as with many other windows shortcuts, has this also

devmor 4y ago
Yep, I've been doing this for quite some time. Like the author says, it's a genuine boost to productivity.
thrdbndndn 4y ago
I use shortcuts heavily, but Win+number is something I never get used to despite knowing them. They way they work when you have multiple X programs opened (say, editors, explorers..) is kinda weird and I ended up just using alt+tab, which is much easier to press anyway.
- Configure0251 4y ago
  Microsoft's PowerToys has a shortcut guide that might help get you over that last hurdle towards using win+number effectively. Might want to give it a look.
  - myfonj 4y ago
    Taskbar Numberer [1] can do this as well (under Window 10). Startup command is start "" "<apps>\7plus-Taskbar-Numberer\64\7+ Taskbar Numberer.exe" -v2 -hidewnd [1] https://ramensoftware.com/7-taskbar-numberer https://ramensoftware.com/7-taskbar-numberer
- layer8 4y ago
  Yes, I use them for launching "singleton" applications, and Alt+Tab for the rest.
Springtime 4y ago
It's superb for toggling pinned programs moment-to-moment, without needing to pay attention to UIs. On smaller-than-regular keyboards, such as 60% size, function keys already require one extra key held to activate (Fn+<number>, an upside is being closer to reach while on the home row), so they're already both equivalent in keypresses for such users.
Arrath 4y ago
Welp. TIL. That's handy, thank you.
wink 4y ago
It's ok, but unfortunately it doesn't seem to register with "multiples of the same application" open, i.e. if I have Firefox at Win-2 then it's always the first window that was opened (which is fine most of the time) but if I need the other Firefox window then it's alt-tabbing again. No, tabs don't help here, I don't have 50 Firefox windows open, but often a second.
- awelxtr 4y ago
  Win+Ctrl+number You're welcome!
  - wink 4y ago
    Ha, thanks. Was on Linux when I wrote that so couldn't try it. Also Win+Alt+Number opens a new window of that type. Weird hand twisting aside, this could be useful :)
Vinnl 4y ago
I think most Linux systems have this too. GNOME definitely, for the applications pinned in the overview, and I would be very surprised if KDE didn't do this too.

trumpeta 4y ago

Another way of doing this is assign Hyper key to Caps Lock with Karabiner and then use that to set up hyper+X shortcuts to different or macros using Hammerspoon. So e.g. I have hyper+a for Alacritty, hyper+b for Browser etc.

lewispollard 4y ago
i3wm workspaces + bindkeys shortcuts come to mind, this is my natural workflow in i3 meta+1-9 to switch workspaces, meta+various keys to launch applications (and can configure i3 to launch them into preferred workspaces if desired)
p2hari 4y ago
Yep, this was the way I use it too. I had 'qmk' shortcuts but later moved to hammerspoon approach. Right now trying this set up . Andweeb's 'Ki Spoon' [1] for much efficient workflow. It is still under development 1. https://github.com/andweeb/Ki https://github.com/andweeb/Ki
Graziano_M 4y ago
I do the same (though I use spacehammer which is built on top of hammerspoon). It's been the biggest game changing in my keyboard-driven productivity. I don't like how it feels non-deterministic to command-tab since the order of the apps change. With a hotkey for each I know exactly what will show up when I hit the key, and better than using function keys, I don't have to move my hand from home row, plus it works when I use an external keyboard (which is most of the time).
mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
This is what I did in stumpwm. And I had a nice macro so I could define an app's command, what key to map to, what desktop it lives on, and whether jumping to the window or pulling it to me was the default.
eviks 4y ago
You can also make your Spacebar (with a tiny delay not to interfere with typing) an app-launcher key, and then you don't even need to move your poor pinky for such frequent space+r for browser space+f for file manager, etc.

hprotagonist 4y ago

~/.config/i3/config: # emacsclient set $em_daemon ~/.local/bin/em # make a quick launcher for specific things I do all the time bindsym $mod+o mode "spotlight" mode "spotlight" { ## specific files in a new emacs buffer # dired in home bindsym d exec $em_daemon ~/; mode "default" # ibuffer bindsym e exec $em_daemon --eval "(ibuffer)"; mode "default" # # guaranteed new scratch buffer bindsym s exec $em_daemon --eval '(switch-to-buffer (format-time-string "%d %b %Y %H:%M:%S"))'; mode "default" ## common binaries bindsym f exec firefox ; mode "default" bindsym h exec --no-startup-id zeal ; mode "default" bindsym j exec --no-startup-id ~/.local/share/JetBrains/Toolbox/bin/jetbrains-toolbox ; mode "default" bindsym m exec --no-startup-id mendeley ; mode "default" bindsym k exec --no-startup-id keepassxc ; mode "default" ## special launchers # ipython bindsym i exec zsh -c '$alacritty -e ~/.local/pipx/venvs/ipython/bin/ipython'; mode "default" # app switcher bindsym a exec "rofi -show window -show-icons -theme gruvbox-dark-hard.rasi"; mode "default" ## just in case we did this by mistake bindsym Escape mode "default" }

bvrmn 4y ago
This. It makes more sense to bind apps to homerow keys with some chain or modificator to "snipe" often-used applications instead of F-keys.
- seanw444 4y ago
  More of a mnemonic in my case, not just homerow, but yeah launching frequented apps has never been more fluid than when I switched to my tiling WM.
  - perihelions 4y ago
    You can also get most of this configuration-free in Gnome. [Super] key switches to a spotlight context; one alphabetic letter focuses the most frequently used app with that prefix; and [Enter] key launches it without prompt.
- 4y ago

hbn 4y ago

Can people hit their function keys without looking at the keyboard? Sure, hitting F5 to go to your terminal is less keystrokes than e.g. Cmd+tab+tab, but I can't hit anything in the function row without glancing down at my keyboard. And I put a lot of value in looking at my keyboard as little as possible

giraffe_lady 4y ago
Why though? I can't consistently hit it without looking, but I can hit it with barely a glance. The cost of looking at the keyboard isn't that high is it?
chii 4y ago
That's why the function keys are seperated into groups of 3, and you can feel which it is by feeling the gaps between them.
- crazygringo 4y ago
  Not on a lot of keyboards. (Edit: I mean no groupings at all, not about the size of groupings.)
  - hbn 4y ago
    Including Apple's
  - Encrypt-Keeper 4y ago
    I've never seen a keyboard that does this. Just took a look around the office to confirm.
    - lkbm 4y ago
      Probably a typo—groups of 4 is (was?) standard. My Das Keyboard has this, as did all(?) the keyboards I used as a kid in the 80s and 90s.
      - 4y ago

mcc1ane 4y ago

So, let's say F2 does something important in an open app (e.g. "Rename file" in Explorer) - does that mean it would not work anymore? Or am I missing something obvious?

tom_ 4y ago
The author sounds like they are using macOS, where the F keys aren't used much.
adam-a 4y ago
Yeah I use F2 constantly for rename, not just in explorer but very useful in lots of apps. In Unity (the game engine) it's invaluable. Also F3 is generally "Find next" when you have a search box open. F12 and Shift-F12 do code navigation in VS and F10 and F11 are useful in the debugger. There are lots of nice things you can do with the F keys which this tip spoils.
spinchange 4y ago
F5 webpage refresher checking-in to say hi.

ataru 4y ago

I bind mine to virtual desktops, but I have the same applications on each desktop all time, so the workflow is quite similar.

csdvrx 4y ago

No. My function keys are used for things I do more often, like change color profiles, toggle a single app into dark mode, etc. My favorite trick is not the function keys but other "useless" keys: like Caps is remapped to be Esc (when released before another key is pressed) or Control (when used in conjunction with another key: act as a modifier), my 2 shifts and 2 alt do their normal modifier function (when used in conjunction with another key) but when used by themselves act as PageUp/PageDown Home/End Going up 2 pages up in the browser? Shift Shift. Top of the page? Alt. Bottom? The other Alt. For the Control keys, as I don't need that many I've experimented with a few remapping, but BackSpace/Delete are very handy. Going to the previous page in the browser? Alt+Control.

600frogs 4y ago

I’ve tried _so_ many different desktop workflows (including writing two custom window managers!), and I’ve finally settled for the exact same workflow - F -keys bound to my most common apps, all fullscreened. It becomes muscle memory within two weeks, and it’s faster than anything else I’ve tried by a mile. I use Thor for MacOS if anyone wants to replicate it, it’s a no-fuss version of the author’s setup. If I ever do need to see two things side-by-side, I’ve also got Rectangle for window positioning. A single cmd+caps lock+H/J/K/L for left-half/restore/maximise/right-half is all I’ve found is necessary.

deleted 4y ago
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clord 4y ago

Would be nice to have a usb keypad and perhaps a little oled screen in each keycap to implement this… my function keys are pretty overloaded with stuff now.

msk-lywenn 4y ago
You're looking for a stream deck: https://www.elgato.com/fr/stream-deck-mk2 https://www.elgato.com/fr/stream-deck-mk2 A related comment above: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34246255 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34246255
- deleted 4y ago
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default_png 4y ago
https://www.elgato.com/en/stream-deck-plus https://www.elgato.com/en/stream-deck-plus https://stream-pi.com/ https://stream-pi.com/ https://hackaday.com/tag/stream-deck/ https://hackaday.com/tag/stream-deck/

marcosdumay 4y ago

You know, the CTRL-Fn combinations are usually mapped to virtual workspaces on Linux, what is much more powerful than applications and give you the same kind of speedup. Who organizes things around application anyway, instead of windows? Anyway, no, it's bad to remap the Fn keys. They have been used to fast intra-application navigation since they appeared, and they are still in wide use. (Does the author not use application shortcuts?) Combining them with another key is just obvious.

chrismorgan 4y ago
And Ctrl+Alt+F[n] to virtual terminals. I only mention this because it reminded me of one of my old laptops where Ctrl+Alt+F{1,3,5,7,9} worked, but Ctrl+Alt+F{2,4,6,8,0} didn’t, or the other way round, due to a bad keyboard matrix. That was inconvenient, because I was deliberately using three distinct X sessions at that time (personal, work, and I forget what the third was). For some reason that quite escapes me now, instead of just using every second virtual terminal, I instead added Ctrl+Alt+{1–9} mappings inside i3 to chvt {1–9}. I still occasionally have cause to pull out a second one, though mostly I use workspaces within the one session.
deathanatos 4y ago
> Who organizes things around application anyway, instead of windows? macOS. There's no Alt+Tab, for example: no way to switch between two arbitrary windows on the Z-stack¹. The not-equivalent that exists is ⌘+Tab, and it switches apps; the usability of it, vs. Alt+Tab, is horrendous. (It fronts stuff you don't want, covering up stuff you do want.) There are workspaces … but I have found them hard to get productive with: macOS will reorder keystrokes around workspace changes. That is, the keyboard input "abc ^→ (workspace change) def" is a race condition: typed quickly (within the animation delay), it becomes as if you typed "abcdef ^→". ¹no, ⌘+` does not count.
- fiddlerwoaroof 4y ago
  You can use the up arrow with an application highlighted in the command-tab picker to select a particular window of the application.

default_png 4y ago

I have a Stream Deck that I set up to change the LCD's based on what the current in focus application is. I also have a button on each of the custom screens that gets me to the "Main Macro" pad. I strongly recommend them for programming. They save me so much time.

the_gipsy 4y ago

No, you're using the computer wrong. See, you should use a tiling window manager with several workspaces and shortcuts without having to look at your keyboard, e.g. Meta+4 to go to workspace 4 where you have your chat apps.

wutbrodo 4y ago
Ha, this was my first thought, though I've got a built-in damper on being that annoying guy who brings up tiling WMs in every workspace conversation. It is a little amusing to see such a dramatic headline supported by the extremely elementary thesis that you should have kbd shortcuts for your favorite applications. On top of that, numbered shortcuts for arbitrary apps is way worse than using Super+[arbitrary key].
theelous3 4y ago
Yep. Came to say this. Having say, meta+4 for "chat" is far better than having f4 for "a chat app". You arrive to your chat workspace, your works slack side by side with your favorite irc and matrix clients, all positioned and scaled perfectly every time. Adding more / fewer / swapping apps in is just a matter of invocation, and there the new configuration sits waiting. The concept is expanded greatly. Shoutout to i3 and xmonad, for my personal setups.
- deafpolygon 4y ago
  I do this as well, but on KDE. (I flip between KDE and Sway depending on my mood)
deleted 4y ago
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iambateman 4y ago
Any recommendation for Mac?
- galoisscobi 4y ago
  As others have mentioned yabai +skhd is excellent. I think using this guide to set it all up went a long way for me: https://cbrgm.net/post/2021-05-5-setup-macos/ https://cbrgm.net/post/2021-05-5-setup-macos/ Yabai is my daily driver and I really like it.

alikrhlwirjnklj 4y ago

> You're using function keys wrong You are using computers wrong. Apple is the only one that lacks this. Windows and most linux WM have this for at least 20 years! windows you just use WIN+[1,2,3,4...] to alternate between your quick launch apps. Linux obviously you have a myriad of options. Including the top comment here now about using virtual desktops which is even better than application (but you can mix them too!) And all that while still keeping your Fkeys functionality on each application! The time I was forced to use a Mac for development was the time my productivity was lowest and frustration highest. I'm fully convinced that Macs exist only because managers (and wanna be managers) make those decisions. Not to mention i've worked on employeer provided apple, dell, hp, lenovos... macs were the only ones i had to send to IT with failing keyboards, dead screens, etc.

nine_k 4y ago
I'm always puzzled by the stubbornness with which Apple refuses to make window management on macOS ergonomic. They think about so many subtler points, they can't fail to notice the elephant in their room. It bothers me every time I have to use macOS. I wonder who should leave the macOS team to have this finally addressed, like Jony Ive had to leave to make the Macbook hardware reasonable again.
- nerdix 4y ago
  I've mentioned in a previous discussion here that I believe that macOS has the worst UX of all the major OSes. And that belief is mostly because of how horrendous window management is (and Finder but that's a different discussion altogether). The lack of hotkeys for switching workspaces was one of my biggest gripes. And the culture that has formed around macOS users is to just accept it and buy numerous third apps to fix things that should be a standard feature of the OS.

commandlinefan 4y ago

I honestly had to glance down at my keyboard to see if it had function keys.

mxgrn 4y ago
Good one :D

froddd 4y ago

I like my hands resting near the bottom of the keyboard, so Cmd-tab is very quick as it is within reach and does not require using my eyes. To use those function keys I’d have to look at the keyboard, which feels like a waste of time. Though I’d rather have function keys back instead of the touchbar, as changing volume/brightness now requires looking at the keyboard as well as a certain precision/dexterity. Edit: formatting.

nahuel0x 4y ago

If macOS didn't added a very annoying fade-out/fade-in delay when switching Spaces, you could simply use them with maximized apps and hotkeys for switching them. Another design mistake from Apple.

the_gipsy 4y ago
Sounds a bit pedantic, but this was the reason I could just not use macOS as a daily driver. IIRC, there was a brief period of time where this anti-feature could be disabled by some obscure command, and the switch was instantly. But this was later gone in an update, which ultimately taught me the lesson that one should not be at the complete mercy of some OS updates.
cyberge99 4y ago
Is there any way to change the delay for that? I would think that tucked away somewhere under the hood there’s a setting that controls the animation duration. Being able to turn that down or off would be a boon to my productivity.
- deleted 4y ago
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the-printer 4y ago
My guess is that there’s a Reduce Motion option in the accessibility preferences like on iOS.
wmeredith 4y ago
I must be missing something because my Mac OS does not do that. There is a slide-in/over animation, but it's nearly instant.
- mrob 4y ago
  "Nearly instant" is a massive loss of usability compared to "instant". The quicker the transition the less disruption there is to your short term memory. If it's instant then switching between virtual desktops is almost as good as having multiple monitors. If I have to wait for even a brief animation (and MacOS's animation is painfully slow) I'm likely to forget details, which means I'll have to switch again, and risk forgetting even more.

eviks 4y ago

The function keys are too far away for such frequent operations, so it's much better to map apps to regular alpha keys (some can also have a mnemonic benefit like 'f' for File manager) with a modifier, e.g., CapsLock or even Space (though these would need to be behind a tiny delay not to interfere with typing), with a proper keyboard remapping app like Karabiner

swah 4y ago
Another option: https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/ https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/

iviv 4y ago

I think this workflow is interesting and the title unfortunately clickbait-ish. We can read about things we find interesting without claiming X is better.

deleted 4y ago

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SkeuomorphicBee 4y ago

In this kind of discussion people often focus solely on frequent actions, but there is one class of action that should have priority for the limited keys: the infrequent urgent. That is, tasks that don't happen that often, but when they do they are very urgent. For me the best example is the sound volume controls, I don't change sound volume nearly as often as I alternate between apps, but when I need to change the sound volume I need it right now, so that is what I'm using my F-keys for.

albert_e 4y ago
Agreed. Some keyboard come with dedicated volume +/-/mute keys which is great and frees up function keys. I have "screenshotting" as a frequent need -- which in some occassions is an urgent one too :) I use 3 different types of screen capture (current window, select a region, repeat last region) mapped to F6 F7 F8 on all my machines now which gets a lot of use.
- namrog84 4y ago
  I use sharex and screenshot and region snip a lot. I have it override the screenshot key and then just ctrl and shift for region. Screen. And current windows modifications. F keys are in my opinion better used elsewhere when you can override screenshot key for screenshots. I know lots of apps that use those F keys you've overriden. https://getsharex.com/ https://getsharex.com/
jerf 4y ago
That is a fine use, but multimedia keys use 3-7ish (depending on how crazy you go) of the 48-ish function keys readily available. By which I mean, unmodified, SHIFT, CTRL, and ALT, and that's without counting multiple modifiers. I've got volume, mute, pause, fast forward and reverse in there but it's far from the only things I've got. (Well... technically FF, reverse, and pause are WIN-right, WIN-left, and WIN-up respectively, but same principle.) I'm not even close to using up all the function keys. I've mapped these in something like the last four window managers I use, and they've survived across probably a dozen physical keyboards now. Physical buttons for these things come and go but "WIN-Up" (or Super-Up if you prefer) has always been there. (I did use a mac with a touch bar for a bit. Was that ever a train wreck for me, as you might expect. Fortunately, people don't seem to be copying them and dumping the function keys. I'm actually perfectly happy with them being a reduced-height bar across the top, as most laptops seem to have now. They don't need to be full height.) In general, I say to anyone who makes a living on a computer... take control of your keyboard! I don't obsess on not using the mouse at all, but the keyboard can do a lot. There's a lot of keys on there, even ignoring the letter keys (which are densely enough "taken" by a lot of other things I don't tend to override them much).

willnonya 4y ago

To all of the "No, youre using computers wrong" responses all I can say is they did declare that they are a web developer...

chrismorgan 4y ago

While talking of function keys— My greatest annoyance with keyboards is that Fn keys (as found to one side of the left Ctrl/Control key; ubiquitous on laptops and common on other keyboards) are always implemented in firmware, and simply don’t do anything with most of the keys, but implement them in such a way that I can’t either. My laptop’s keyboard has one Fn key, and 82 others.¹ I can only use Fn with 20 of them—one is legitimately handled in firmware², one does nothing³, two emit combos⁴, and 16 emit distinct key codes. The remaining 62 keys? They just get passed through as though I weren’t holding down the Fn key. I really wish I could use that Fn key just as a regular additional modifier. I use Super+[hjkl] in my tiling window manager, why can’t I use Fn+[hjkl] instead if I want to? Yes, I know that shifting it all from firmware to driver would cause inconvenience in some situations. Look, perhaps we could at least begin by adding a key code for Fn when it’s tapped by itself or with any of the 62 keys. I dunno, Hyper or something (is Hyper a thing at that level? or is there some other extra modifier available?). That’s sufficiently pragmatic, right? —⁂— ¹ Asus Zephyrus G15 (2021), GA503QM. I included the power button as one of the 82 keys, as I use it that way: I have XF86PowerOff switch to a Sway/i3 mode where pressing it again shuts down, r reboots, h hibernates, &c. It’s fun being like most projectors with their “press the power button again to show you actually meant it”. But you know my favourite key on the keyboard? XF86AudioMicMute. Really not looking forward to the inevitable day when I get a laptop without one again. ² Fn+Super disables/enables the Super key. Windows things. Wish I could disable this feature, because just occasionally I accidentally trigger it, and I will never want it. ³ As far as I can tell, Fn+Space just gets swallowed. evtest on the appropriate /dev/input/event* file doesn’t show anything being emitted. ⁴ Fn+F6 = Super+Shift+S, and Fn+F9 = Super+P, because those are standard Windows shortcuts. I don’t get why they did it this way, though they’re both very common, given how much more interesting stuff they’ve done than most others. Mostly I’m just grumbling about duplicates because I already want Super+P to do something else, so now Fn+F9 is a dead weight, though I would otherwise have used it.

sophacles 4y ago
If you haven't already gone down the custom keyboard rabbit hole, I suspect you might like it. There's a pretty large enthusiast community out in the world, and there's a lot of ways to go custom - build your own from scratch, use a kit, use a pre-built with flashable firmware, etc. The firmwares used (e.g. QMK) allow you to build the sort of thing you're talking about into your keyboard and more.

emacs28 4y ago

The best productivity hack is to get a keyboard with programmable QMK firmware and remap the keys however/wherever you want.

yankcrime 4y ago

For the macOS folks, I prefer rcmd to accomplish the same thing with less cognitive overhead: https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/ https://lowtechguys.com/rcmd/

swah 4y ago
I have this set-up but after alt-tabbing for 20 years its kinda hard to stop.
- duderific 4y ago
  I haven't ever noticed a productivity hit from alt-tabbing. Many of the devs I work with use Spaces and the three-finger slide to move between apps. However this doesn't work if you're not using the trackpad or Magic Mouse. Additionally, since I'm usually just moving between a few apps (VSCode, terminal, browser, Teams) it's usually pretty easy to just alt-tab or alt-tab-tab with no loss of context.
  - swah 4y ago
    Me too - I just think that its a main factor of my left wrist pain because one does it maybe a thousand times per day...
alin23 4y ago
Yep, I can certainly recommend ⌘ rcmd as well! Source: am developer of the app ^_^
the-printer 4y ago
Came to post this. Haven’t yet tried their Hammerspoon-integrated feature but I’m interested.

tsuujin 4y ago

This kind of use case should have been what the Touch Bar supported. I was actually excited when the Touch Bar came out because I though I would finally be able to just have named buttons, even click-through menus, instead of having to memorize what f1-f12 did on a given app. Imagine if instead of “ok, f1 opens my [some application], I just need to memorize that” you could just add a button that says [some application]”. Sadly the support for the Touch Bar was pretty middling to poor.

jdlyga 4y ago

I do this using Win+1,2,3,4,etc on Windows and Gnome 3. I believe this has been a feature since Windows 7. It's one of the first features I look for when trying out a new Linux desktop environment since it's so convenient.

pxoe 4y ago

f1 key in its default 'help' function is so remarkably useless, i just remap it to Enter. and then, remap tilde to to Left and Caps Lock to Right, and you've got a neat little navigation block on the left side of the keyboard.

terminal_d 4y ago

A better "hack" for linux users: Linux supports a "digital-only" modifier called "Hyper". You can use Xmodmap to set a key as hyper on press, and set Hyper-F[X] to whatever functions you wish to. Alternatively, use a keyboard with QMK, or install a dedicated application like KMonad.

jacob019 4y ago

I remap the useless caps lock to AltGr and then customize the whole keyboard. Mostly for unicode characters, but some shortcuts too—especially those F keys. I'm using Linux and do it with xkb. Can write a blog article if anyone is interested.

diarrhea 4y ago
It seems adding en-dash to your repertoire might be of interest :^)
- jacob019 4y ago
  Good call, updated and added to my layout :) Using em dash though.

kkfx 4y ago

I use the same concept in Emacs/EXWM to launch/jump/bury X11 and native buffers, + mod.+keys for extras like F5 run notmuch, C-F5 access unread tag directly, M-F5 compose a new message etc. That's why I damn HATE the disappearance of classic MANY-keys keyboards...

runjake 4y ago

I use my function keys for other things within programs. I use Alfred on macOS to quickly launch various apps and actions using the launcher hotkey plus a few chars. I don't have a problem with my workflow, and it syncs between my Macs. I am doing similar with Albert on Linux, with the goal of someday moving back to Linux full-time. At this point, I have a vast collection of workflows and snippet completions and I feel like my experience is pretty optimized for my tasks, but you do you.

williamdclt 4y ago

I can't hit Fn keys reliably without looking. Instead I mapped switching to my common programs to `fn+h/j/k/l` and other closeby keys (firefox = fn+h, vscode = fn+j, etc). My right-hand fingers are already on hjkl anyway, it's much much faster for me :)

chrismorgan 4y ago
Proper keyboards group in clusters F1–F4, F5–F8, F9–F12, with gaps between them. Unfortunately, this practice is regularly disregarded (even though uniformity is obviously a terrible idea), and particularly uncommon on laptop keyboards.
- williamdclt 4y ago
  I probably still wouldn't be able to hit them accurately, I'm not a great typist :) fn+h/j/k/l isn't mapped to anything, these keys are much more accessible and switching windows is probably the thing I do most, so it seems to make sense to me

kbd 4y ago

I use Karabiner-Elements and Hammerspoon to map caps lock to a "hyper" key, so browser is hyper+b, text editor is hyper+t, terminal is hyper+s, notes/tasks (Obsidian) is hyper+k, etc.

wink 4y ago

This is not too different to how I've been using tiling window managers for the last decade. There 9 or 10 virtual desktops which are accessed with WIN+1-0. 1 is for shells, 2 is the IDE, 3/4 are browsers, 6 is administrative stuff, usually a root shell, 0 is for zoom, 5,7,8 are less defined or just "whatever doesn't fit". In addition I'm using the multi-monitor switching from xmonad in i3 (i.e. if I have [1] on the left and [2] on the right screen, when I activate [1] while on the right one, they switch places, if I activate [3], then it will replace [2] and [1] stays on the left one). It sounds very pedantic but I don't even have to think when context switching and it's made my life a lot easier. Interestingly it doesn't work as well on my private computer because (to no one's surprise) I am using many more GUI tools and do different things when not working.

frankjr 4y ago

You can do something similar (albeit less fancy) without using any 3rd party applications on macOS. 1. Open Automator.app and create a Quick action. 2. Drag "Launch Application" to the workflow and choose an application to open. Save it. 3. Open Preferences -> Shortcuts -> Services and assign a keyboard shortcut to your action. Unfortunately, macOS will not let you assign many combinations. The other annoying thing is that running the shortcut is not instantaneous, there seems to be a noticeable delay before the action executes.

mynameishere 4y ago

Is it okay to use them for what they are actually useful for? F3 = repeat search, F5 = refresh, etc, etc, all context dependent, of course, but that is a good thing. Mac people I do not understand.

mmphosis 4y ago
I understand. Unfortunately, we have wildly different preferences and keyboards. If I had Function keys: F1 = help, F2 = rename, F3 = repeat search, Alt+F4 = close, F5 = refresh, all context dependent, of course On a Mac: Help = help, Return = rename, Command+G = find again, Command+W = close, Command+R = Refresh, usually consistent. Maybe, one day, there will be truly customizable keyboards.

chadlavi 4y ago

All the apps I use the most are open most of the time. I can just use cmd+tab to switch between them quickly. To each their own, but this feels unnecessary to me in my own personal workflow. I've never thought to myself "boy I wish I could open one specific app, that wasn't already open, with a single keystroke"

blueblob 4y ago
On Windows, win+number will open the item in the number position in your bottom bar. I rarely use it for the same reason as you.

monroewalker 4y ago

Karabiner has already been mentioned here but I'll add that goku (https://github.com/yqrashawn/GokuRakuJoudo https://github.com/yqrashawn/GokuRakuJoudo) is THE way to setup Karabiner and it can be hard to overcome the extremely verbose and unergonomic default json config of Karabiner otherwise. Goku also makes it trivial to add shortcuts which are activated by quickly pressing one key while another is held. I use this for the kind of launch mode described in the OP. eg. w + e = editor (Intellij), w + r = chrome, w + f = firefox.. The drawback to these shortcuts is that they can unintentionally be activated when regularly typing since we don't always release a key before pressing the next. That's only happened seldomly for me though since "w" isn't a frequently used letter and I've set the shortcut activation window pretty low so the w + <key> key has to be pressed essentially immediately after w. Similarly, I use q + w for previous tab, q + e for next tab, and s+d to open the clipboard history from Alfred

rxhanson 4y ago

Charmstone [1] is a different take from everything mentioned here (I'm the developer). The idea is to use your spatial memory to switch/launch apps faster than anything else that I've found, with a smaller learning curve and less memorization. You can use keyboard shortcuts with the arrow keys, modifier keys + cursor movement, or a trackpad gesture. [1] https://charmstone.app https://charmstone.app

thurn 4y ago
Tried it out. I like this idea, but requiring two hands is a deal-breaker for me. I need to be able to switch apps while my hands are over the keyboard without needing mouse/trackpad interaction, ideally staying as close to home row as possible.
- rxhanson 4y ago
  Thanks for trying it and for the feedback. Would you use it if you could set the keyboard shortcuts to mod+hjkl or something like that, rather than mod+arrow keys?
xwowsersx 4y ago
Neat idea. I just downloaded it. How can I use just the keyboard, e.g. with arrows to select one the apps in the switcher? Using the mouse is a nonstarter for me. EDIT: oh duh "display with arrow keys". Nice. Going to try this out for a while. It's definitely way faster than cmd + tabbing through my many apps.
kybernetyk 4y ago
Just tried it. Great tool.

wodenokoto 4y ago

I really want my keyboard brightness key back. The M-series MacBooks have Siri and … something else I don’t use instead of keyboard brightness.

mxgrn 4y ago
You'll still be able to do that with Fn+F1/F2.
- wodenokoto 4y ago
  Wouldn’t that activate the F1/F2 function of the currently in-focus application (with F1 often being “help”)?

jojohack 4y ago

Alfred workflow instructions in case you don't wish to use Keyboard Maestro for this: https://ldstephens.medium.com/launch-your-favorite-mac-apps-with-keyboard-shortcuts-using-alfred-406635e2bbd4 https://ldstephens.medium.com/launch-your-favorite-mac-apps-...

david_allison 4y ago

I've recently bought an Elgato Stream Deck*[0] (programmable 15-key LED macro-pad) and would strongly recommend it. Simply: define an icon, define a shell script/app/site and press a button to execute. It natively supports 'profiles' for contextual actions if a given application is active, and 'folders', to extend the actions available given the 15 key limitation. I believe there's also a SDK + plugin infrastructure which lets you define live-updating icons, but I haven't given this a try. [0] https://www.elgato.com/en/stream-deck-mk2 https://www.elgato.com/en/stream-deck-mk2 * EDIT to differentiate from Steam Deck

swah 4y ago
That is cool but "too far" - just put those keys back on the keyboard instead of making the ridiculous tiny keyboards that require chording :) (If possible, I wish these dynamic F-keys would make the keyboard taller instead of wider...)
twobitshifter 4y ago
Unfortunate that steamdeck exists, I had to reread multiple times to figure out this wasn’t the valve gaming handheld
ajolly 4y ago
Love mine. There's an advanced launcher plugin for "run or raise" functionality. I've got a little script to do the same for web pages, but I have an extended it yet to search for any open tab rather than just the ones that are currently active in the top window. I deal with this by having websites specific launchers.

boomskats 4y ago

For my Gnomies, the Run-or-raise extension [0] is stellar. It does exactly what it says: you bind a key combo to a launcher command, and optionally define a windowname or wm_class query to check for the existence of the program before it's launched. If it's running it's raised, if it's not then it's run. It has options for the window behaviour after toggling, optionally minimising the programs etc. I can't rate it highly enough. It helped me finally step away from my decade-long i3wm-adhd addition, where everything else failed. [0]: https://github.com/CZ-NIC/run-or-raise https://github.com/CZ-NIC/run-or-raise

teo_zero 4y ago

I couldn't disagree more. My mental sanity depends on some fixed beliefs. One of those is that every key sequence not involving the Win key is sent to and handled by the application in focus. Including F-keys, which many applications expect, in any case. Ex: F2=edit cell, F9=recalculate in Excel. Global actions handled by the SO or DE must involve Win. Ex: Win+L lock screen. And yes, Redmond-imposed Alt-Tab is an abomination: it should have been Win+Tab since the beginning. The workflow you're proposing could be easily achieved with Win+ a carefully chosen letter. Benefits: 1. the letter is easier to remember; 2. You have 20-something free slots instead of 12 (excluding the ones that are already taken for standard actions like L for lock); 3. Most probably your fingers are already there and you have muscles memory of where the letters are; 4. Consistent, expected behavior of where keys are sent to.

1attice 4y ago
Idk where you were at that era but the Win key came out half a decade after Alt-Tab. Win95 didn't even have the Win key. Goodness. Think before you post. :) A thing cannot be an abomination for not making use of a building material which would not exist for most of the decade.
- dec0dedab0de 4y ago
  I am pretty sure I had a windows key on the windows 95 packard bell I got for christmas 95. Edit: it was the same model as this reddit thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/vintagecomputing/comments/s518wo/i_finished_the_restore_of_my_packard_bell_legend/ https://www.reddit.com/r/vintagecomputing/comments/s518wo/i_...
- kolinko 4y ago
  Win95 had a win key! It was introduced right aling the start menu
shhsshs 4y ago
What about special key sequences like Ctrl+Alt+Delete on Windows, or Ctrl+Alt+F-key on most Linux distros? Or even more crazy special commands like Alt+PrintScreen+REISUB?

kazinator 4y ago

Basically, your applications are pinned to positions on a task bar, and that task bar is made of a row of physical buttons.

xalava 4y ago

Gnome assigns SUPER+NUM to the applications in the sidebar by default. You can change the applications or their order visually and the keyboard shortcut is highly accessible. It's one of the well thought features that makes me stick with it.

sigmonsays 4y ago

I just use rofi and type what I want to launch. I dont really see the need for all this.

deafpolygon 4y ago

Eh..? Don't get me wrong - if it works for you or OP, great! Keep doing it. I use Sway and KDE depending on what tickles my fancy. For application launching, I just use Alt+Space and type the first few letters of what I want. My frequent flyers get assigned to Meta+Alt+Letter. - Krunner / Rofi - Alt+Space (Meta+D was a bit contorted for me) - Meta+Enter - Konsole (KDE) / Kitty (Sway) - Meta+Shift+<1-0> - move active window to desktop - Meta+1-0 - switch to desktop #1-#10 A lot of apps use F-keys so it's not a good fit for me. When possible, I like to map custom shortcuts for various applications using F-keys.. not use it as an application launcher. For example: With Dolphin, I've gotten used to F2 for renaming (Windows holdover), F3 for split file view, F4 for terminal, F5 for refresh Kate or VS Code, I tend to map F5 to Build/Run/Debug.

Karawebnetwork 4y ago
He does cover this briefly: "Is it up to an app launcher such as Spotlight or Alfred?" I'd be curious as to why he finds the F keys faster. Perhaps not having to wait for the bar to appear, not having to "context switch" by thinking about the app's name and not having to type anything. He talks about how one key is his music software for example, so by simply remembering F6 it skips having to even know what the app's name is and having to potentialy pick the second of third choice of a list. "[alt space] spotif... oh damn, no [backspace] it's itun... wait no I just switched to Tidal... [backspace] So [T] [enter] oops, I just opened the Terminal..."
- deafpolygon 4y ago
  And I respect that. But, krunner and rofi is instant for me. I guess I don't really switch between apps that much for this context switching to be a problem.
- mxgrn 4y ago
  > I'd be curious as to why he finds the F keys faster. Simply because it's a single key press, even no modifier is needed. So, yeah, it's faster and less thinking.
  - 4y ago

motoboi 4y ago

In macOS, just CMD-<space>,t-e<enter> will give me a terminal. So many keys, you say. Well, it takes me probably 1/10 the time to hit fn-F1. Also, no extra app, Chrome is just CMD-<space>,c-h<enter>.

soufron 4y ago
Nope, it's not the same. It's definitely faster and smoother to use only one key.
- motoboi 4y ago
  I swear for god that its faster for me. Muscle memory maybe?

keester 4y ago

linux user (kde, cinnamon, etc.). I have been using ctl-f1,ctl-f2, etc to switch between virtual desktops since about 2000. Each virtual desktop is labeled like 'email', 'docs', 'browser', 'editor', 'sql' etc. At each desktop I can alt-tab between a couple of apps, say IDEA and a terminal, or SquirrelSQL and a terminal. So I navigate apps by first selecting the correct desktop and then possibly alt tabbing a little bit. That works well for me and I think probably a lot of users since it's the default behavior after install.

somada141 4y ago

Personally I’ve been using a similar approach for over a decade where I have 9 desktops on my Mac most of which have fixed windows on them eg 1 for a file explorer, 2 for mail, 3 for browser, 4 and 5 for IDEs, 6 for related tooling, 7 for notes and maybe another browser window, 8 for music, and 9 for chat windows and I switch between them with Ctrl+<number>. On top of all of them desktops I can Ctrl+Space the terminal (Quake style, Warp now, used to be iTerm) and Alt+Space for Raycast (used to be Alfred). This was I rarely if ever need to Cmd+Tab since everything is fixed in place most of the time.

Jordrok 4y ago

This is exactly why I like to use a gaming keyboard with extra programmable function keys off to the left side. All the flexibility without having to override any default functionality that the standard keys might have. Edit: Also, dedicated media keys and a volume control wheel/knob are a must!

powersnail 4y ago

Is there a keyboard-oriented window manager that doesn't require memorizing what keys do what? What I envision is having one master key combination to pull up a panel or overlay of some sort, which displays which key I press next to go to a certain place, or do a certain action. So there's just one thing to memorize. Sort of like how vimium works in browser, where you press 'f', and each clickable gets a little label. (But preferably not randomly assigned) The memorizing-most-commonly-used-50-keyboard-combination thing really doesn't work for me, whether it's home row or function keys. I mean, I still have to look at the little pictures for stove knobs after years of using the same stove, and that's just four knobs.

codethief 4y ago
IIRC Manjaro with i3 displays a list of common key chords on the desktop: https://www.google.com/search?q=manjaro+i3&source=lnms&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=manjaro+i3&source=lnms&tbm=i... You could certainly write a short Rofi script to display them in a popup window and browse/select/execute them (via i3-msg).
francoispon 4y ago
i think stumpwm has some kind of "which-key" mode.... which is i think what you are looking for, and of course there is always exwm that can do *anything*
ozaark 4y ago
On Mac I just use CMD+space to pull up spotlight which very quickly opens anything matching what you type from there. Usually within a single keystroke after CMD+space pulls up the desired app and typically takes under a second. It does a lot of other neat things as well but I use that feature daily. Windows is similar in just pressing the windows key allows you to type the name of an app or file but in my experience is much slower and inaccurate compared to OSX. It's easier for me to remember the name of the app I want than that+the key binding with muscle memory I've then had to set.

aendruk 4y ago

My favorite function key trick is to first move the number keys into a “virtual numpad” and then move the function keys down onto the unused number row. That way the function keys are easy to reach without looking and always available without conflicting with the laptop’s media/utility keys.

mxgrn 4y ago
That's a great idea!

hemmert 4y ago

Looking forward to try it out! Sounds like a great thing!

roxgib 4y ago

Another solution to this problem is to get a standalone numpad and assign the keys as hotkeys. Lots of macro apps allow different functions to be assigned to specific keyboards.

abirch 4y ago
autohotkey is my friend. I love it when a program doesn't give you an option to remap keys

personjerry 4y ago

Or... put them on your Dock?

mxgrn 4y ago
Way slower and more cognitive overhead.

0rca 4y ago

For MacOS there is Hammerspoon, that provides immensely powerful scripting, but can merely open and close the apps, too. -- ~/.hammerspoon/init.lua function define_shortcut(appName, key, mod) hs.hotkey.bind(mod, key, function() hs.application.enableSpotlightForNameSearches(true) local app = hs.application.find(appName) if app and app:isFrontmost() then app:hide() else hs.application.open(appName) end end) end define_shortcut("Alacritty", "F1", {}) define_shortcut("Firefox", "F2", {})

reportgunner 4y ago

You can use Win+[number on the row key] on Windows to do this, no configuration required. The number corresponds to the position of an app on the taskbar. You can pin apps to the task bar to make sure they are always in the same position.

dredmorbius 4y ago

In the discussion of standards, standardisation, and reserving specific keystrokes for specific contexts (applications, OS / windowing system, increasing Web browser (an increasingly inadequate description), etc., we have ... an embarrassment of riches. Or something like that. The first standardisation within a GUI context I'm aware of was the Common User Access system on IBM PCs. That grew out of the early PC era within which different programs had their own idiosyncratic command-key conventions, several of which are listed in the Wikipedia article on the topic: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access> This still wasn't the first such standard. IBM already had fairly standardised function-key conventions under MVS and TSO/ISPF. The Unix world inherited emacs functions from ITS (as a set of macros over the TECO editor), vi keybindings, and a number of other conventions. Emacs commands have been incorporated into Readline, and are generally available on bash and similar shells. There was a revision of CUA under Windows (whose name / initialism I forget), as well as a set of interface guidelines for Apple's classic Macintosh, as well as MacOS / OS X). Within the Linux world, GNOME and KDE offer the HIG, Human Interface Guidelines. And various X11 window managers offer their own shortcuts and hotkeys (I've long used and extended a set for WindowMaker, for my own use, which incorporate some of the ideas in the submitted article). There's also the browser environment, in which there are often conflicts: browser-versus-OS (window manager / GUI shell), browser-versus-webapps (e.g., a site's own specific keybindings), and browser-versus-extensions, such as, say, Vimperator, which provides a vi/vim-like keybinding interface to major browsers. A key problem is that once a standard does emerge, interface conventions change, often profoundly. And independent evolved systems (e.g., Emacs, VIM, CUA, MS Windows, Apple Mac, ...) have a rather stubborn persistence measured in decades. Moving from mainframes to minis to PCs to GUIs and over the past decade to both mobile/touch- and Web-based applications, and arguably voice-based (Siri, Google, Alexa, Cortana, ...) are further confounding standards. Given that the user-base of smartphones / tablets is now roughly 10x that of desktop-based systems, design principles for smartphones seem to be driving desktop conventions, regardless of suitedness to task.