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Unfortunately, Apple proponents love to smugly point to hotkeys as if "it's so simple." Great example: Apple's bizarre and petty refusal to put a real Delete k
by BuckyBeaver 4y ago
Unfortunately, Apple proponents love to smugly point to hotkeys as if "it's so simple."
Great example: Apple's bizarre and petty refusal to put a real Delete key on its laptop or non-full-sized keyboards. They only have a Backspace key, mislabeled "delete." This means that millions of users are arrowing (or moving the insertion point by hand) across the characters they want to delete and backspacing them away. Apple apologists will howl, NOOOO! Command-delete! As if any normal user (especially switching from another platform) would guess this. And yes, they would have to guess this, because it's not marked on the keyboard.
This became doubly inexcusable with the deprecation of the Eject key. It's not as if Apple could pretend that there was "no room" for a Delete key... not that they could anyway, since everyone else manages to provide one.
- madeofpalk 4y agoMac is the only operating system with keyboard shortcuts? I don't think there's a wrong or a right way here, there's just what you're used to. To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure if I completely understand your complaint - I almost exclusively use Windows and I'm not really sure what the Delete key does but is just 'reverse backspace'? I never use it.
- BuckyBeaver 4y agoNobody said the Mac is the only operating system with keyboard shortcuts, so maybe you're replying to the wrong comment there. The Delete key deletes the character to the right of the insertion point; the Backspace key deletes the character to the left. You must be wasting a lot of keystrokes! A Delete key also deletes stuff; like E-mails, files... any currently-selected item in most applications. I don't "backspace" E-mails or other objects to delete them.
- madeofpalk 4y agoI guess I just don't delete stuff from left-to-right - most of the time I'm undoing a typo I've just typed, so backspace feel more appropriate. Otherwise decades of habit just has me put the cursor to the right of characters I want to remove. Again, I don't think either is more inherently correct, there's just what you're used to.
- BuckyBeaver 4y agoUnfortunately, Apple has decided that Backspace IS "more correct." Everyone else has been providing both keys for decades. If you do a lot of editing, and certainly programming, you quickly chafe at the lack of a Delete key. I've been using Karabiner on the Mac to remap F12 to be Delete, losing the Volume-up control in the process. Annoying, but worth it.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- ziml77 4y agoOn a Mac keyboard layout, the key at the upper right of the main section is named delete. And that name alighns with how it's used across macOS: as the equivalent of the delete key on the PC layout. The exception to that equivalence is in text editing where it behaves like backspace. But macOS doesn't ignore the desire to delete text in the other direction. fn+delete will perform a forward character delete.
- BuckyBeaver 4y agoA two-handed, unmarked key combo to delete a single character is a poor substitute for what has been a standard key on almost every other keyboard for decades. Looking at a Macbook keyboard, regardless of what label Apple puts on it, you can see that it's missing either a Backspace key or a Delete key.
- david2ndaccount 4y agoCtrl-d in a textfield/textview forward deletes, Ctrl-h backwards deletes. These are stand Mac hotkeys that have been around for decades.
- BuckyBeaver 4y agoThanks, but I'll just use a proper keyboard. Interesting that even Apple chose the D key for "delete" and the action is "forward-delete" and not Backspace, though.
- vmladenov 4y ago^D is from emacs, not Apple. macOS just implements emacs shortcuts in input fields, quite a handy feature.
- BuckyBeaver 4y agoGreat, that's even better. The meaning of "Delete" as "forward delete" predates Apple's ignorance on the matter.
- pensatoio 4y agoHopefully I didn't come off as smug. ツ
- BuckyBeaver 4y agoHa ha, I don't think you did!
- vmladenov 4y ago> Apple apologists will howl, NOOOO! Command-delete! Cmd-Delete deletes text to the beginning of the input line, Fn-Delete is forward delete. Also, what’s with the inflammatory language?
- BuckyBeaver 4y agoWhat "inflammatory language?"
- catiopatio 4y agoYour posts are strikingly reminiscent of a 1990s OS flame war. “Apple proponents love to smugly point …” “Apple apologists will howl, NOOOO! Command-delete!”
- BuckyBeaver 4y agoThat makes sense, because the behavior I'm reporting is of the same infantile ilk.