[X4U] Keyboard Shortcuts (was: OS X Update 10.3.9 A Change in Safari)

[Stroller]

On Apr 17, 2005, at 5:04 am, John Azevedo wrote:

> On Apr 16, 2005, at 11:25 PM, Stroller wrote:
>
>> I REALLY want [Apple] to introduce ... underlining [of] shortcut 
>> titles when I press ALT, so I know which button to press next to 
>> activate  the shortcut.
>
> Why not just look next to the Menu Item's title?

Because in order to do this I have to either:
- take my hand off the keyboard & use the mouse to open the menu item.
- press CTRL-F2 (without accidentally hitting CTRL-F1 on the way there, 
thereby disabling keyboard access) and then right-arrow several times, 
in order to find the correct menu item.

If you've never used Windows or KDE much, then perhaps you won't know 
to what I'm referring.

Let's say I'm reading your message in Mail.app, and I happen to wonder 
what email program you use - "I'll pop open the long-headers & see if 
there's an `X-Mailer:' header", I think.
- If I happen to know that Apple-shift-H is the appropriate key-combo 
to view the message's full headers, I'm laughing, but personally I find 
there are only a handful of Mac shortcuts that I can ever remember.
- Otherwise to open the long headers using the keyboard I have to 
CTRL-F2, press the right-arrow 4 times, the down arrow 5 times, the 
right-arrow again and then enter.
- It's probably easier to remove my hand from the keyboard & mouse onto 
the view menu; you're right - the keyboard shortcut is illustrated 
there, but by that stage I don't need it anymore, I'm busy and have 
other stuff to do, so I'm unlikely to remember it. The benefits of 
keyboard shortcuts have just been negated.

If Mail.app were a Windows application and I didn't remember what the 
keyboard short cut is, then no problem. As soon as I press the ALT key, 
the "V" of View is discreetly underlined in the menu, as is the "F" of 
File, "E" of Edit" &c. Since Mailbox & Message both begin with "M", the 
programmer might choose the "a" of Mailbox to be underlined and have 
lease message to be accessed with ALT-a, but that doesn't matter to me, 
because I've already seen that I need to press "V", and the view menu 
has expanded. I know that I have to go into the Message submenu, and 
"M" of that word is underlined, so I go press that letter on the 
keyboard and then "H" for headers (because that is also underlined).

Because all the keys required during this task are underlined & 
consequently obvious in Windows, it has taken me about a second to 
press ALT-a, v, m, h, and get the menu option I require. Compare this 
to the Macintosh's 13 key-presses. Also, because these key-strokes are 
indicated _at the time I require them_ (as opposed to being illustrated 
next to the menu item after I access it using an alternative input 
method) I'm more likely to notice, be aware of, and actually learn 
them. As a consequence I can tell you without thinking about it that 
one can shutdown a Windows XP PC without removing one's hands from the 
keyboard by pressing the Start key then u twice.

I hate to be sitting here at my £1500 Macintosh, posting obsessively 
too many times per day to a Macintosh mailing-list and telling you that 
a PC does something better than a Mac, but I'm sorry, it's true. It 
does. Just this one single thing.

Stroller.