6 ms·

> "the two worst things about the original Touch Bar MBPs - the lack of a physical Escape key, and the full-size left and right arrow keys." The "butterfly mec

> "the two worst things about the original Touch Bar MBPs - the lack of a physical Escape key, and the full-size left and right arrow keys." The "butterfly mechanism" keyboards are awful, unreliable, and get worse with time, so I'm very glad to see them go. Likewise, the return of the physical Escape key is very welcome. But honestly, the design of the arrow keys has never bothered me in the slightest. If anything, the present configuration is slightly better because it's aesthetically cleaner and gives you a larger surface to hit the left and right arrows.

stetrain 7y ago
But when not looking at the keyboard, having full height left and right arrow keys makes them feel just like the nearby Option and ? keys. Having a distinct arrow-key-group shape makes them easier to locate by touch.
- dpkonofa 7y ago
  You can't feel the break in between the up/down arrow keys by touch?
  - geerlingguy 7y ago
    It's not always easy. If I need to quickly move to the arrow keys (I touch type, so no looking!), I have about 80-85% success finding the right key on the first press... with the inverted-T layout, that's about 99%. There's something weird about the way my brain handles the key being the same size as the option key next to it, and the fact that the tops of all those keys are exactly the same.
    - nicpottier 7y ago
      If you touch type then learn the OS X shortcuts of CTRL-B, CTRL-F, CTRL-P, CTRL-N, far more efficient than moving your hand over to the arrow keys and works in (virtually) all places you are editing text.
      - hibbelig 7y ago
        It doesn’t work in the menus for example. The cursor keys are still important.
        emidln 7y ago
        I don't think I have anything special configured for my Mojave setup and these seem to work for me. In particular, I use Ctrl + Shift + F2 (on my external keyboard) to focus the menubar and then I can use Ctrl-b and Ctrl-f to navigate back (left) and forward (right) between menus, Enter to select a menu, and then Ctrl-n or Ctrl-p to navigate next/previous entries in the menu, with Enter again to select.
        hibbelig 7y ago
        Interesting! I always use Cmd-Shift-/, which focuses the search field in the help menu, and Ctrl-b and Ctrl-f do not escape from there. But focusing the menu bar with Ctrl-F2 does indeed allow me to use Ctrl-f and Ctrl-b. And after hitting Return to open a menu, I can use Ctrl-n and Ctrl-p to navigate down and up. Interesting. I will have to try more, but I still think that there are places in macOS where Ctrl-b and Ctrl-f do not work, and I have to use the arrow keys, instead.
  - brianpan 7y ago
    When you're searching for the arrow keys, the break is one thin line only in the middle of one key. When the keys are half height, there is are two large gaps to find. The difference is a few mm vs almost a cm and 3 targets to find vs one.
munificent 7y ago
I hate the full-size left and right arrow keys because it means I can't easily use my sense of touch to find the arrow keys. I mistype them all the time now, even after months of use. That was never a problem with the previous inverted-T design.
- sgustard 7y ago
  Many PC laptop keyboards have full-size keys for all four arrows. Tiny keys for a feature I use so frequently is user-hostile, whether it's 2 or 4 of them.
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    They also usually have an awful-looking extra row just for the arrow keys. And FWIW, I find that the inverted-T arrangement is even easier to quickly find by touch than full-height arrow keys.
  - hibbelig 7y ago
    It’s not about the size for me. Sure the full height inverted T is easy to use. The half height inverted T also works. But the one that isn’t inverted T is difficult.
- tbabb 7y ago
  Seconded. I frequently mistype L/R as up/down, and this is infuriating when striking 'command' + arrow to go to the beginning/end of the line (an extremely common op for me), and instead going to the top/bottom of the file, completely losing my place. (Of course that particular problem would be less of an issue if the keyboard had home/end/pgUp/pgDn, which I'm still sore about, years after they got rid of them). Arrow keys are so important I might almost want them all full size, in a "+" configuration.
  - mbreese 7y ago
    I wonder -- is this for a 13" or 15" laptop? I'm curious because after this thread I was checking on how I tend to find the arrow keys. I have a 13" model and finding the edge of the computer itself seems to help me find the appropriate keys.
lilyball 7y ago
The "butterfly mechanism" keyboards never bothered me. I actually like the feel of my MBP's keyboard. Likewise the software Escape key never bothered me. But honestly, the design of the arrow keys is super important. With the full-height left/right keys it's hard to quickly find the arrow keys by feel. The new (old) arrow key design is honestly what I'm most interested in with this computer after the 16" screen.
- wilg 7y ago
  How is it hard? They're at the bottom right so you can find them by feel pretty quickly.
  - hibbelig 7y ago
    The lady and right keys are easy. But up and down are difficult. With the half height left and right keys it’s easier to find the up and down keys. The down key is between left and right and the up key is an island (or a peninsula at least). Does that make sense? I bought the last half height model when I upgraded my MBP 13”.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - wilg 7y ago
      I can find the up and down easily because they are shaped differently. They are the only keys split horizontally, and the connecting edges are curved inward unlike the other keys. I find them easy to feel fore. I am glad the new keyboard solves this problem for others though, I don't think the full-height left/right keys are particularly better.
- DoofusOfDeath 7y ago
  I hadn't given it much thought until your post, but on my 2017 13" MBP, here's how I seem to do it: 1. Put my right hand in approximately the correct location. 2. With my middle finger, find the space between the up/down keys. 3. Now my right hand's index finger is above the "left" key, and my right hand's ring finger is above the "right" key.
masukomi 7y ago
are you a touch typist? because lifting your hand, and repositioning it onto a grid of undifferentiated keys is MUCH harder when you can't feel the shape of the inverted T and can't see it (because you're not looking at the keyboard or because you're visually impaired).
- lolive 7y ago
  Remapping CapsLock+hjkl to arrows IS productive.(oh, and CapsLock+Space to Enter, too!)
- savoytruffle 7y ago
  Remember when Apple's keys had a dot on the D and K instead of a line on F and J?

stetrain 7y ago

But when not looking at the keyboard, having full height left and right arrow keys makes them feel just like the nearby Option and ? keys. Having a distinct arrow-key-group shape makes them easier to locate by touch.

dpkonofa 7y ago
You can't feel the break in between the up/down arrow keys by touch?
- geerlingguy 7y ago
  It's not always easy. If I need to quickly move to the arrow keys (I touch type, so no looking!), I have about 80-85% success finding the right key on the first press... with the inverted-T layout, that's about 99%. There's something weird about the way my brain handles the key being the same size as the option key next to it, and the fact that the tops of all those keys are exactly the same.
  - nicpottier 7y ago
    If you touch type then learn the OS X shortcuts of CTRL-B, CTRL-F, CTRL-P, CTRL-N, far more efficient than moving your hand over to the arrow keys and works in (virtually) all places you are editing text.
    - hibbelig 7y ago
      It doesn’t work in the menus for example. The cursor keys are still important.
      - emidln 7y ago
        I don't think I have anything special configured for my Mojave setup and these seem to work for me. In particular, I use Ctrl + Shift + F2 (on my external keyboard) to focus the menubar and then I can use Ctrl-b and Ctrl-f to navigate back (left) and forward (right) between menus, Enter to select a menu, and then Ctrl-n or Ctrl-p to navigate next/previous entries in the menu, with Enter again to select.
        hibbelig 7y ago
        Interesting! I always use Cmd-Shift-/, which focuses the search field in the help menu, and Ctrl-b and Ctrl-f do not escape from there. But focusing the menu bar with Ctrl-F2 does indeed allow me to use Ctrl-f and Ctrl-b. And after hitting Return to open a menu, I can use Ctrl-n and Ctrl-p to navigate down and up. Interesting. I will have to try more, but I still think that there are places in macOS where Ctrl-b and Ctrl-f do not work, and I have to use the arrow keys, instead.
- brianpan 7y ago
  When you're searching for the arrow keys, the break is one thin line only in the middle of one key. When the keys are half height, there is are two large gaps to find. The difference is a few mm vs almost a cm and 3 targets to find vs one.

munificent 7y ago

I hate the full-size left and right arrow keys because it means I can't easily use my sense of touch to find the arrow keys. I mistype them all the time now, even after months of use. That was never a problem with the previous inverted-T design.

sgustard 7y ago
Many PC laptop keyboards have full-size keys for all four arrows. Tiny keys for a feature I use so frequently is user-hostile, whether it's 2 or 4 of them.
- saagarjha 7y ago
  They also usually have an awful-looking extra row just for the arrow keys. And FWIW, I find that the inverted-T arrangement is even easier to quickly find by touch than full-height arrow keys.
- hibbelig 7y ago
  It’s not about the size for me. Sure the full height inverted T is easy to use. The half height inverted T also works. But the one that isn’t inverted T is difficult.
tbabb 7y ago
Seconded. I frequently mistype L/R as up/down, and this is infuriating when striking 'command' + arrow to go to the beginning/end of the line (an extremely common op for me), and instead going to the top/bottom of the file, completely losing my place. (Of course that particular problem would be less of an issue if the keyboard had home/end/pgUp/pgDn, which I'm still sore about, years after they got rid of them). Arrow keys are so important I might almost want them all full size, in a "+" configuration.
- mbreese 7y ago
  I wonder -- is this for a 13" or 15" laptop? I'm curious because after this thread I was checking on how I tend to find the arrow keys. I have a 13" model and finding the edge of the computer itself seems to help me find the appropriate keys.

lilyball 7y ago

The "butterfly mechanism" keyboards never bothered me. I actually like the feel of my MBP's keyboard. Likewise the software Escape key never bothered me. But honestly, the design of the arrow keys is super important. With the full-height left/right keys it's hard to quickly find the arrow keys by feel. The new (old) arrow key design is honestly what I'm most interested in with this computer after the 16" screen.

wilg 7y ago
How is it hard? They're at the bottom right so you can find them by feel pretty quickly.
- hibbelig 7y ago
  The lady and right keys are easy. But up and down are difficult. With the half height left and right keys it’s easier to find the up and down keys. The down key is between left and right and the up key is an island (or a peninsula at least). Does that make sense? I bought the last half height model when I upgraded my MBP 13”.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - wilg 7y ago
    I can find the up and down easily because they are shaped differently. They are the only keys split horizontally, and the connecting edges are curved inward unlike the other keys. I find them easy to feel fore. I am glad the new keyboard solves this problem for others though, I don't think the full-height left/right keys are particularly better.
DoofusOfDeath 7y ago
I hadn't given it much thought until your post, but on my 2017 13" MBP, here's how I seem to do it: 1. Put my right hand in approximately the correct location. 2. With my middle finger, find the space between the up/down keys. 3. Now my right hand's index finger is above the "left" key, and my right hand's ring finger is above the "right" key.

masukomi 7y ago

are you a touch typist? because lifting your hand, and repositioning it onto a grid of undifferentiated keys is MUCH harder when you can't feel the shape of the inverted T and can't see it (because you're not looking at the keyboard or because you're visually impaired).

lolive 7y ago
Remapping CapsLock+hjkl to arrows IS productive.(oh, and CapsLock+Space to Enter, too!)
savoytruffle 7y ago
Remember when Apple's keys had a dot on the D and K instead of a line on F and J?