6 ms·

Lol. I came here to say the only thing that matters is that copy and paste in Linux is 'cntrl+shift+c'. You can try changing it, but your still fucked in most

Lol. I came here to say the only thing that matters is that copy and paste in Linux is 'cntrl+shift+c'. You can try changing it, but your still fucked in most terminals, and then you end up with two key combos depending on context. It's a nightmare, and I'm really glad you have the top comment. Clearly I'm not alone.

howdydoo 5y ago
Are there any apps other than terminals that don't use ctrl-c? I can forgive that in a terminal app because it conflicts with SIGINT, but it would be very weird if a normal app like vscode did it differently.
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  Not really no. It seems to be only terminals. Mind you, Mac has a similar annoyance with its command-C/V. If you work with Linux (+BSD) , Windows and Mac every day, as I do, be prepared to be frustrated a LOT. I'd love if keyboards just had dedicated keys for this. It's used enough to warrant them (much more than other obscure functions like SysRq that do get their own key, or Apple's 19 function keys). I guess this is because I'm the DOS single task days there wasn't much of a need for copying and pasting.
- medo-bear 5y ago
  alt+w is ctrl+c in emacs. moreover you can enable emacs-like key bindings in most terminals so alt+w can work there too without conflict
- somenewaccount1 5y ago
  You would think, but I'm a sys admin and 1) live in the terminal. 2) copy and paste to/from the terminal often 3) do not like accidentally cancelling a command when I just meant to copy something.
xedrac 5y ago
Why bother implementing ctrl+c and ctrl+v in Linux when highlighting text copies it, and middle click pastes it? Ctrl+c feels like the dark ages in comparison.
- mindwok 5y ago
  The biggest pain with this is when you want to highlight some other text to paste over. For example I use the keyboard method for copying urls and pasting into my address bar, otherwise when you select all on the address bar you copy that instead.
  - db48x 5y ago
    At least in Firefox you don’t need to clear out the urlbar before pasting into it; what you paste replaces whatever is there. Dunno about Chrome.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  I usually use middle paste on a desktop mouse but keyboard paste on a touchpad device. As for copying on highlight it depends how you manage your windows, if you use a traditional floating WM and typically click windows to select them you end up with a lot of single character copies messing with your clipboard. Doubly so in the touchpad case again. Or if you like to highlight to bulk delete/replace or if you like to highlight to simply highlight the section on your terminal as you read a manpage or whatever in another window or probably more use cases that didn't immediately come to mind. Point being it's more about use case matching than one option being the dark ages and another being The One Right Way™. Layer on that some like using clipboard history and others just want a single parking space and it gets even more blurry.
- tigerInATurvy 5y ago
  I'm one of those people who highlights lines as I read them to help me keep focus. Plus, I'd rather have explicit copying via a specific action than something that just happens automatically on highlight.
- commoner 5y ago
dopidopHN 5y ago
I developed the utterly useless capacity to switch between Azerty / QWERTY and OS X/Debian/Win pretty seamlessly. I will make a mistake, look à what I’m currently using a switch the layout internally. I really wish I did not have to do that
pkulak 5y ago
That doesn't fly with me. I just use Alacritty and re-bind the keys so I can still use ctrl-c and v: https://github.com/pkulak/dotfiles/blob/master/.config/alacritty/alacritty.yml https://github.com/pkulak/dotfiles/blob/master/.config/alacr...
- somenewaccount1 5y ago
  That was actually what I ended up doing too.....but then I miss having tabs and go back to the system terminal, and Allacrity explicitly doesn't want tabs. Argh. It's all so anoying.
  - opan 5y ago
    Why not use tmux for tabbing?
  - pkulak 5y ago
    Yeah, I use my window manager for the tabs. They are very necessary, but I like it better when the WM does it instead of every app. You'd be surprised how often you want to have your browser and terminal tabbed together in the same window once it's an option. Plus, you don't have to remember ever app's tabbing hotkeys.
ohazi 5y ago
For various reasons, most Linux applications try not to use the Super (Windows) key for anything by default, which makes it a good candidate for use as a custom modifier key for whatever you want. For example, users of tiling window managers often use Super+... for interacting with their desktop (open a terminal, open a launcher, switch workspaces, swap windows, etc.). There's nothing stopping you from deciding to use Super+c/v as copy/paste instead of Ctrl+c/v or Ctrl+Shift+c/v. Apple doesn't use Ctrl+c/v either... they use Command, so the conflict you're referring to doesn't exist there either.
- somenewaccount1 5y ago
  Except that key binding for copy and paste are application specific and not always configurable, so indeed Linux echo system does actually stop you from making that sorta mod.
nerdponx 5y ago
I think MacOS got something right by using its Command key for "desktop-wide" shortcuts that aren't specific to one application, (kind of) leaving Ctrl and Alt for applications. I generally try to follow this pattern when possible. But I really do wish that it was easier to get a consistent look and feel on Linux, including key bindings.
- jhasse 5y ago
  except that it doesn't ... e.g. switching workspaces on mac ist ctrl+arrow.
  - nerdponx 5y ago
    That's why I said "kind of".
mkdirp 5y ago
Terminal is the only thing that maps ctrl+shift+c/v to copy/paste because ctrl+c/v conflicts with signals. I've never come across any other program that maps something that isn't ctrl+c/v to copy/paste. MacOS is able to keep this consistent because ctrl+c/v isn't mapped to copy/paste, and instead command+c/v is. If you really want, Linux is perfectly capable of mapping Super+c/v to copy/paste. You would probably only need to do this in your terminal emulator and your DE.
- rbreaves 5y ago
  Really not a good idea to remap super for copy and paste though.. that is just a very surface level thing to do I think and recommend to any mac user transitioning to Linux and is why I built Kinto.sh so that hacks like "remap Super+c/v" for copy and paste don't have to exist. https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto The proper way is remap the modifier keys and then remap further based on the app on focus. Gives you coverage whether you explicitly remapped an individual app or not.
  - ryanschneider 5y ago
    I came to this thread just to post that System 76 should hire you to work on their keyboard shortcuts if they are serious about attracting macOS users. Muscle memory is the only thing keeping me on macOS now, I’ve tried using an IDE on both Windows and Linux and gave up after a couple minutes. I tried kinto on Pop about a year ago and it worked pretty well but conflicted with their workspace and tiling key commands so never tried switching to it beyond a single days worth of preview.
    - rbreaves 5y ago
      Yea, I am not surprised. I actually was trying to target Pop_OS! to use as a daily on a desktop of mine, but... I had issues with the installer due to it not liking a network ethernet device I believe. I did get past that, but then I had an issue with wanting to use btrfs for snapshot features - the installer though does not setup your partitions correctly for that. It felt like Pop_OS! went out of their way to rewrite the own custom installers and then just decided not to support btrfs for whatever opinionated reason? I dunno - but it made me rather unhappy with the situation and I switched back to my Ubuntu Budgie distro of choice. Sad - because I would have dog fooded Kinto.sh seriously on Pop_OS! had they supported btrfs properly w/ snapshot support. Most Ubuntu based distros don't change the installer so much that proper btrfs support is broken. I do support them though and may purchase one of their laptops in the future and sure - I would love to work for System76 - despite not yet using their OS on anything besides a VM. I do think they get a lot right, and love that they open sourced their BIOS for their laptops. We need more companies like them selling Linux pre-installed.
amelius 5y ago
Why don't we have dedicated "Copy" and "Paste" keys yet? I hate typing Ctrl+Key all the time. Put them in the place of "Scroll Lock" and "Pause/Break" or "SysRq".
- gsinclair 5y ago
  You can achieve this by using your own keyboard (one which has extra programmable keys) or by using Karabiner (or AutoHotKey or …) to make life easier for you. For instance, if you hold C down it could interpret that as Command-C.
II2II 5y ago
Apple gets around that issue by using a differnet modifier key. They have a different modifier key since the original Macintosh dropped the mostly standard control key. It was added to their Macintosh keyboards later, for interoperability with other systems. Windows, on the other hand, has the same issue as Linux. As soon as you call up a command prompt, they are using different shortcut keys.
- sbuk 5y ago
  > They have a different modifier key since the original Macintosh dropped the mostly standard control key. The ctrl-z/x/c/v combination didn't exist when the Macintosh came out. The cmd+z/x/c/v existed on the Lisa (39 years ago!), so predates Mac by 2 years, which in turn predates Windows using by using ctrl-z/x/c/v by 8. Originally, Windows used the IBM CUA standard[0], which can still be used in Windows (KDE and Gnome came 13 and 16 years later respectively). If you're in a windows terminal, try ctrl+ins to copy and shift+ins to paste, works in Gnome and in KDE (with some remapping in Konsole.) Using ctrl-c in a *NIX based system seems like a dumb decision to me, since ctrl-c is SIGINT - kind of useful. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access#Description https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access#Descrip...
1_player 5y ago
Get yourself a terminal that supports smart copy. It's a thing. Tilix, kitty, Windows Terminal and others support using ctrl-c for both copy-to-clipboard and SIGINT. To me it's a game changer and judging from the sibling comments, pretty much no one knows this is a feature that exists. Ctrl-Shift-C/V is barbaric and I have opened issues and merge requests to implement it in other popular terminal emulators.
- somenewaccount1 5y ago
  Dang, some sweet advice. Thank you!

howdydoo 5y ago

Are there any apps other than terminals that don't use ctrl-c? I can forgive that in a terminal app because it conflicts with SIGINT, but it would be very weird if a normal app like vscode did it differently.

GekkePrutser 5y ago
Not really no. It seems to be only terminals. Mind you, Mac has a similar annoyance with its command-C/V. If you work with Linux (+BSD) , Windows and Mac every day, as I do, be prepared to be frustrated a LOT. I'd love if keyboards just had dedicated keys for this. It's used enough to warrant them (much more than other obscure functions like SysRq that do get their own key, or Apple's 19 function keys). I guess this is because I'm the DOS single task days there wasn't much of a need for copying and pasting.
medo-bear 5y ago
alt+w is ctrl+c in emacs. moreover you can enable emacs-like key bindings in most terminals so alt+w can work there too without conflict
somenewaccount1 5y ago
You would think, but I'm a sys admin and 1) live in the terminal. 2) copy and paste to/from the terminal often 3) do not like accidentally cancelling a command when I just meant to copy something.

xedrac 5y ago

Why bother implementing ctrl+c and ctrl+v in Linux when highlighting text copies it, and middle click pastes it? Ctrl+c feels like the dark ages in comparison.

mindwok 5y ago
The biggest pain with this is when you want to highlight some other text to paste over. For example I use the keyboard method for copying urls and pasting into my address bar, otherwise when you select all on the address bar you copy that instead.
- db48x 5y ago
  At least in Firefox you don’t need to clear out the urlbar before pasting into it; what you paste replaces whatever is there. Dunno about Chrome.
zamadatix 5y ago
I usually use middle paste on a desktop mouse but keyboard paste on a touchpad device. As for copying on highlight it depends how you manage your windows, if you use a traditional floating WM and typically click windows to select them you end up with a lot of single character copies messing with your clipboard. Doubly so in the touchpad case again. Or if you like to highlight to bulk delete/replace or if you like to highlight to simply highlight the section on your terminal as you read a manpage or whatever in another window or probably more use cases that didn't immediately come to mind. Point being it's more about use case matching than one option being the dark ages and another being The One Right Way™. Layer on that some like using clipboard history and others just want a single parking space and it gets even more blurry.
tigerInATurvy 5y ago
I'm one of those people who highlights lines as I read them to help me keep focus. Plus, I'd rather have explicit copying via a specific action than something that just happens automatically on highlight.
commoner 5y ago

dopidopHN 5y ago

I developed the utterly useless capacity to switch between Azerty / QWERTY and OS X/Debian/Win pretty seamlessly. I will make a mistake, look à what I’m currently using a switch the layout internally. I really wish I did not have to do that

pkulak 5y ago

That doesn't fly with me. I just use Alacritty and re-bind the keys so I can still use ctrl-c and v: https://github.com/pkulak/dotfiles/blob/master/.config/alacritty/alacritty.yml https://github.com/pkulak/dotfiles/blob/master/.config/alacr...

somenewaccount1 5y ago
That was actually what I ended up doing too.....but then I miss having tabs and go back to the system terminal, and Allacrity explicitly doesn't want tabs. Argh. It's all so anoying.
- opan 5y ago
  Why not use tmux for tabbing?
- pkulak 5y ago
  Yeah, I use my window manager for the tabs. They are very necessary, but I like it better when the WM does it instead of every app. You'd be surprised how often you want to have your browser and terminal tabbed together in the same window once it's an option. Plus, you don't have to remember ever app's tabbing hotkeys.

ohazi 5y ago

For various reasons, most Linux applications try not to use the Super (Windows) key for anything by default, which makes it a good candidate for use as a custom modifier key for whatever you want. For example, users of tiling window managers often use Super+... for interacting with their desktop (open a terminal, open a launcher, switch workspaces, swap windows, etc.). There's nothing stopping you from deciding to use Super+c/v as copy/paste instead of Ctrl+c/v or Ctrl+Shift+c/v. Apple doesn't use Ctrl+c/v either... they use Command, so the conflict you're referring to doesn't exist there either.

somenewaccount1 5y ago
Except that key binding for copy and paste are application specific and not always configurable, so indeed Linux echo system does actually stop you from making that sorta mod.

nerdponx 5y ago

I think MacOS got something right by using its Command key for "desktop-wide" shortcuts that aren't specific to one application, (kind of) leaving Ctrl and Alt for applications. I generally try to follow this pattern when possible. But I really do wish that it was easier to get a consistent look and feel on Linux, including key bindings.

jhasse 5y ago
except that it doesn't ... e.g. switching workspaces on mac ist ctrl+arrow.
- nerdponx 5y ago
  That's why I said "kind of".

mkdirp 5y ago

Terminal is the only thing that maps ctrl+shift+c/v to copy/paste because ctrl+c/v conflicts with signals. I've never come across any other program that maps something that isn't ctrl+c/v to copy/paste. MacOS is able to keep this consistent because ctrl+c/v isn't mapped to copy/paste, and instead command+c/v is. If you really want, Linux is perfectly capable of mapping Super+c/v to copy/paste. You would probably only need to do this in your terminal emulator and your DE.

rbreaves 5y ago
Really not a good idea to remap super for copy and paste though.. that is just a very surface level thing to do I think and recommend to any mac user transitioning to Linux and is why I built Kinto.sh so that hacks like "remap Super+c/v" for copy and paste don't have to exist. https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto The proper way is remap the modifier keys and then remap further based on the app on focus. Gives you coverage whether you explicitly remapped an individual app or not.
- ryanschneider 5y ago
  I came to this thread just to post that System 76 should hire you to work on their keyboard shortcuts if they are serious about attracting macOS users. Muscle memory is the only thing keeping me on macOS now, I’ve tried using an IDE on both Windows and Linux and gave up after a couple minutes. I tried kinto on Pop about a year ago and it worked pretty well but conflicted with their workspace and tiling key commands so never tried switching to it beyond a single days worth of preview.
  - rbreaves 5y ago
    Yea, I am not surprised. I actually was trying to target Pop_OS! to use as a daily on a desktop of mine, but... I had issues with the installer due to it not liking a network ethernet device I believe. I did get past that, but then I had an issue with wanting to use btrfs for snapshot features - the installer though does not setup your partitions correctly for that. It felt like Pop_OS! went out of their way to rewrite the own custom installers and then just decided not to support btrfs for whatever opinionated reason? I dunno - but it made me rather unhappy with the situation and I switched back to my Ubuntu Budgie distro of choice. Sad - because I would have dog fooded Kinto.sh seriously on Pop_OS! had they supported btrfs properly w/ snapshot support. Most Ubuntu based distros don't change the installer so much that proper btrfs support is broken. I do support them though and may purchase one of their laptops in the future and sure - I would love to work for System76 - despite not yet using their OS on anything besides a VM. I do think they get a lot right, and love that they open sourced their BIOS for their laptops. We need more companies like them selling Linux pre-installed.

amelius 5y ago

Why don't we have dedicated "Copy" and "Paste" keys yet? I hate typing Ctrl+Key all the time. Put them in the place of "Scroll Lock" and "Pause/Break" or "SysRq".

gsinclair 5y ago
You can achieve this by using your own keyboard (one which has extra programmable keys) or by using Karabiner (or AutoHotKey or …) to make life easier for you. For instance, if you hold C down it could interpret that as Command-C.

II2II 5y ago

Apple gets around that issue by using a differnet modifier key. They have a different modifier key since the original Macintosh dropped the mostly standard control key. It was added to their Macintosh keyboards later, for interoperability with other systems. Windows, on the other hand, has the same issue as Linux. As soon as you call up a command prompt, they are using different shortcut keys.

sbuk 5y ago
> They have a different modifier key since the original Macintosh dropped the mostly standard control key. The ctrl-z/x/c/v combination didn't exist when the Macintosh came out. The cmd+z/x/c/v existed on the Lisa (39 years ago!), so predates Mac by 2 years, which in turn predates Windows using by using ctrl-z/x/c/v by 8. Originally, Windows used the IBM CUA standard[0], which can still be used in Windows (KDE and Gnome came 13 and 16 years later respectively). If you're in a windows terminal, try ctrl+ins to copy and shift+ins to paste, works in Gnome and in KDE (with some remapping in Konsole.) Using ctrl-c in a *NIX based system seems like a dumb decision to me, since ctrl-c is SIGINT - kind of useful. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access#Description https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access#Descrip...

1_player 5y ago

Get yourself a terminal that supports smart copy. It's a thing. Tilix, kitty, Windows Terminal and others support using ctrl-c for both copy-to-clipboard and SIGINT. To me it's a game changer and judging from the sibling comments, pretty much no one knows this is a feature that exists. Ctrl-Shift-C/V is barbaric and I have opened issues and merge requests to implement it in other popular terminal emulators.

somenewaccount1 5y ago
Dang, some sweet advice. Thank you!