Yes, most of the time. You can’t use all Emacs keys, but many are built-in and still useful and they’ve been in MacOS and predecessors since the days when it was NeXT…)
The main ones I use are:
Control +… (add shift to extend the selection)
a/e : beginning / end of ‘real line’ (e.g. they ignore softwrapping so that they’re really beginning / end of paragraph. As cmd-left/right go just to the beginning / end of the line, there’s a useful distinction there.)
n/p : next / previous line
b/f : next / previous character
v : end of document
d : delete next character
h : delete previous character
l : centre text vertically
k : delete to end of line
t : swap two characters.
There are more, but those are the ones I use every day (which is why DT’s choice of shortcuts can be ‘interesting’…). They take a bit of getting used to, but when they’re assimilated it’s annoying to have to reach for the arrows or delete key…
I also use the opt-key with b/f/d for back / forward / delete words – but to do that you have to make changes in a file (~/Library/KeyBindings/DefaultKeyBinding.dict).
If you want to go down this route, then you may find these links useful:
Thanks for the detailed explanation that’s pretty elaborate and clever.
Do I understand correctly, you hold down Control. But your control is Caps Lock. So you hold it down with the little finger of your left hand? And then you press a letter with your right hand?
Edit: Have you ever tried a “system” that doesn’t need a modifier?
To stick with your examples: “p” is simply “p” or “p” jumps to the previous line?
Pretty much. I tend to use the left hand with Ctl-a, s and d, because it’s so easy, but otherwise I use both hands for the shortcuts. The ability to use Caps Lock as both Control and Escape and Return as Control and Enter is really useful – and I miss it when I’m on a machine which doesn’t have it.
Karabiner Elements is well worth checking out for this sort of thing… it’s free and you can download the configurations I’ve mentioned from their site. People do a lot more with it than I do… https://karabiner-elements.pqrs.org.
Yes, that’s right. I also tend to look for better solutions where none are needed.
I don’t know what Karabiner does, but the reasoning is simple. It’s about pressing a letter short or long. Short, types the letter and long, does something else. Then you could complicate it further by having different lengths of long. So that three functions could be used for one letter. Quite absurd, but fascinating.
I have tried that. It actually works well, very well in fact. The problem is (I write a lot) that all the letters have to be typed when the key is released. This leads to a significant delay when typing. Unfortunately, I have never been able to get used to this.
But if anyone can get used to it, it’s the best thing ever.
I also use Karabiner Elements, but my setup is not very advanced. So thank you @brookter for some inspiration!
I mainly installed it because I run a few applications that make heavy use of the function keys. I’m used to the default macOS configuration though, where you add the Fn/Globe modifier to get the normal Fn keys. It makes sense to swap the default if you use them all the time, but I only really use them in these applications.
I found a script that automated toggling the preference in keyboard settings. But it relied on interface scripting, and I still had to remember to run it…
Then I learned that using Karabiner Elements, you can customize how the function keys behave depending on which application is in the foreground. No more toggling
I was pretty excited by all the possiblities, but I never got around to doing much more with it. I did set caps lock as Hyper key (and remapped it to double-tap right shift), but this thread is making me rethink that.
That is radical… Karabiner’s just a low level way of intercepting key codes and remapping them, so I suppose it could do it in principle. One modification I’ve seen has a, s, d, and f as command keys when they’re held down, but they still do that in conjunction with another letter. I couldn’t see any modifications in the Karabiner list to exactly what you’re describing, though…
KE does a lot, and I really have only scratched the surface. The only other modification I use is to tap both shift keys to toggle Caps Lock.
There are some interesting modifications, though – I quite like the one which inverts the number keys so that you use 9 for ( and shift-9 for 9 for example. Apparently some programmers love this, but I’m not a programmer, so haven’t bothered with it (yet).
There’s a spacebar as control modification in Karabiner Elements – I tried it and didn’t like it at all. I’m not a very fast typist, but quick enough to hate any friction like this.
I know exactly what you mean. The “friction” you perceive has to do with the fact that the app has to decide what you want to do in a very short time. SpaceLaucher does this quite well, but not good enough.
that’s pretty elaborate and clever.
