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> MBP with an awful keyboard layout OSX lets me remap caps lock to control without digging in the registry or playing "find where they moved Xorg.conf." It's j

> MBP with an awful keyboard layout OSX lets me remap caps lock to control without digging in the registry or playing "find where they moved Xorg.conf." It's just an option in the preferences. Emacs movement shortcuts like C-a and C-e (move-beginning-of-line and move-end-of-line) work everywhere out of the box. ^C can be kill and ^p can be previous-line because they don't collide with copy and print, so terminals Just Work instead of each having their own convention to memorize. Also, for some reason the OSX terminal is the only one that reliably gets SIGWINCH and unicode reliably correct, and has for a decade. It's weird that linux terminals are so bad at this, but whatever. This is what good design looks like.

Arainach 4y ago
>OSX lets me remap caps lock to control without digging in the registry or playing "find where they moved Xorg.conf." It's just an option in the preferences. For native apps. Sort of. * Though you can assign Ctrl to the Fn key, you cannot assign the Fn action to any key so you can't swap them without giving up the ability to use the Fn key at all. * This doesn't work for web apps. Google Docs etc. will still use Command key shortcuts and will thus be different locally versus remoted into a machine. * Some key mappings break in text boxes. I've remapped Find to Control+F, which works most of the time, but not if my cursor is in a text box, because then it moves the cursor forward. Control+B for bold and Control-A for select all are likewise. To make it worse, this only happens for certain text boxes, and heck if I can figure out the pattern. In all, it's an incredibly frustrating experience.
- e63f67dd-065b 4y ago
  > Some key mappings break in text boxes. I've remapped Find to Control+F, which works most of the time, but not if my cursor is in a text box, because then it moves the cursor forward. Control+B for bold and Control-A for select all are likewise. To make it worse, this only happens for certain text boxes, and heck if I can figure out the pattern. Don't remap Cmd+<key> shortcuts to Ctrl+<key>. The great thing about the cmd key is that it doesn't conflict with anything else. Ctrl-f is forward, ctrl-b is back, ctrl-a is beginning of line, etc, these have been around in emacs (readline?) for a long time and it's great that native os textboxes implement them. This is why it's inconsistent; bad apps use their own snowflake controls and fail to implement them. cmd-<key> don't conflict which is why they're used. Ctrl-c meaning both SIGINT and "copy to clipboard" is a disaster on terminals, the cmd-c life is much better. By trying to remap cmd to ctrl you're working against the OS and the OS will fight you back because it's not designed to do that.
  - Arainach 4y ago
    The entire industry outside of Apple has standardized on keyboard shortcuts. When using my Mac, 80% of my work is remoted into a Linux machine where I need Ctrl+ hotkeys. I have more than 30 years of experience using machines with Ctrl+ hotkeys. All of my machines outside of the work Mac use those hotkeys. I have no interest in switching now.
xdennis 4y ago
> OSX lets me remap caps lock to control without digging in the registry or playing "find where they moved Xorg.conf." It's just an option in the preferences. In Linux you just have to add 'include "capslock(escape)"' in xkb symbols file and it works on any Linux distro. I just set it up in my dotfile installer in 2013 and never had to fiddle with the interface since. I never have to wonder "where did they moved the option in the interface this time?". It's just a script I have to run when I set up a new distro install.

Arainach 4y ago

>OSX lets me remap caps lock to control without digging in the registry or playing "find where they moved Xorg.conf." It's just an option in the preferences. For native apps. Sort of. * Though you can assign Ctrl to the Fn key, you cannot assign the Fn action to any key so you can't swap them without giving up the ability to use the Fn key at all. * This doesn't work for web apps. Google Docs etc. will still use Command key shortcuts and will thus be different locally versus remoted into a machine. * Some key mappings break in text boxes. I've remapped Find to Control+F, which works most of the time, but not if my cursor is in a text box, because then it moves the cursor forward. Control+B for bold and Control-A for select all are likewise. To make it worse, this only happens for certain text boxes, and heck if I can figure out the pattern. In all, it's an incredibly frustrating experience.

e63f67dd-065b 4y ago
> Some key mappings break in text boxes. I've remapped Find to Control+F, which works most of the time, but not if my cursor is in a text box, because then it moves the cursor forward. Control+B for bold and Control-A for select all are likewise. To make it worse, this only happens for certain text boxes, and heck if I can figure out the pattern. Don't remap Cmd+<key> shortcuts to Ctrl+<key>. The great thing about the cmd key is that it doesn't conflict with anything else. Ctrl-f is forward, ctrl-b is back, ctrl-a is beginning of line, etc, these have been around in emacs (readline?) for a long time and it's great that native os textboxes implement them. This is why it's inconsistent; bad apps use their own snowflake controls and fail to implement them. cmd-<key> don't conflict which is why they're used. Ctrl-c meaning both SIGINT and "copy to clipboard" is a disaster on terminals, the cmd-c life is much better. By trying to remap cmd to ctrl you're working against the OS and the OS will fight you back because it's not designed to do that.
- Arainach 4y ago
  The entire industry outside of Apple has standardized on keyboard shortcuts. When using my Mac, 80% of my work is remoted into a Linux machine where I need Ctrl+ hotkeys. I have more than 30 years of experience using machines with Ctrl+ hotkeys. All of my machines outside of the work Mac use those hotkeys. I have no interest in switching now.

xdennis 4y ago

> OSX lets me remap caps lock to control without digging in the registry or playing "find where they moved Xorg.conf." It's just an option in the preferences. In Linux you just have to add 'include "capslock(escape)"' in xkb symbols file and it works on any Linux distro. I just set it up in my dotfile installer in 2013 and never had to fiddle with the interface since. I never have to wonder "where did they moved the option in the interface this time?". It's just a script I have to run when I set up a new distro install.