One of the most difficult transitions in switching from PC to Mac, at least for me, has been getting used to the different keyboard mappings. Some are not consistent across applications, which is disappointing, I have to say. When you spend a lot of time bouncing between various utilities, this quickly becomes source of frustration.
In my quest to find the Mac variants of all the Windows keyboard shortcuts I relied on so heavily, I became obsessed and decided to start a list of commands for the programs I live in – to refer to until I can memorize everything. :) Whether you’re switching platforms or just converting to the keyboard persuasion, you may find this list very useful. I’m sure I’ll be adding to it as time goes on…
General application control
| open a file | cmd + o |
| create a file | cmd + n |
| save a file | cmd + s |
| print a file | cmd + p |
| minimize a window (inserts a table row in Dreamweaver) |
cmd + m |
| close an application | cmd + q |
| force unresponsive app to close | cmd + opt + esc |
| close a window (or tab in Firefox) |
cmd + w |
| cancel a dialog or action | esc |
Word processing/text editing
| copy | cmd + c |
| cut | cmd + x |
| paste | cmd + v |
| bold text (or unbold) | cmd + b |
| italicize text (or remove it) | cmd + i |
| undo action | cmd + z |
| select all | cmd + a |
| move to beginning or end of a line | cmd + left or right arrow |
| move to beginning or end of a word | option + left or right arrow |
| move to beginning or end of a paragraph | option + up or down arrow |
| move to beginning or end of document | cmd + up or down arrow |
| view beginning or end of a document | home or end keys |
Form field input
| tab forward through form fields | tab |
| tab backward through from fields | shift + tab |
| jump to beginning or end of a line | cmd + up or down arrow |
| select from cursor point to beginning or end | shift + up or down arrow |
| select entire line from beginning to end | cmd + shift + up or down arrow |
| jump to the beginning of a word | cmd + left arrow |
| jump to the end of a word | cmd + right arrow |
Firefox shortcuts
| load home page(s) | opt + home key |
| new tab | ctrl + t |
| go back | delete |
| go forward | shift + delete |
| open bookmarks | cmd + b |
| open downloads | cmd + j |
| open history | cmd + shift + h |
| refresh | f5 (or cmd + r) |
| force reload (no cache) | cmd + shift + r |
| full screen mode | f11 |
| highlight address bar | f6 |
| search within a page (or document) | cmd + f |
Mozilla has many more Firefox shortcuts available here.
Dreamweaver shortcuts
| next document (tab) | cmd + ` |
| previous document (tab) | cmd + shift + ` |
| switch cursor focus from code to design view | ctrl + ` |
| jump to beginning or end of a line | home or end keys |
| move up or down by paragraph, row, or field | cmd + up or down arrow |
| refresh design view | f5 |
| duplicate a file | cmd + d |
| upload a file | cmd + shift + u |
| spell check | shift + fn + f7 |
| preview in browser | opt + fn + f12 |
| open find & replace dialog | cmd + f |
You can also create and/or edit custom keyboard shortcuts for DW. Just go to Dreamweaver > Keyboard Shortcuts to get started.
Photoshop shortcuts
| new layer | cmd + shift + n |
| duplicate layer | cmd + j |
| bring layer forward | cmd + ] |
| send layer backward | cmd + [ |
| group layers | cmd + g |
| merge layers | cmd + e |
| select all | cmd + a |
| deselect | cmd + d |
| undo | cmd + z |
| multiple undo | cmd + opt + z |
| image size | cmd + opt + i |
| canvas size | cmd + opt + c |
| commit text | cmd + enter |
| cycle through screen modes | f |
| cycle through blend modes of a layer | shift + plus sign |
| zoom in or out without switching tools | cmd + plus or minus sign |
| move document without switching tools | spacebar |
Creative Curio also has a (more comprehensive) list of Photoshop keyboard shortcuts, many of which are platform independent. Again, with Photoshop you can assign your own as well. Just go to Window >Workspaces > Keyboard Shortcuts & Menus.
Navigating and searching
| switch between Spaces | ctrl + arrow |
| cycle forward through multiple apps (without opening them) | cmd + tab |
| cycle back through apps | cmd + shift + tab |
| search in Spotlight | cmd + spacebar |
| open Finder (Mac’s equivalent of Explorer) |
cmd + f |
| move to an item by keying the fist letter of its name * | exampe: J moves focus to the first item in a list starting with J |
| expand or collapse a selected folder * | cmd + left or right arrow |
* Works in Finder and Dreamweaver’s Files window
Special fuctions
| capture a screen shot (entire screen) | cmd + shift + 3 |
| select a specific area to screen capture | cmd + shift + 4 |
| move item to trash | cmd + delete |
| open Exposé and Spaces preferences | opt + f4 |
| open Display preferences | opt + f1 |
| open Sound preferences | opt + f11 |
Want more? iboughtamac.com put together a list useful shortcuts too, although some are geared a bit more toward advanced users rather than newbies. And of course Apple has an extensive list of OS X keyboard commands for just about any function you’d want to perform.
One final note, if you just can’t get used to the Home and End keys functionality (Dreamweaver is the only app I know of where they work properly), check out Starry Hope’s Keyfixer mini-app. If remaps the key bindings so they’ll perform the same function as in Windows.
11/12/2007
I can’t live without these:
capture a screen shot to clipboard (entire screen) ctrl + cmd + shift + 3
select a specific area to screen capture to clipboard ctrl + cmd + shift + 4
And of course, Quicksilver is life-changing.
11/12/2007
This is a great list, Charity! Thanks for the mention, too :) I didn’t know about most of those FF shortcuts. The only one I use all the time is Ctrl + T for the new tab.
11/12/2007
@Ian – I keep hearing about Quicksilver but I still don’t exactly know what it is. The site has been down all week so I haven’t been able to check it out yet. :(
@Lauren – I find myself using delete (or backspace on Windows) a LOT when browsing, and f5 when testing. If only I had a dollar for every time I used that indispensable shortcut!
11/12/2007
When the site is backup you might find this Quicksilver Tutorials Round-up link handy.
Quicksilver is the first thing I install on my friends macs. You’ll love it.
11/12/2007
Wow, Merlin uses it – it must be good. ;) Thanks for the link Ian!
11/12/2007
I’m beginning to really love your posts… only 8 days to go !!! ;)
I’d love to read a lowdown on your experiences with BootCamp and getting Windows to run on a mac – from the perspective of a convert. There’s one or two PC-only apps that I don’t think I’m going to be able to say goodbye to.
11/12/2007
LOL thanks Aaron! I actually haven’t used Bootcamp yet, or tried to boot Windows from the Mac by any other means. I’m hearing all over the place that VMware Fusion is the way to go over Parallels, but I can’t speak from experience. Are you planning to run Windows on your Mac then?
I’m curious about which apps you want to hang on to. Myself – I’ll really miss Picasa, but I think I can live without it considering iPhoto is so cool. I’m finding it a little tough to convert from Thunderbird to Mail, but it’s still available for Mac so I take comfort knowing I can switch back any time. ;) I can’t think of anything else that has really affected me in terms of switching. All my faves (PS, DW, FF, Open Office, even Yahoo Messenger have Mac versions so I’m set!
What’s more exciting to me is trying out software that has been previously unavailable being on Windows, like CSS Edit. Woohoo! :D
11/12/2007
Missing comment there. :P
I agree with the Quicksilver comment, it’s a must-have. It’s like Spotlight, but better and faster.
Mac is very nice, and as I said many times, it speeds up my workflow a lot (thanks to CSSEdit 2 ^_^), but I still can’t manage to cut and paste a file. -_-
11/12/2007
@Kevin – yeah not sure what happened there. Every once in a while a comment shows up without any content. I’m sure it has something to do with links, but I have no idea how to fix it. Changing the amount of links allowed per comment seems to have no affect. I only had two links in the comment this time (max is three), but when I took them out it showed up fine. Grr. I don’t get it. :(
I’m totally gonna try out CSS Edit on your recommendation once I get settled in a little more with the new system. Can’t wait to try it out!
11/13/2007
Charity – The main app I’m going to miss from the PC is actually Picassa. I know all the die-hard mac fans are going to say Picassa is a clone of iPhoto, but I’ve used both and Picassa is much better IMO. Plus I have so many photos and they’re all meticulously organised that I don’t want to give up Picassa. hence I will be partitioning my drive and installing XP just to run Picassa!
11/14/2007
[...] girlfriend was taking the piss the other day because I rarely use keyboard shortcuts. Well Design Adaptions have a good list of them to learn [...]
11/18/2007
[...] Raccourcis Mac : toujours utile d’avoir sous le coude une liste de raccourcis, ici on trouve les principaux programmes de Mac avec en plus photoshop, Firefox et bien d’autres. [...]
11/27/2007
Really good and really interesting post. I expect (and other readers maybe :)) new useful posts from you!
Good luck and successes in blogging!
11/20/2008
The only thing I wouldn’t like is that different applications can have different commands and it gets REALLY frustrating. Thanks for the list though. I never knew what the screenshot command was in Mac!