18 ms·

Some Excel users pop F1 off their keyboards (2012)

158 points by raldi 9y ago

jabot 9y ago
This should really be solved in software... However, I remember trying to map capslock to control on windows a few years back. It involved becoming an administrator and entering an opaque hexadecimal key into the registry. Simply popping off the key is probably easier. Oh, on linux it boils down to "setxkbmap -option ctrl:nocaps", which doesn't require root...
- Lorkki 9y ago
  An official keymap editor exists for Windows, but it's not terribly well supported, and I can see how using it would be a hassle especially if you're not technically inclined: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-hardware/custom-keyboard-layout-with-windows-10/b71c7905-1e30-4b0c-861b-253efd2b5a9e https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10...
  - jabot 9y ago
    I did not know that tool. Also, apparently it cannot map control keys... https://superuser.com/questions/413384/how-to-remap-control-keys-in-ms-layout-creator https://superuser.com/questions/413384/how-to-remap-control-...
- slezyr 9y ago
  Or even better solution: programmable keyboards. It's sad that just few keyboards have opensource firmware and allow to remap keys. One of them Ergodox EZ ~$350 https://ergodox-ez.com/ https://ergodox-ez.com/
  - jabot 9y ago
    I have an atreus keyboard, and I have changed the layout :-) However, 350$ seems like a lot of money for a problem that should really be solvable at no cost in software...
    - slezyr 9y ago
      The biggest problem with software (on OS side) is than you can't use your custom layout in BIOS, LiveCDs or when you need to type password if your hardware is encrypted. Another problem is games. I use dvorak and all games use qwerty bindings so you need either to remap keys for each game or start game with QWERTY layout. If you forgot to start it with qwerty you need to restart the game, which is was really frustrating for me. It's even more problematical with online games like League of legends and etc. I see no problem for this feature to be present on even cheapest keyboards. I picked ergodox just for an examle.
      - jabot 9y ago
        Fair point. In the context of the article we're talking about a highly specialized office environment, where bios/live boot environments etc. do not happen often. There, a software solution is useful and cheap. In the more general case, and for those people that do not mind carrying their own keyboard everywhere, you are right. Especially since a keyboard that expensive probably lasts for a long enough time...
  - mannykannot 9y ago
    In at least one finance company I know of, alternative keyboards are not permitted without getting security's permission. They might not do a very thorough examination, but I can imagine they might disallow a programmable keyboard on the basis of it being too complex to analyze the risks.
- cooper12 9y ago
  On MacOS it Just Works (at least for modifier keys) :) https://i.imgur.com/Bt1X7Nq.png https://i.imgur.com/Bt1X7Nq.png
- SwellJoe 9y ago
  On Linux with Gnome you can use Tweak Tool. It's under Typing->Caps Lock Behavior.
- dmitriid 9y ago
  > This should really be solved in software And this software is called "Excel". This should really be solved in software called "Excel". As in: remove functionality from F1
  - woodrowbarlow 9y ago
    the problem cited in the article is performance. a "help" dialog shouldn't take several seconds to open, it shouldn't take foreground control, and you shouldn't have to wait for it to finish opening in order to close it. and you definitely shouldn't have to move your hand to the mouse to close something that was opened by an accidental keystroke. if the view doesn't get obstructed and you could simply tap F1 a second time (or Esc) and instantly be back to what you were doing, i think the UX problem would be solved. in firefox, i sometimes hit F12 on accident -- but i can just tap it again to close the dev tools, even if it hasn't finished loading. that's decent UX.
    - dmitriid 9y ago
      No.. The problem cited in the article is: a common operation that is invoked hundreds of times a day is bound to F2. An uncommon operation that breaks the user's flow is bound to F1. Users keep hitting F1 by accident. The only proper and decent UX in this case is to remove the source of the error. You do that by removing the binding of F1
      - woodrowbarlow 9y ago
        > that breaks the user's flow this is the problem. and it breaks the user's flow because it obscures the work area and can't be instantly dismissed. there's nothing wrong with putting relatively uncommon actions next to common actions on the keyboard as long as the actions don't break the user's flow.
        dmitriid 9y ago
        > as long as the actions don't break the user's flow. This. Yet you propose to keep the action that breaks the user flow even if it's often triggered by mistake ;) I propose to remove the action that breaks the user flow.
- yread 9y ago
  You could setup an AutoHotkey to "silence" it https://superuser.com/questions/291018/consume-keystroke-in-autohotkey-dont-let-it-propagate-to-other-apps https://superuser.com/questions/291018/consume-keystroke-in-...
- LambdaComplex 9y ago
  My keyboard (Ducky Shine 3) actually has a dip switch on the back that swaps capslock and control. Not sure if any other companies do that though
  - joejev 9y ago
    Filco also has this.
- WorldMaker 9y ago
  SharpKeys [1] is the tool I've kept in my toolbelt to do this for several years now. (Though I swap capslock for an extra backspace or escape depending on mood and amount of Vim in my life at the time.) [1] https://github.com/randyrants/sharpkeys https://github.com/randyrants/sharpkeys
dingo_bat 9y ago
At least this is one problem new MacBook users won't have!
- jerrre 9y ago
  for me it's ⌘+W vs ⌘+Q in Firefox: the first closes the current tab, the second the whole browser which takes some time to restart. Solved it now with an add-on
  - shangxiao 9y ago
    Which is why I thought that the hold-⌘-Q to close Chrome was a godsend! Apparently this is also a feature with Firefox: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/824072 https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/824072
  - imeron 9y ago
    This was a long standing bug for Firefox but they fixed it a couple of months ago. (The bug was about Firefox not honoring the macOS's key remapping.)
  - dredmorbius 9y ago
    All the worse if you're used to readline / emacs keybindings, where ^W is "delete word". Editing a Web form and suddenly having the entire tab disappear is less than gruntling.
    - kps 9y ago
      There are dozens of us! Firefox at least lets you set the shortcut key to Meta instead of Control.
  - wazoox 9y ago
    There's a preference that asks for confirmation if there's more than one open tab.
g09980 9y ago
Not too different from me accidentally triggering so many undesired things with the MacBook Pro TouchBar. I previously had no idea how many interfaces respond to the Esc key, now I do.
stephengillie 9y ago
There are dozens of us. It's massively disrupting to the state of flow to miss a key by one, and suddenly another window pops up, but there's no text inside. It takes several seconds for the window to compose itself, and several more to close. I do keep the F1 key somewhere safe, to put back onto the keyboard, for the next keyboard user.
- cm2187 9y ago
  I do too. And the scroll lock and num lock too. And I added a sticker to let IT know that the keyboard isn't broken and shouldn't be replaced.
  - chli 9y ago
    I came here to mention Scroll Lock which normally doesn't do much in Windows applications but I was utterly confused the other day when my Excel started behaving weirdly !
    - acheron 9y ago
      Well, now you know what Scroll Lock is for, heh. :) It's done that in spreadsheets since the early versions of Lotus 1-2-3 for MSDOS.
- grecy 9y ago
  ahhh, can't you just map it to something else? (nothing?)
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - if_by_whisky 9y ago
    Excel users don't think that way, I guess. Remapping keys requires a registry update on Windows, which many of my windows-at-work friends don't get access to. Even if they did, they might not trust themselves to make registry updates. Popping the key off is easy, secure, and effective.
Nzen 9y ago
tl;dr F1 is generally help . Excel's help is apparently slow to load and close. Hence, the interviewees removed the key to avoid pressing it, when they meant to press F2. It's disappointing but unsurprising they didn't just have windows (autohotkey?) map it to F2.
- appleiigs 9y ago
  In a corporate environment I cant install anything on my computer.
- mywacaday 9y ago
  Article says its a banking environment, nobody outside of desktop support will have admin access to their PC/Laptop. That includes developers/application support/server admins/DBAs etc. If you want an application installed that's not on an approved list request will likely go to IT security for review(Don't hold your breath). portableapps.com made life somewhat bearable. PS No Dropbox/Google Drive/Onedrive, No personal webmail and a heavily restricted proxy for all browsing.
  - vog 9y ago
    > Article says its a banking environment, nobody outside of desktop support will have admin access to their PC/Laptop But then it should be even simpler: Have the desktop support team (or whoever manages all those PC/Laptops) solve it centrally, once and for all, for every computer in the company.
- cm2187 9y ago
  I am not aware of any F1 help screen that is of any use on windows.
  - jackmott 9y ago
    Just tried it in visual studio. loads up a web browser. that is irresponsible.
ptero 9y ago
Why would not they remap F1 to something else, say another F2 if they so like it? The functionality has been at both Linux and Windows for a very long time.
- bru 9y ago
  Because popping the key is by far the simplest solution, especially if you won't miss it in any of your usual workflows. AFAIK remapping it will need Autohotkey or similar, and banks & funds aren't the environment the more welcoming to arbitrary binaries, even if free software.
- GCU-Empiricist 9y ago
  They are users, users too often think in terms of optimizing what they do, not the tools they use, or learning to optimize things they think are underlying and fixed.
- DavidWoof 9y ago
  AFAIK, Windows has never had a built-in way to remap keys. Sure, you can download third-party tools to do it, but that's often a dicey move in a corporate environment where you aren't allowed to install third-party software. I'm really surprised more keyboards can't do this kind of simple remapping themselves. I used to remap the keys on virtually every machine I worked on, but these days I just bring in my CODE keyboard which does some simple remapping itself (e.g., caps lock -> ctrl).
- jerf 9y ago
  In addition to what other people mention, it's generally a bad idea to take a sloppy input and try to autocorrect it, because it encourage bad habits that will really surprise you the next time the autocorrect doesn't work as you expect. This ranges from autocorrecting spelling, to keypresses, to UNIX commands, to all sorts of things. It's better to block or highlight (if relevant) the bad input than to try to correct it automatically. For one thing, if you encourage sloppy input, the brain automatically adjusts and will become even more sloppy; while this isn't necessarily a never-ending spiral it is still quite likely to lead somewhere worse than blocking bad input entirely. (Incidentally, if you want to fiddle with your keyboard but you don't want to go whole-hog with switching to an entirely different layout, you can use this principle to switch around two keys really quickly. If you want to try your Caps Lock as, say, CTRL, that's fine, but be sure to unmap the CTRL key itself. If you don't, it'll just be frustrating as you try to force yourself to remember, and realize three weeks later that Caps Lock is still mapped to CTRL but you haven't used it at all. If you do unmap the old key entirely, you'll find you've adjusted entirely in as little as 5 minutes, and it's only another 5 minutes to go back, if that's what you decide. You can iterate on these things much more easily than you might think.)
rubenbe 9y ago
I would guess that PCs in banks are quite locked down, maybe even making it impossible to remap keys. But everyone can pop some keys from his/her keyboard. Plus it's a much easier (and fun) office mod than messing around in the settings of all your applications ;)
- mstade 9y ago
  Correct – even for developers in DMZ networks have a hard time getting to install things they need to work. Many organizations have convoluted processes for requesting admin access to your machine. Even if you do get access it doesn't mean you necessarily can even download things, most have firewalls that block binaries from anything but "trusted" sources (basically white listed domains, so yeah – "trust".) In a few cases, monitoring on machines have raised red flags and I've had to explain after the fact why I've installed or run a particular piece of software, and in some cases got a proverbial wrist slap and things/access reset. It's all for good reasons I'm sure, but some processes and rules are so opaque and convoluted and arbitrary, plucking keys off a keyboard is much easier. Source: I've worked as a developer in mostly top tier banks since 2011.
shangxiao 9y ago
Huh! I've been considering remapping F1 in vim for a while, I might actually go ahead and use it for something quite common (I've already taken up F2-12 for other handy tasks).
superasn 9y ago
Windows help and Windows troubeshooter are among the two most useless things in the OS (and lately it's Cortana). It far easier and more relevant to just do a Google search than waste time with these things. Same goes for answers.microsoft.com, whenever i see that link on top og Google results I'm pretty sure I'll just waste 10 minutes of my life and then search for the same thing on Stackexchange and pray to god someone has answered there in the succinct SO way. God knows how much resources and man hours Microsoft puts into making these things.
- pjmlp 9y ago
  Those features are not made for us, rather for the majority of clueless users that save files in whatever directory happens to be the default one.
  - Macha 9y ago
    Do they know what F1 is?
    - aluhut 9y ago
      They will when they find out what F2 does.
    - pjmlp 9y ago
      Many keyboards have "Help" written on it.
  - virtualized 9y ago
    That's the type of user who would never read the help content even if it was good.
- froindt 9y ago
  I remember back in the days of 98 when in my experience, hitting F1 would trigger the help which would never load rapidly or successfully. My standard operating procedure was to do a hard shutdown. It was so frustrating. I was roughly 5-7 while using it. Maybe it wasn't that bad and I was simply impatient. Regardless, it's always been useless to me.
atesti 9y ago
I wish I could remove "F1" from Chrome: I'm in the middle of a lot of tabs, reading them after each other and accidentially pressing F1 instead of ESC and a new useless help tab obens on the far right. Luckily if I close it immediately without navigating, Chrome is clever enough to return me to the last tab
- blockoperation 9y ago
  If you're able to build Chromium yourself, here's a trivial patch which does just that (only tested on Linux): https://gist.github.com/blockoperation/5ec91d666e670e39584d2ed84efad049 https://gist.github.com/blockoperation/5ec91d666e670e39584d2...
- raldi 9y ago
  On what OS does Chrome do anything when you press F1 or Esc? On my Mac, neither seems to do anything.
hammock 9y ago
Also, don't ever accidentally create a circular reference...same thing.
jtraffic 9y ago
In my view, there are many insights like this to be had by physically studying product users a bit more. The startup community has built a strong habit of studying users before a new solution is adopted, but not as much after. The insights designers get from just watching someone use a product are always delightful. The idea is basically ethnography for design. (https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/book/the-encyclopedia-of-human-computer-interaction-2nd-ed/ethnography https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/book/the-encyc...) 'Desire lines' in parks are one example. Desire lines are the paths in the grass that get worn down because people use them even though the designer didn't plan for it.
- 1_2__4 9y ago
  The cynic in me says most startup types would witness this behavior, snort derisively and say "they're not our target market".
  - digi_owl 9y ago
    Or "you are doing/holding it wrong!!!". Damn it, i have had a prominent FOSS DE guy basically claim that users are idiots after studying the results of a usability test of their DE. For me, in the trenches, it is more that users find their own ways of doing things. And if it works for them it works for them, and we have no business correcting them.
    - Something1234 9y ago
      Who was this and what DE was he working on?
    - keksicus 9y ago
      What DE? You can't leave us hanging like that, we're not chads and this isn't Election2000.
- ceejayoz 9y ago
  Agreed. When I worked at a newspaper, my most valuable contributions by far were ones made after spending a day with a reporter, ad designer, etc. and talking with them about their daily routine.
nayuki 9y ago
It suffices to use KeyTweak for Windows, not physically modify the keyboard. For example, I used it to disable the Back/Forward buttons on my ThinkPad.
- qorrect 9y ago
  Yeah mangling the keyboard should be a last option , I'm guessing they're not aware that all the keys can be remapped.
  - narag 9y ago
    Maybe they lack the permissions for installing applications. Intercepting keyboard is not exactly a human right :-)
  - amelius 9y ago
    Mangling the keyboard is more gratifying >:)
dmitriid 9y ago
I call such things "this is what happens when developers and designers do not use their own products"
zokier 9y ago
When I was younger and played games, popping out the windows key was typical. At best triggering windows menu meant lost round, but more typically a crashed game or even crashed Windows. Even today I'm wary of task switching from a game, as it still doesn't seem to be entirely robust
- keksicus 9y ago
  I haven't hosed a windows session yet, and maybe just one game was crashy ever, while task switching for the last two decades. I ran Windows Server though typically.
  - mikejmoffitt 9y ago
    I remember this not-so-fondly. This wouldn't be a problem for a game that is composited alongside the desktop in a "Windowed" mode, but for a full-screen application it is an "exclusive" application. The Source engine handles this context switch absolutely terribly. Task-switching out of Team Fortress 2 is a stuttery mess, where for around ten seconds it'll just loop the tiny audio buffer it last filled on top of a black screen before anything is usable again.
meri_dian 9y ago
There's a financial modeling in Excel competition held each year that awards a golden keyboard without an F1 key to the winner.
- youdontknowtho 9y ago
  That's awesome.
- oxguy3 9y ago
  I guess there's a niche for everything: https://www.modeloff.com/modeloff-golden-keyboard/ https://www.modeloff.com/modeloff-golden-keyboard/ (slightly larger photo of the golden keyboard: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CULeDw8XIAAo0-U.png https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CULeDw8XIAAo0-U.png )
pX0r 9y ago
Press F1 for Hell
PascLeRasc 9y ago
This Planet Money episode is a must-listen for Excel fans: http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/25/389027988/episode-606-spreadsheets http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/25/389027988/episo...
jasonkester 9y ago
Back in my Engineer days, where I'd spend much of my time writing technical reports, I'd always remove the Insert key from my keyboard. It's sitting there in that block of six keys that you use all the time when editing text (home, end, page up/down, delete), and it's a little timebomb. You would invariably hit it by accident at some point and change your editor into "overwrite all my stuff" mode. It would usually take a minute or two of ruining your document before you realized what was happening and spent the next several minutes repairing the damage. I would go years at a time without ever hitting that key on purpose, so I just kept it in a drawer, in case it ever needed using. Now, as a developer, there's an Insert in tons of useful keyboard combos, so it needs to stay there. And laptops have ruined that old useful six-key block so it's a lot rarer to hit it by accident. But it had no business being there. Fifteen years later, I'm still not a friend of that key.
- emodendroket 9y ago
  I can't think of one time I've ever intentionally used the overwrite functionality either.
  - deong 9y ago
    I vaguely recall using it a few times back in the day to edit things like fixed-format columnar text files. Now that sort of thing is easier with years worth of accumulated knowledge of tools, but I wasn't born with that knowledge.
    - rrobukef 9y ago
      Until you hit backspace to correct something...
  - raldi 9y ago
    You've never made ASCII art?
  - randylahey 9y ago
    Really? I use it frequently while programming in Vim. Definitely one of my top ten operations.
jenkstom 9y ago
Business Insider has annoying anti-adblocker popups. Is there some way to block websites that do this? I tried living without adblocker for a while, but I started getting some very not safe for work ads from dhgate all over the place. Just because I buy electronics doesn't mean I want ads for lingerie...
- S_A_P 9y ago
  Agreed. I actually got so irritated with this site, that I have added the simple blocker add in to chrome to block this site. I refuse to support them anymore. I dont care if they have something I want to read, Im not visiting that site ever again...
- oxguy3 9y ago
  I have a little stylesheet installed on my browser that I use for fixing random annoyances on various websites, and my favorite feature in it is adding "text-decoration: line-through" to links that point to certain sites such as Business Insider. That way, I still have the option to visit the site, but I get a strong visual indicator to avoid it. My stylesheet is here; you can install it with the Stylish browser extension: https://gist.github.com/oxguy3/3338da5c38348c2a6e72 https://gist.github.com/oxguy3/3338da5c38348c2a6e72
- zeveb 9y ago
  It's displaying fine with NoScript.
- pwg 9y ago
  > Business Insider has annoying anti-adblocker popups. Is there some way to block websites that do this? With NoScript blocking their javascript from even running, there's no annoying anti-adblocker popup. The article opened just fine and was fully readable.
hateful 9y ago
F2 is also rename on a host of Windows applications, including Windows Explorer. I've popped it off more than once but couldn't get used to not hitting F3 instead of F2. What I ended up doing was to rename Windows Help (winhlp32.exe at the time) to something else then copy and rename cmd.exe (or command.com, depending on how far back) to "winhlp32.exe". Now when I pressed F1 it would open a command window, much more useful and less intrusive if hit accidentally.
frenchman_in_ny 9y ago
I work in the field - years ago I had someone create a small program called "TurnOffF1" that runs silently in the background. It captures any F1 keypush in Excel only & blocks the Help popup. Wish I had the source code for the program.
- digi_owl 9y ago
  Autohotkey perhaps?
glaberficken 9y ago
OMG! This is genius!, how have i never thought of this before! I bet the people removing caps lock, scroll lock, insert etc are doing it because of the "cleaning ladies"! Not because they accidentally hit the keys. But because in most offices, keyboards are swiped clean daily by cleaning crews and when you arrive each morning you find an assortment of those keys toggled on or off. (I have even locked my Windows account on occasion due to not noticing a combination of Caps Lock / Num Lock toggled on/off in the morning)
- RankingMember 9y ago
  What country are you operating out of? I've never heard of cleaning people doing this in offices in the US.
  - jsjohnst 9y ago
    Every Silicon Valley, NYC, and Denver office I’ve worked in had cleaning crews who dusted desks / keyboards at least weekly, if not more often. Source: I’ve been in the office working when they came through.
    - RankingMember 9y ago
      Weird, guess they don't care about us developers in the mid-atlantic region.
  - glaberficken 9y ago
    I'm in Portugal. When I worked in London (UK) it was the same.
- Newtopian 9y ago
  I lock my keyboard away when I leave... I'll sleep better knowing nobody made it off with my 200$ mechanical clacker. As a side bonus I don't get mystery things locked when I arrive the next morning.
IanDrake 9y ago
New product idea: a physical key guard. A small plastic cage that slips over a key and doesn't allow it to be pushed by accident, but still allows it to be pushed with extra force. Kinda like the safety on a glock.
- ahakki 9y ago
  What safety on a Glock? I was of the impression that they had no external safety features.
  - IanDrake 9y ago
    A Glock safety doesn't prevent you from pulling the trigger, but it requires you to pull it correctly which can reduce (but not eliminates) accidents. I believe earlier versions had an initial heavy trigger that lightened once it was past the "safety" point. I don't know first hand, this was just from a passing discussion with a police officer.
philipov 9y ago
I don't use Excel very often and I need my F1 key for other tools, but I've had capslock removed for years.
- 13of40 9y ago
  That's brilliant - I never thought of that.
- DerfNet 9y ago
  I use a Model M and remap capslock to super/windows button. I'm so used to it I remap it on laptops as well. Have never come across an instance to actually use all caps.
- ashark 9y ago
  Why? It makes a great "ctrl".
  - philipov 9y ago
    I use my pinky to press shift and tab already. I press ctrl with the side of my hand. This way I can press both ctrl and shift at the same time, which is important for RTS and FPS games. Maybe I should map it to backspace like was suggested by WorldMaker.
    - ashark 9y ago
      Huh, must be keyboard size/shape differences but palm-pressing "fn" on my keyboard (where "ctrl" would be on a normal keyboard) while hitting "shift" with my pinkie is impossible without mashing other keys around them, and is really uncomfortable. End up pressing "shift" with the side of my first knuckle, that finger's so contorted. I use pinkie + ring when I hit two modifiers on that side, though that does mean I take a finger off "WASD", for gaming purposes. It'd be easier to train myself to hit shift+caps (as a ctrl) with just my pinkie than to do the palm + pinkie method, I think. Again, probably a hardware difference.
- WorldMaker 9y ago
youdontknowtho 9y ago
I was thinking about that the other day. I recently re-watched that Joel Spolsky video "You suck at Excel". F2 for cell edit makes it super easy to hit F1...which brings up help...which you can't just hit escape to dismiss. I'm actually a better than average typist, but yeah...that happens to me more than I like.
myrandomcomment 9y ago
Okay for those that do not get it. 1. It’s a bank. 2. Banks lock down their computers. 3. So you cannot install other software to fix this in software. 4. You do not have access to the system low enough to rename / remove the winhelp.exe crap. 5. No 3rd party hardware is allowed in the bank. So no bringing your own keyboard. All the time we get into this threads on HN where the techie goes well you could just...bla bla bla. In the real would of corporate IT everything you say is a non-starter.
- lkbm 9y ago
  Oh wow, I never even thought of messing with winhelp.exe. Luckily, I was able to remap F1 at my job, so it was fine. :-)
- emodendroket 9y ago
  Besides all that... it seems like this is an easier fix. Don't a lot of computer gamers remove their Windows keys for similar reasons?
  - devopsproject 9y ago
    yes. you can also ahk it or get a keyboard with a winkey kill switch
- turblety 9y ago
  Exactly this. Could not have said it better myself. Even trying to sort this stuff out properly could cost your department millions of pounds due to bureaucracy and incompetent management.
- mfoy_ 9y ago
  The greater point is that if you put something really useful next to something really annoying it will exacerbate the issue. F1 should not be so bad, and it should not be so close to F2. Even just leaving alone how bad, and utterly useless, the help dialogues in Windows are it's just terrible UX design. It would be like having a "eject engine block" button next to the "start car" button. One day you're going to hit it instead of the one you meant... Annoying / dangerous UI controls should be kept out of the way of the more common features.
teekert 9y ago
In all their wisdom Asus put the power button next to the delete button on my BX410 [0]. Too bad I can't pop that button. Setting it to do nothing is the first thing I do after installing Linux (which I do regularly). [0] https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites/global/products/APfLG1Rkk3fpEkfx/V1/images/main/img-keyboard.png https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites/global/products/APfLG1Rk...
- netsharc 9y ago
  But Windows also has that option: "When I press the power button: [Dropdown]", and one of the options is "Do nothing"...
- shoo 9y ago
  i remember a similar issue for desktop computers from ~15 years ago, and a keyboard with a helpful shutdown button. i think it was located a bit to the right of F12. from memory windows just started shutting down and there wasn't a way to interrupt it. pretty funny. not something you'd hit often, but possible to hammer accidentally if playing a full screen game that used a bunch of F1-F12 keys. after hitting this a few times while playing games i levered all of those extra helpful keys out.
  - teekert 9y ago
    Yes but I don't use Windows on said machine :) Edit: oops meant @netsharc
- boyce 9y ago
  I have a Lenovo Flex 10 - the volume rocker is close to the power button and feels the same. Accidentally leave the volume on full, open a youtube video or independent article, accidentally turn off the device. Wake our baby either with the noise or my subsequent swearing at the useless machine.
Grue3 9y ago
Firefox on Linux has a similar issue. A very common shortcut Ctrl-W is right next to Ctrl-Q, which completely closes the application, and there's no built-in way to turn it off! Which makes the software completely unusable unless you install a separate plugin that disables Ctrl-Q shortcut. It's really amazing that Mozilla doesn't think this is a bug.
- WorldMaker 9y ago
  For a similar solution to the one in the article here for your problem: Some "gamer keyboards" have an extra bump on W (similar to but often distinct from the home row bumps for J and F) for the importance of WASD to games. You could invest in one of those or emulate it with a bit of tape or something.
frankosaurus 9y ago
I typically use my ring finger to locate the left edge of F1 and press F2 with my middle finger. I have similar "by feel" approaches for F3 and F4.
edw 9y ago
This may be 90% cargo culting, 10% reality. One of my former co-workers desperately wanted to be perceived as an Excel ninja, and had heard that people who had achieved guru-level Excel mastery would remove their F1 keys, and so one day pried off her F1 key. Meanwhile the person in our office who probably could have written Minecraft in Excel and then built an Excel simulator in Excel Minecraft had a keyboard with a conspicuously intact F1 key. Same thing happens in programming circles. I am not exempt: All my MacBook keyboards get their caps lock keys remapped to control, in honor of my Apple II childhood and SunOS pizza box college heritage.
- sunkencity 9y ago
  well, emacs, or terminal usage in general on a mac with the control key not on edge of keyboard is extremely unergonomic. So yay to control in the right place.
  - alreadyhere 9y ago
    Yup, I remapped mine out of a reaction to RSI, not nostalgia. I never even thought of that angle before!
  - edw 9y ago
    I'm with you; you're talking to a more than twenty-five year user of Emacs here. I do try, however, to be no less circumspect of my own actions than I am of others'. Is saving my pinkie from cramping worth losing the ability to type on anyone else's keyboard? I'd say so, but there is a cost.
- ctrl-j 9y ago
  > All my MacBook keyboards get their caps lock keys remapped to control You must be an emacs heathen. Caps lock gets remapped to ESC.
  - tremendo 9y ago
    Control when held in combination with other keys, ESC when tapped by itself.
takk309 9y ago
Maybe it is my poor skills with a key board or the design of my keyboard but I hit F12 on accident more often than F1. I hate F1 with a passion but F12, which does a save as, is useful. I have never understood the hatred for caps lock. I use it all the time, probably press it 12 to 20 times a day. I also write a lot of reports with a pile of long acronyms that have to be all caps.
c3534l 9y ago
I'm surprised they don't tear out numlock, the bane of anyone who uses a 10-key.
Animats 9y ago
The real problem is slow help popup. Everybody wants to do help in a browser now, so pressing F1 probably means a slow browser launch. (Not sure about this; I use LibreOffice only.) Just fix Excel so that a second press of F1 makes the help screen go away, even if the browser is still launching.
- marvy 9y ago
  This is 99% of the way to a correct solution. But I think it would be better if pressing Escape would dismiss the help screen, rather than another press of F1, so that the few people who intent to use help don't accidentally dismiss it. But nitpicks aside, this is the correct solution, because it captures the core insight: the user should never fear pressing the wrong key. The ultimate irony in violating this rule is when you've conditioned your users that the most dangerous thing they can do is ask for help.
wruza 9y ago
Why not just stick a piece of folded paper or a toothpick at the top left corner to prevent F1 from being pressed?
jmgao 9y ago
This is also common among progamers, for similar reasons: https://i.ytimg.com/vi/glSiSoAounY/maxresdefault.jpg https://i.ytimg.com/vi/glSiSoAounY/maxresdefault.jpg
bash-j 9y ago
My HP work laptop has the home key next to a smaller backspace. Very frustrating.
piokuc 9y ago
I removed capslock from my keyboard whilst in a previous job cause I never needed it and, worse, kept hitting it instead of tab accidentally. Not using Excell, just coding on a Linux workstation.
StringyBob 9y ago
As a programmer without bios access to my work PC I removed the caps-lock key from my desktop keyboard. Now I use a MacBook Pro I've remapped it to be escape - which is doubly useful as escape doesn't exist as a physical key!
hxta98596 9y ago
Whoa, I briefly worked on a project related to this, over in Redmond, like 20 years ago (ya I'm an oldie). So weird to see this being talked about in 2017, based on an article from 2012!?! My background is in banking, here is some additional info on the F1 key thing in case anyone is interested in this random odd topic: The article is not exactly wrong but it's misleading (more on that later). Yes the F1 key opens the Excel Help Window. Removing the F1 key is NOT a common practice among bankers. The origin, or one of the origins, of removing the F1 key as seen in this article, comes from how banks used to train their new interns and first year employees to use Excel. The first few weeks on the job at a Wall St bank were spent in a little training course and the training course was allowed to have a bit more "fun" than the real more professional side of the job soon to come for these rookies. It was important to teach new banking analysts to be very efficient in Excel, this meant requiring them to memorize how to use the features of Excel without needing to look it up in the Help Menu AND training them to use keyboard shortcuts not the mouse, as keyboard shortcuts are faster. What this led to was some Wall St banks in their training class would have a little fun in training and tell new analysts/students to unplug the mouse from the computer (so you have to learn the keyboard shortcuts) and tell them to remove the F1 key (so they can't just look up how to do something that they should have memorized). Of course, these training aid tactics of silliness were only relevant for the first few weeks on the job. As new analysts would very soon start learning all about macros and VBA in the second half of the training course. The F1 key can easily and quickly be disabled in a number of ways in the VBA editor of Excel [1] and the idea that a bunch of bankers are removing the F1 key from the keyboard so they don't accidentally press it while reaching for F2 as this article describes is frankly ridiculous. Everyone uses macros and if F1 is disabled it is coded not physically removed, more than likely the help menu has been remapped to a multi-key shortcut just in case. To those comments who say this is banking and the computers are locked down to the point you cannot install other software or make changes to current software, this is partly true but this does not extend to blocking employees from macros and VBA in Excel. Using and writing Excel macros is crucial to the job and it is expected to be utilized. I have never seen a bank where access to macros and VBA is blocked. Now, it is possible to go to a bank and see someone has removed their F1 key from their keyboard. But it is not a common practice. IF you do see an F1 key removed it usually is because either: (1) the person removed the F1 key during training and then lost it or just never replaced it. (2) They are a brand new employee still in training (though less likely because training has changed in recent years and fun is not allowed anymore). (3) They were told incorrectly by a frat buddy or other "wall street bro" that removing the F1 is cool and sign of being an Excel ninja wizard. Reason 3 is sadly the most likely reason and if you read the article you will see they only spoke to and interviewed banking analysts, i.e. brand new rookie employees, not real investment bankers who have been on the job more than a few months and are out of the analyst phase. If I saw an F1 key removed at a bank keyboard I would judge that person a little as it would not reflect very well on an experienced banking employee - unless that person was on one of the tech teams in which case they can do what they want and many have their own keyboards (which are loud guys) and I wouldn't question their computer knowledge skills. The main reason not to permanently remove the F1 key after training is because other important finance software (like Bloomberg) needs the F1 key for other functions (in fact the bloomberg terminal official keyboard moved the help key to its own different button and its on a different row from the F1-F12 keys). Also, having worked at Microsoft very briefly I think I can say Microsoft is aware of the issue of the F1 key Help Menu bothering some users where it is located and how slow the Help Menu can be. Back in 90s they used to talk to their customers and power users all the time and it's likely they still do today, in addition the telemetry they snatch from everyone these days. They know, they aren't changing it. Lastly, while this was a mild case of an outdated and misleading article with a clickbait headline, business insider is usually much worse and I would just like to recommend that business insider be considered a fake news site and spam and blocked from Hacker News. Just a suggestion. Thank you.
ccarter84 9y ago
Definitely been there, haven't done it to the laptop yet because for some reason that seemed more tacky than on my full keyboard

158 points by raldi 9y ago

This should really be solved in software... However, I remember trying to map capslock to control on windows a few years back. It involved becoming an administrator and entering an opaque hexadecimal key into the registry. Simply popping off the key is probably easier. Oh, on linux it boils down to "setxkbmap -option ctrl:nocaps", which doesn't require root...

Lorkki 9y ago
An official keymap editor exists for Windows, but it's not terribly well supported, and I can see how using it would be a hassle especially if you're not technically inclined: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-hardware/custom-keyboard-layout-with-windows-10/b71c7905-1e30-4b0c-861b-253efd2b5a9e https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10...
- jabot 9y ago
  I did not know that tool. Also, apparently it cannot map control keys... https://superuser.com/questions/413384/how-to-remap-control-keys-in-ms-layout-creator https://superuser.com/questions/413384/how-to-remap-control-...
slezyr 9y ago
Or even better solution: programmable keyboards. It's sad that just few keyboards have opensource firmware and allow to remap keys. One of them Ergodox EZ ~$350 https://ergodox-ez.com/ https://ergodox-ez.com/
- jabot 9y ago
  I have an atreus keyboard, and I have changed the layout :-) However, 350$ seems like a lot of money for a problem that should really be solvable at no cost in software...
  - slezyr 9y ago
    The biggest problem with software (on OS side) is than you can't use your custom layout in BIOS, LiveCDs or when you need to type password if your hardware is encrypted. Another problem is games. I use dvorak and all games use qwerty bindings so you need either to remap keys for each game or start game with QWERTY layout. If you forgot to start it with qwerty you need to restart the game, which is was really frustrating for me. It's even more problematical with online games like League of legends and etc. I see no problem for this feature to be present on even cheapest keyboards. I picked ergodox just for an examle.
    - jabot 9y ago
      Fair point. In the context of the article we're talking about a highly specialized office environment, where bios/live boot environments etc. do not happen often. There, a software solution is useful and cheap. In the more general case, and for those people that do not mind carrying their own keyboard everywhere, you are right. Especially since a keyboard that expensive probably lasts for a long enough time...
- mannykannot 9y ago
  In at least one finance company I know of, alternative keyboards are not permitted without getting security's permission. They might not do a very thorough examination, but I can imagine they might disallow a programmable keyboard on the basis of it being too complex to analyze the risks.
cooper12 9y ago
On MacOS it Just Works (at least for modifier keys) :) https://i.imgur.com/Bt1X7Nq.png https://i.imgur.com/Bt1X7Nq.png
SwellJoe 9y ago
On Linux with Gnome you can use Tweak Tool. It's under Typing->Caps Lock Behavior.
dmitriid 9y ago
> This should really be solved in software And this software is called "Excel". This should really be solved in software called "Excel". As in: remove functionality from F1
- woodrowbarlow 9y ago
  the problem cited in the article is performance. a "help" dialog shouldn't take several seconds to open, it shouldn't take foreground control, and you shouldn't have to wait for it to finish opening in order to close it. and you definitely shouldn't have to move your hand to the mouse to close something that was opened by an accidental keystroke. if the view doesn't get obstructed and you could simply tap F1 a second time (or Esc) and instantly be back to what you were doing, i think the UX problem would be solved. in firefox, i sometimes hit F12 on accident -- but i can just tap it again to close the dev tools, even if it hasn't finished loading. that's decent UX.
  - dmitriid 9y ago
    No.. The problem cited in the article is: a common operation that is invoked hundreds of times a day is bound to F2. An uncommon operation that breaks the user's flow is bound to F1. Users keep hitting F1 by accident. The only proper and decent UX in this case is to remove the source of the error. You do that by removing the binding of F1
    - woodrowbarlow 9y ago
      > that breaks the user's flow this is the problem. and it breaks the user's flow because it obscures the work area and can't be instantly dismissed. there's nothing wrong with putting relatively uncommon actions next to common actions on the keyboard as long as the actions don't break the user's flow.
      - dmitriid 9y ago
        > as long as the actions don't break the user's flow. This. Yet you propose to keep the action that breaks the user flow even if it's often triggered by mistake ;) I propose to remove the action that breaks the user flow.
yread 9y ago
You could setup an AutoHotkey to "silence" it https://superuser.com/questions/291018/consume-keystroke-in-autohotkey-dont-let-it-propagate-to-other-apps https://superuser.com/questions/291018/consume-keystroke-in-...
LambdaComplex 9y ago
My keyboard (Ducky Shine 3) actually has a dip switch on the back that swaps capslock and control. Not sure if any other companies do that though
- joejev 9y ago
  Filco also has this.
WorldMaker 9y ago
SharpKeys [1] is the tool I've kept in my toolbelt to do this for several years now. (Though I swap capslock for an extra backspace or escape depending on mood and amount of Vim in my life at the time.) [1] https://github.com/randyrants/sharpkeys https://github.com/randyrants/sharpkeys

dingo_bat 9y ago

At least this is one problem new MacBook users won't have!

jerrre 9y ago
for me it's ⌘+W vs ⌘+Q in Firefox: the first closes the current tab, the second the whole browser which takes some time to restart. Solved it now with an add-on
- shangxiao 9y ago
  Which is why I thought that the hold-⌘-Q to close Chrome was a godsend! Apparently this is also a feature with Firefox: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/824072 https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/824072
- imeron 9y ago
  This was a long standing bug for Firefox but they fixed it a couple of months ago. (The bug was about Firefox not honoring the macOS's key remapping.)
- dredmorbius 9y ago
  All the worse if you're used to readline / emacs keybindings, where ^W is "delete word". Editing a Web form and suddenly having the entire tab disappear is less than gruntling.
  - kps 9y ago
    There are dozens of us! Firefox at least lets you set the shortcut key to Meta instead of Control.
- wazoox 9y ago
  There's a preference that asks for confirmation if there's more than one open tab.

g09980 9y ago

Not too different from me accidentally triggering so many undesired things with the MacBook Pro TouchBar. I previously had no idea how many interfaces respond to the Esc key, now I do.

stephengillie 9y ago

There are dozens of us. It's massively disrupting to the state of flow to miss a key by one, and suddenly another window pops up, but there's no text inside. It takes several seconds for the window to compose itself, and several more to close. I do keep the F1 key somewhere safe, to put back onto the keyboard, for the next keyboard user.

cm2187 9y ago
I do too. And the scroll lock and num lock too. And I added a sticker to let IT know that the keyboard isn't broken and shouldn't be replaced.
- chli 9y ago
  I came here to mention Scroll Lock which normally doesn't do much in Windows applications but I was utterly confused the other day when my Excel started behaving weirdly !
  - acheron 9y ago
    Well, now you know what Scroll Lock is for, heh. :) It's done that in spreadsheets since the early versions of Lotus 1-2-3 for MSDOS.
grecy 9y ago
ahhh, can't you just map it to something else? (nothing?)
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- if_by_whisky 9y ago
  Excel users don't think that way, I guess. Remapping keys requires a registry update on Windows, which many of my windows-at-work friends don't get access to. Even if they did, they might not trust themselves to make registry updates. Popping the key off is easy, secure, and effective.

Nzen 9y ago

tl;dr F1 is generally help . Excel's help is apparently slow to load and close. Hence, the interviewees removed the key to avoid pressing it, when they meant to press F2. It's disappointing but unsurprising they didn't just have windows (autohotkey?) map it to F2.

appleiigs 9y ago
In a corporate environment I cant install anything on my computer.
mywacaday 9y ago
Article says its a banking environment, nobody outside of desktop support will have admin access to their PC/Laptop. That includes developers/application support/server admins/DBAs etc. If you want an application installed that's not on an approved list request will likely go to IT security for review(Don't hold your breath). portableapps.com made life somewhat bearable. PS No Dropbox/Google Drive/Onedrive, No personal webmail and a heavily restricted proxy for all browsing.
- vog 9y ago
  > Article says its a banking environment, nobody outside of desktop support will have admin access to their PC/Laptop But then it should be even simpler: Have the desktop support team (or whoever manages all those PC/Laptops) solve it centrally, once and for all, for every computer in the company.
cm2187 9y ago
I am not aware of any F1 help screen that is of any use on windows.
- jackmott 9y ago
  Just tried it in visual studio. loads up a web browser. that is irresponsible.

ptero 9y ago

Why would not they remap F1 to something else, say another F2 if they so like it? The functionality has been at both Linux and Windows for a very long time.

bru 9y ago
Because popping the key is by far the simplest solution, especially if you won't miss it in any of your usual workflows. AFAIK remapping it will need Autohotkey or similar, and banks & funds aren't the environment the more welcoming to arbitrary binaries, even if free software.
GCU-Empiricist 9y ago
They are users, users too often think in terms of optimizing what they do, not the tools they use, or learning to optimize things they think are underlying and fixed.
DavidWoof 9y ago
AFAIK, Windows has never had a built-in way to remap keys. Sure, you can download third-party tools to do it, but that's often a dicey move in a corporate environment where you aren't allowed to install third-party software. I'm really surprised more keyboards can't do this kind of simple remapping themselves. I used to remap the keys on virtually every machine I worked on, but these days I just bring in my CODE keyboard which does some simple remapping itself (e.g., caps lock -> ctrl).
jerf 9y ago
In addition to what other people mention, it's generally a bad idea to take a sloppy input and try to autocorrect it, because it encourage bad habits that will really surprise you the next time the autocorrect doesn't work as you expect. This ranges from autocorrecting spelling, to keypresses, to UNIX commands, to all sorts of things. It's better to block or highlight (if relevant) the bad input than to try to correct it automatically. For one thing, if you encourage sloppy input, the brain automatically adjusts and will become even more sloppy; while this isn't necessarily a never-ending spiral it is still quite likely to lead somewhere worse than blocking bad input entirely. (Incidentally, if you want to fiddle with your keyboard but you don't want to go whole-hog with switching to an entirely different layout, you can use this principle to switch around two keys really quickly. If you want to try your Caps Lock as, say, CTRL, that's fine, but be sure to unmap the CTRL key itself. If you don't, it'll just be frustrating as you try to force yourself to remember, and realize three weeks later that Caps Lock is still mapped to CTRL but you haven't used it at all. If you do unmap the old key entirely, you'll find you've adjusted entirely in as little as 5 minutes, and it's only another 5 minutes to go back, if that's what you decide. You can iterate on these things much more easily than you might think.)

rubenbe 9y ago

I would guess that PCs in banks are quite locked down, maybe even making it impossible to remap keys. But everyone can pop some keys from his/her keyboard. Plus it's a much easier (and fun) office mod than messing around in the settings of all your applications ;)

mstade 9y ago
Correct – even for developers in DMZ networks have a hard time getting to install things they need to work. Many organizations have convoluted processes for requesting admin access to your machine. Even if you do get access it doesn't mean you necessarily can even download things, most have firewalls that block binaries from anything but "trusted" sources (basically white listed domains, so yeah – "trust".) In a few cases, monitoring on machines have raised red flags and I've had to explain after the fact why I've installed or run a particular piece of software, and in some cases got a proverbial wrist slap and things/access reset. It's all for good reasons I'm sure, but some processes and rules are so opaque and convoluted and arbitrary, plucking keys off a keyboard is much easier. Source: I've worked as a developer in mostly top tier banks since 2011.

shangxiao 9y ago

Huh! I've been considering remapping F1 in vim for a while, I might actually go ahead and use it for something quite common (I've already taken up F2-12 for other handy tasks).

superasn 9y ago

Windows help and Windows troubeshooter are among the two most useless things in the OS (and lately it's Cortana). It far easier and more relevant to just do a Google search than waste time with these things. Same goes for answers.microsoft.com, whenever i see that link on top og Google results I'm pretty sure I'll just waste 10 minutes of my life and then search for the same thing on Stackexchange and pray to god someone has answered there in the succinct SO way. God knows how much resources and man hours Microsoft puts into making these things.

pjmlp 9y ago
Those features are not made for us, rather for the majority of clueless users that save files in whatever directory happens to be the default one.
- Macha 9y ago
  Do they know what F1 is?
  - aluhut 9y ago
    They will when they find out what F2 does.
  - pjmlp 9y ago
    Many keyboards have "Help" written on it.
- virtualized 9y ago
  That's the type of user who would never read the help content even if it was good.
froindt 9y ago
I remember back in the days of 98 when in my experience, hitting F1 would trigger the help which would never load rapidly or successfully. My standard operating procedure was to do a hard shutdown. It was so frustrating. I was roughly 5-7 while using it. Maybe it wasn't that bad and I was simply impatient. Regardless, it's always been useless to me.

atesti 9y ago

I wish I could remove "F1" from Chrome: I'm in the middle of a lot of tabs, reading them after each other and accidentially pressing F1 instead of ESC and a new useless help tab obens on the far right. Luckily if I close it immediately without navigating, Chrome is clever enough to return me to the last tab

blockoperation 9y ago
If you're able to build Chromium yourself, here's a trivial patch which does just that (only tested on Linux): https://gist.github.com/blockoperation/5ec91d666e670e39584d2ed84efad049 https://gist.github.com/blockoperation/5ec91d666e670e39584d2...
raldi 9y ago
On what OS does Chrome do anything when you press F1 or Esc? On my Mac, neither seems to do anything.

hammock 9y ago

Also, don't ever accidentally create a circular reference...same thing.

jtraffic 9y ago

In my view, there are many insights like this to be had by physically studying product users a bit more. The startup community has built a strong habit of studying users before a new solution is adopted, but not as much after. The insights designers get from just watching someone use a product are always delightful. The idea is basically ethnography for design. (https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/book/the-encyclopedia-of-human-computer-interaction-2nd-ed/ethnography https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/book/the-encyc...) 'Desire lines' in parks are one example. Desire lines are the paths in the grass that get worn down because people use them even though the designer didn't plan for it.

1_2__4 9y ago
The cynic in me says most startup types would witness this behavior, snort derisively and say "they're not our target market".
- digi_owl 9y ago
  Or "you are doing/holding it wrong!!!". Damn it, i have had a prominent FOSS DE guy basically claim that users are idiots after studying the results of a usability test of their DE. For me, in the trenches, it is more that users find their own ways of doing things. And if it works for them it works for them, and we have no business correcting them.
  - Something1234 9y ago
    Who was this and what DE was he working on?
  - keksicus 9y ago
    What DE? You can't leave us hanging like that, we're not chads and this isn't Election2000.
ceejayoz 9y ago
Agreed. When I worked at a newspaper, my most valuable contributions by far were ones made after spending a day with a reporter, ad designer, etc. and talking with them about their daily routine.

nayuki 9y ago

It suffices to use KeyTweak for Windows, not physically modify the keyboard. For example, I used it to disable the Back/Forward buttons on my ThinkPad.

qorrect 9y ago
Yeah mangling the keyboard should be a last option , I'm guessing they're not aware that all the keys can be remapped.
- narag 9y ago
  Maybe they lack the permissions for installing applications. Intercepting keyboard is not exactly a human right :-)
- amelius 9y ago
  Mangling the keyboard is more gratifying >:)

dmitriid 9y ago

I call such things "this is what happens when developers and designers do not use their own products"

zokier 9y ago

When I was younger and played games, popping out the windows key was typical. At best triggering windows menu meant lost round, but more typically a crashed game or even crashed Windows. Even today I'm wary of task switching from a game, as it still doesn't seem to be entirely robust

keksicus 9y ago
I haven't hosed a windows session yet, and maybe just one game was crashy ever, while task switching for the last two decades. I ran Windows Server though typically.
- mikejmoffitt 9y ago
  I remember this not-so-fondly. This wouldn't be a problem for a game that is composited alongside the desktop in a "Windowed" mode, but for a full-screen application it is an "exclusive" application. The Source engine handles this context switch absolutely terribly. Task-switching out of Team Fortress 2 is a stuttery mess, where for around ten seconds it'll just loop the tiny audio buffer it last filled on top of a black screen before anything is usable again.

meri_dian 9y ago

There's a financial modeling in Excel competition held each year that awards a golden keyboard without an F1 key to the winner.

youdontknowtho 9y ago
That's awesome.
oxguy3 9y ago
I guess there's a niche for everything: https://www.modeloff.com/modeloff-golden-keyboard/ https://www.modeloff.com/modeloff-golden-keyboard/ (slightly larger photo of the golden keyboard: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CULeDw8XIAAo0-U.png https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CULeDw8XIAAo0-U.png )

pX0r 9y ago

Press F1 for Hell

PascLeRasc 9y ago

This Planet Money episode is a must-listen for Excel fans: http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/25/389027988/episode-606-spreadsheets http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/25/389027988/episo...

jasonkester 9y ago

Back in my Engineer days, where I'd spend much of my time writing technical reports, I'd always remove the Insert key from my keyboard. It's sitting there in that block of six keys that you use all the time when editing text (home, end, page up/down, delete), and it's a little timebomb. You would invariably hit it by accident at some point and change your editor into "overwrite all my stuff" mode. It would usually take a minute or two of ruining your document before you realized what was happening and spent the next several minutes repairing the damage. I would go years at a time without ever hitting that key on purpose, so I just kept it in a drawer, in case it ever needed using. Now, as a developer, there's an Insert in tons of useful keyboard combos, so it needs to stay there. And laptops have ruined that old useful six-key block so it's a lot rarer to hit it by accident. But it had no business being there. Fifteen years later, I'm still not a friend of that key.

emodendroket 9y ago
I can't think of one time I've ever intentionally used the overwrite functionality either.
- deong 9y ago
  I vaguely recall using it a few times back in the day to edit things like fixed-format columnar text files. Now that sort of thing is easier with years worth of accumulated knowledge of tools, but I wasn't born with that knowledge.
  - rrobukef 9y ago
    Until you hit backspace to correct something...
- raldi 9y ago
  You've never made ASCII art?
- randylahey 9y ago
  Really? I use it frequently while programming in Vim. Definitely one of my top ten operations.

jenkstom 9y ago

Business Insider has annoying anti-adblocker popups. Is there some way to block websites that do this? I tried living without adblocker for a while, but I started getting some very not safe for work ads from dhgate all over the place. Just because I buy electronics doesn't mean I want ads for lingerie...

S_A_P 9y ago
Agreed. I actually got so irritated with this site, that I have added the simple blocker add in to chrome to block this site. I refuse to support them anymore. I dont care if they have something I want to read, Im not visiting that site ever again...
oxguy3 9y ago
I have a little stylesheet installed on my browser that I use for fixing random annoyances on various websites, and my favorite feature in it is adding "text-decoration: line-through" to links that point to certain sites such as Business Insider. That way, I still have the option to visit the site, but I get a strong visual indicator to avoid it. My stylesheet is here; you can install it with the Stylish browser extension: https://gist.github.com/oxguy3/3338da5c38348c2a6e72 https://gist.github.com/oxguy3/3338da5c38348c2a6e72
zeveb 9y ago
It's displaying fine with NoScript.
pwg 9y ago
> Business Insider has annoying anti-adblocker popups. Is there some way to block websites that do this? With NoScript blocking their javascript from even running, there's no annoying anti-adblocker popup. The article opened just fine and was fully readable.

hateful 9y ago

F2 is also rename on a host of Windows applications, including Windows Explorer. I've popped it off more than once but couldn't get used to not hitting F3 instead of F2. What I ended up doing was to rename Windows Help (winhlp32.exe at the time) to something else then copy and rename cmd.exe (or command.com, depending on how far back) to "winhlp32.exe". Now when I pressed F1 it would open a command window, much more useful and less intrusive if hit accidentally.

frenchman_in_ny 9y ago

I work in the field - years ago I had someone create a small program called "TurnOffF1" that runs silently in the background. It captures any F1 keypush in Excel only & blocks the Help popup. Wish I had the source code for the program.

digi_owl 9y ago
Autohotkey perhaps?

glaberficken 9y ago

OMG! This is genius!, how have i never thought of this before! I bet the people removing caps lock, scroll lock, insert etc are doing it because of the "cleaning ladies"! Not because they accidentally hit the keys. But because in most offices, keyboards are swiped clean daily by cleaning crews and when you arrive each morning you find an assortment of those keys toggled on or off. (I have even locked my Windows account on occasion due to not noticing a combination of Caps Lock / Num Lock toggled on/off in the morning)

RankingMember 9y ago
What country are you operating out of? I've never heard of cleaning people doing this in offices in the US.
- jsjohnst 9y ago
  Every Silicon Valley, NYC, and Denver office I’ve worked in had cleaning crews who dusted desks / keyboards at least weekly, if not more often. Source: I’ve been in the office working when they came through.
  - RankingMember 9y ago
    Weird, guess they don't care about us developers in the mid-atlantic region.
- glaberficken 9y ago
  I'm in Portugal. When I worked in London (UK) it was the same.
Newtopian 9y ago
I lock my keyboard away when I leave... I'll sleep better knowing nobody made it off with my 200$ mechanical clacker. As a side bonus I don't get mystery things locked when I arrive the next morning.

IanDrake 9y ago

New product idea: a physical key guard. A small plastic cage that slips over a key and doesn't allow it to be pushed by accident, but still allows it to be pushed with extra force. Kinda like the safety on a glock.

ahakki 9y ago
What safety on a Glock? I was of the impression that they had no external safety features.
- IanDrake 9y ago
  A Glock safety doesn't prevent you from pulling the trigger, but it requires you to pull it correctly which can reduce (but not eliminates) accidents. I believe earlier versions had an initial heavy trigger that lightened once it was past the "safety" point. I don't know first hand, this was just from a passing discussion with a police officer.

philipov 9y ago

I don't use Excel very often and I need my F1 key for other tools, but I've had capslock removed for years.

13of40 9y ago
That's brilliant - I never thought of that.
DerfNet 9y ago
I use a Model M and remap capslock to super/windows button. I'm so used to it I remap it on laptops as well. Have never come across an instance to actually use all caps.
ashark 9y ago
Why? It makes a great "ctrl".
- philipov 9y ago
  I use my pinky to press shift and tab already. I press ctrl with the side of my hand. This way I can press both ctrl and shift at the same time, which is important for RTS and FPS games. Maybe I should map it to backspace like was suggested by WorldMaker.
  - ashark 9y ago
    Huh, must be keyboard size/shape differences but palm-pressing "fn" on my keyboard (where "ctrl" would be on a normal keyboard) while hitting "shift" with my pinkie is impossible without mashing other keys around them, and is really uncomfortable. End up pressing "shift" with the side of my first knuckle, that finger's so contorted. I use pinkie + ring when I hit two modifiers on that side, though that does mean I take a finger off "WASD", for gaming purposes. It'd be easier to train myself to hit shift+caps (as a ctrl) with just my pinkie than to do the palm + pinkie method, I think. Again, probably a hardware difference.
WorldMaker 9y ago

youdontknowtho 9y ago

I was thinking about that the other day. I recently re-watched that Joel Spolsky video "You suck at Excel". F2 for cell edit makes it super easy to hit F1...which brings up help...which you can't just hit escape to dismiss. I'm actually a better than average typist, but yeah...that happens to me more than I like.

myrandomcomment 9y ago

Okay for those that do not get it. 1. It’s a bank. 2. Banks lock down their computers. 3. So you cannot install other software to fix this in software. 4. You do not have access to the system low enough to rename / remove the winhelp.exe crap. 5. No 3rd party hardware is allowed in the bank. So no bringing your own keyboard. All the time we get into this threads on HN where the techie goes well you could just...bla bla bla. In the real would of corporate IT everything you say is a non-starter.

lkbm 9y ago
Oh wow, I never even thought of messing with winhelp.exe. Luckily, I was able to remap F1 at my job, so it was fine. :-)
emodendroket 9y ago
Besides all that... it seems like this is an easier fix. Don't a lot of computer gamers remove their Windows keys for similar reasons?
- devopsproject 9y ago
  yes. you can also ahk it or get a keyboard with a winkey kill switch
turblety 9y ago
Exactly this. Could not have said it better myself. Even trying to sort this stuff out properly could cost your department millions of pounds due to bureaucracy and incompetent management.
mfoy_ 9y ago
The greater point is that if you put something really useful next to something really annoying it will exacerbate the issue. F1 should not be so bad, and it should not be so close to F2. Even just leaving alone how bad, and utterly useless, the help dialogues in Windows are it's just terrible UX design. It would be like having a "eject engine block" button next to the "start car" button. One day you're going to hit it instead of the one you meant... Annoying / dangerous UI controls should be kept out of the way of the more common features.

teekert 9y ago

In all their wisdom Asus put the power button next to the delete button on my BX410 [0]. Too bad I can't pop that button. Setting it to do nothing is the first thing I do after installing Linux (which I do regularly). [0] https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites/global/products/APfLG1Rkk3fpEkfx/V1/images/main/img-keyboard.png https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites/global/products/APfLG1Rk...

netsharc 9y ago
But Windows also has that option: "When I press the power button: [Dropdown]", and one of the options is "Do nothing"...
shoo 9y ago
i remember a similar issue for desktop computers from ~15 years ago, and a keyboard with a helpful shutdown button. i think it was located a bit to the right of F12. from memory windows just started shutting down and there wasn't a way to interrupt it. pretty funny. not something you'd hit often, but possible to hammer accidentally if playing a full screen game that used a bunch of F1-F12 keys. after hitting this a few times while playing games i levered all of those extra helpful keys out.
- teekert 9y ago
  Yes but I don't use Windows on said machine :) Edit: oops meant @netsharc
boyce 9y ago
I have a Lenovo Flex 10 - the volume rocker is close to the power button and feels the same. Accidentally leave the volume on full, open a youtube video or independent article, accidentally turn off the device. Wake our baby either with the noise or my subsequent swearing at the useless machine.

Grue3 9y ago

Firefox on Linux has a similar issue. A very common shortcut Ctrl-W is right next to Ctrl-Q, which completely closes the application, and there's no built-in way to turn it off! Which makes the software completely unusable unless you install a separate plugin that disables Ctrl-Q shortcut. It's really amazing that Mozilla doesn't think this is a bug.

WorldMaker 9y ago
For a similar solution to the one in the article here for your problem: Some "gamer keyboards" have an extra bump on W (similar to but often distinct from the home row bumps for J and F) for the importance of WASD to games. You could invest in one of those or emulate it with a bit of tape or something.

frankosaurus 9y ago

I typically use my ring finger to locate the left edge of F1 and press F2 with my middle finger. I have similar "by feel" approaches for F3 and F4.

edw 9y ago

This may be 90% cargo culting, 10% reality. One of my former co-workers desperately wanted to be perceived as an Excel ninja, and had heard that people who had achieved guru-level Excel mastery would remove their F1 keys, and so one day pried off her F1 key. Meanwhile the person in our office who probably could have written Minecraft in Excel and then built an Excel simulator in Excel Minecraft had a keyboard with a conspicuously intact F1 key. Same thing happens in programming circles. I am not exempt: All my MacBook keyboards get their caps lock keys remapped to control, in honor of my Apple II childhood and SunOS pizza box college heritage.

sunkencity 9y ago
well, emacs, or terminal usage in general on a mac with the control key not on edge of keyboard is extremely unergonomic. So yay to control in the right place.
- alreadyhere 9y ago
  Yup, I remapped mine out of a reaction to RSI, not nostalgia. I never even thought of that angle before!
- edw 9y ago
  I'm with you; you're talking to a more than twenty-five year user of Emacs here. I do try, however, to be no less circumspect of my own actions than I am of others'. Is saving my pinkie from cramping worth losing the ability to type on anyone else's keyboard? I'd say so, but there is a cost.
ctrl-j 9y ago
> All my MacBook keyboards get their caps lock keys remapped to control You must be an emacs heathen. Caps lock gets remapped to ESC.
- tremendo 9y ago
  Control when held in combination with other keys, ESC when tapped by itself.

takk309 9y ago

Maybe it is my poor skills with a key board or the design of my keyboard but I hit F12 on accident more often than F1. I hate F1 with a passion but F12, which does a save as, is useful. I have never understood the hatred for caps lock. I use it all the time, probably press it 12 to 20 times a day. I also write a lot of reports with a pile of long acronyms that have to be all caps.

c3534l 9y ago

I'm surprised they don't tear out numlock, the bane of anyone who uses a 10-key.

Animats 9y ago

The real problem is slow help popup. Everybody wants to do help in a browser now, so pressing F1 probably means a slow browser launch. (Not sure about this; I use LibreOffice only.) Just fix Excel so that a second press of F1 makes the help screen go away, even if the browser is still launching.

marvy 9y ago
This is 99% of the way to a correct solution. But I think it would be better if pressing Escape would dismiss the help screen, rather than another press of F1, so that the few people who intent to use help don't accidentally dismiss it. But nitpicks aside, this is the correct solution, because it captures the core insight: the user should never fear pressing the wrong key. The ultimate irony in violating this rule is when you've conditioned your users that the most dangerous thing they can do is ask for help.

wruza 9y ago

Why not just stick a piece of folded paper or a toothpick at the top left corner to prevent F1 from being pressed?

jmgao 9y ago

This is also common among progamers, for similar reasons: https://i.ytimg.com/vi/glSiSoAounY/maxresdefault.jpg https://i.ytimg.com/vi/glSiSoAounY/maxresdefault.jpg

bash-j 9y ago

My HP work laptop has the home key next to a smaller backspace. Very frustrating.

piokuc 9y ago

I removed capslock from my keyboard whilst in a previous job cause I never needed it and, worse, kept hitting it instead of tab accidentally. Not using Excell, just coding on a Linux workstation.

StringyBob 9y ago

As a programmer without bios access to my work PC I removed the caps-lock key from my desktop keyboard. Now I use a MacBook Pro I've remapped it to be escape - which is doubly useful as escape doesn't exist as a physical key!

hxta98596 9y ago

Whoa, I briefly worked on a project related to this, over in Redmond, like 20 years ago (ya I'm an oldie). So weird to see this being talked about in 2017, based on an article from 2012!?! My background is in banking, here is some additional info on the F1 key thing in case anyone is interested in this random odd topic: The article is not exactly wrong but it's misleading (more on that later). Yes the F1 key opens the Excel Help Window. Removing the F1 key is NOT a common practice among bankers. The origin, or one of the origins, of removing the F1 key as seen in this article, comes from how banks used to train their new interns and first year employees to use Excel. The first few weeks on the job at a Wall St bank were spent in a little training course and the training course was allowed to have a bit more "fun" than the real more professional side of the job soon to come for these rookies. It was important to teach new banking analysts to be very efficient in Excel, this meant requiring them to memorize how to use the features of Excel without needing to look it up in the Help Menu AND training them to use keyboard shortcuts not the mouse, as keyboard shortcuts are faster. What this led to was some Wall St banks in their training class would have a little fun in training and tell new analysts/students to unplug the mouse from the computer (so you have to learn the keyboard shortcuts) and tell them to remove the F1 key (so they can't just look up how to do something that they should have memorized). Of course, these training aid tactics of silliness were only relevant for the first few weeks on the job. As new analysts would very soon start learning all about macros and VBA in the second half of the training course. The F1 key can easily and quickly be disabled in a number of ways in the VBA editor of Excel [1] and the idea that a bunch of bankers are removing the F1 key from the keyboard so they don't accidentally press it while reaching for F2 as this article describes is frankly ridiculous. Everyone uses macros and if F1 is disabled it is coded not physically removed, more than likely the help menu has been remapped to a multi-key shortcut just in case. To those comments who say this is banking and the computers are locked down to the point you cannot install other software or make changes to current software, this is partly true but this does not extend to blocking employees from macros and VBA in Excel. Using and writing Excel macros is crucial to the job and it is expected to be utilized. I have never seen a bank where access to macros and VBA is blocked. Now, it is possible to go to a bank and see someone has removed their F1 key from their keyboard. But it is not a common practice. IF you do see an F1 key removed it usually is because either: (1) the person removed the F1 key during training and then lost it or just never replaced it. (2) They are a brand new employee still in training (though less likely because training has changed in recent years and fun is not allowed anymore). (3) They were told incorrectly by a frat buddy or other "wall street bro" that removing the F1 is cool and sign of being an Excel ninja wizard. Reason 3 is sadly the most likely reason and if you read the article you will see they only spoke to and interviewed banking analysts, i.e. brand new rookie employees, not real investment bankers who have been on the job more than a few months and are out of the analyst phase. If I saw an F1 key removed at a bank keyboard I would judge that person a little as it would not reflect very well on an experienced banking employee - unless that person was on one of the tech teams in which case they can do what they want and many have their own keyboards (which are loud guys) and I wouldn't question their computer knowledge skills. The main reason not to permanently remove the F1 key after training is because other important finance software (like Bloomberg) needs the F1 key for other functions (in fact the bloomberg terminal official keyboard moved the help key to its own different button and its on a different row from the F1-F12 keys). Also, having worked at Microsoft very briefly I think I can say Microsoft is aware of the issue of the F1 key Help Menu bothering some users where it is located and how slow the Help Menu can be. Back in 90s they used to talk to their customers and power users all the time and it's likely they still do today, in addition the telemetry they snatch from everyone these days. They know, they aren't changing it. Lastly, while this was a mild case of an outdated and misleading article with a clickbait headline, business insider is usually much worse and I would just like to recommend that business insider be considered a fake news site and spam and blocked from Hacker News. Just a suggestion. Thank you.

ccarter84 9y ago

Definitely been there, haven't done it to the laptop yet because for some reason that seemed more tacky than on my full keyboard