KeyBinding madness

There’s a somewhat mysterious individual who is consistently leaving brilliant little pieces of code and information in my comments. Dr. Drang has been visited by this apparition as well. We’re both duly impressed with what he (or she?) does.

So, I’m digging through the code Lri’s posted and I find a DefaultKeyBinding.dict file. It’s the best one I’ve ever seen, and it inspires me to do some “fiddling” of my own. I figured I’d post my result, but with due credit to Lri (hi, Lri!).

The DefaultKeyBinding.dict file tells your computer at a fairly root level how to handle keyboard shortcuts in input fields. It doesn’t work everywhere, but sometimes it’s surprising where it does work. In those cases, you can save yourself a ton of time by committing a few custom keystrokes to memory.

You may be familiar with the basic Emacs keybindings that are default (Ctrl-a beginning of line, Ctrl-e end of line, etc.), but this allows you to go much further. For more information, check out Macworld hints, an older but very relevant article from Harvard and do a search for more information.

Basically, all you need to do is put the DefaultKeyBinding.dict file into ~/Library/KeyBindings and restart applications you want it to work in. Edit away, and change shortcuts to things you’re comfortable with. Several of mine are sequences which allow groupings, which I like, but you might not. Be aware that these can be a little unpredictable as to when they’ll override a system/application default and when they’ll be overridden (I know there’s a logic to it, I just don’t want to dive into that).

I’ve posted my KeyBindings on GitHub and included a cheatsheet in MultiMarkdown as well as a Readme with the tables already rendered. Direct download link below. If you’re looking for something to nerd out on this weekend, this should whet your appetite.

Your support is greatly appreciated!

Just for reference, here’s the table of shortcuts in the KeyBindings file:

Grouped items begin with the groups shortcut, followed by the Keys specified. Items separated by commas are sequential, not concurrent.

All purpose key combos

Group	Keys	Function
	Opt-z	copy character before cursor
	Opt-r	repeat character before cursor
	Opt-t	transpose characters
	Opt-+	uppercase word
	Opt--	lowercase word
	Opt-.	capitalize word
	Ctrl-w	delete word before cursor
	Opt-w	select word
	Opt-f	cut word (fold)
	Opt-g	copy word (grab)
	Opt-h	paste word (hit)
	Opt-l	select entire line/paragraph
	Opt-s	select from beginning of paragrah to last character
	Opt-d	delete line/paragraph
	Opt-y	copy paragraph
	Opt-x	cut paragraph
	Opt-p	paste paragraph below
	Opt-Shift-P	paste paragraph above
	Ctrl-Shift-A	select to beginning of paragraph and copy
	Ctrl-Shift-E	select to end of paragraph and copy
	Opt-q	cut to beginning of paragraph
	Opt-k	cut to end of paragraph
	Opt-,	move paragraph up a line, inserting blank space after
	Opt-	move paragraph to end of document
	Opt-o	blank line after current
	Opt-Shift-O	blank line before current
	Cmd-Opt-/	comment with //
	Cmd-Opt-3	comment with #

Markdown-specific shortcuts (Ctrl-Cmd-W)

Group	Keys	Function
	Cmd-Opt-b	bold selection
	Cmd-Opt-i	italicize selection
Ctrl-Cmd-w	Return	force Return
Ctrl-Cmd-w	Tab	force Tab
Ctrl-Cmd-w	14	# Headlines
Ctrl-Cmd-w	l,t	link text "[selected text](|)"
Ctrl-Cmd-w	l,c	clipboard link "[|selected text](clipboard contents)"
Ctrl-Cmd-w	i,t	image, selection as alt ""
Ctrl-Cmd-w	i,c	clipboard image ""
Ctrl-Cmd-w	:,t	create a reference from selected text
Ctrl-Cmd-w	:,c	create a reference from selected text, clipboard as url
Ctrl-Cmd-w	[	insert reference link
Ctrl-Cmd-w	+|-|*	lists
	Opt-Shift-L	new list item after current
Ctrl-Cmd-w	e	entity
Ctrl-Cmd-w	/	http://

Surround (Ctrl-Cmd-s)

Group	Keys	Function
Ctrl-Cmd-s	(	wrap () with spaces
Ctrl-Cmd-s	)	wrap () no spaces
Ctrl-Cmd-s	[	wrap [] with spaces
Ctrl-Cmd-s	]	wrap [] no spaces
Ctrl-Cmd-s	{	wrap {} with spaces
Ctrl-Cmd-s	}	wrap {} no spaces
Ctrl-Cmd-s	<	wrap <> with spaces
Ctrl-Cmd-s	>	wrap <> no spaces
Ctrl-Cmd-s		wrap single quotes
Ctrl-Cmd-s	`	wrap backticks
Ctrl-Cmd-s	"	wrap double quote

List/Paragraph motion

Group	Keys	Function
	Ctrl-Cmd-k	move line up
	Ctrl-Cmd-j	move line down
	Ctrl-Cmd-l	indent line
	Ctrl-Cmd-h	outdent line (all the way)
	Ctrl-Opt-k	copy line and paste above
	Ctrl-Opt-j	copy line and paste below
	Cmd-Opt-Up	modify selection up
	Cmd-Opt-Down	modify selection down
	Cmd-Del	Forward delete to end of paragraph

Document navigation

Group	Keys	Function
	PgUp	Page Up
	PgDown	Page Down
	Opt-PgUp	Scroll up
	Opt-PgDown	Scroll Down
	Opt-1	bookmark
	Opt-2	jump to bookmark