Being a long time linux user, I occasionally find myself as a stranger in a strange land using MacOSX on my wife’s macbook. The lack of certain specific keys for common text navigation (for example PageUp/PageDown keys, Home/End keys and Backspace key) makes keyboard navigation of text documents very cumbersome and slow. I hate having to take my fingers away from the keyboard to use the mouse to navigate around a text document. Furthermore, it’s not that easy to find lists of key combinations just for text navigation on MacOSX, so I’ve compiled my own.

So for linux refugees who find themselves on MacOSX, here are the keyboard shortcuts you will need to navigate your way around a text file:

Function MacOSX Linux
Move to end of line cmd-right arrow End
Move to start of line cmd-left arrow Home
Move to end of file cmd-down arrow ctrl-End
Move to beginning of file cmd-up arrow ctrl-Home
Move to end of the current/next word option-right arrow ctrl-right arrow
Move to beginning of the current/previous word option-left arrow ctrl-left arrow
Select one character to the right shift-right arrow shift-right arrow
Select one character to the left shift-left arrow shift-left arrow
Select text to the end of the line shift-cmd-right arrow shift-End
Select text to the beginning of the line shift-cmd-left arrow shift-Home
Select text to the end of the file shift-cmd-down arrow ctrl-shift-End
Select text to the beginning of the file shift-cmd-up arrow ctrl-shift-Home
Select text to the end of the current/next word shift-option-right arrow ctrl-shift-right arrow
Select text to the beginning of the current/previous word shift-option-left arrow ctrl-shift-left arrow
Delete next character fn-delete Delete
Delete to end of current word fn-option-delete ctrl-Delete
Delete to end of current line fn-cmd-Delete shift-End then Delete
Move cursor down one page ctrl-V PageDown
Scroll down one page fn-down arrow -
Scroll up one page fn-up arrow -

Then there’s the terminal. Having just set out all the text navigation equivalents for MacOSX above, the terminal on MacOSX doesn’t seem to follow any of these rules. For example, want to get to the beginning of the current command? You press ctrl-a. To get to the end of the command, press ctrl-e. This can be quite frustrating that the keyboard shortcuts are not consistent across all apps. Luckily, fn-delete still works. Also, other functions, such as ctrl-r and using the ‘!’ character to call up specific commands from history still work.

So there you have it Linux refugees – hopefully this will make any excursions you make into MacOSX slightly more bearable.

VN:F [1.9.22_1171]
Rating: 0.0/5 (0 votes cast)