I stumbled upon a BetterTouchTool setting that filled me with glee today. It probably should have been obvious to me earlier, but I hadn’t tried right clicking a gesture in the table view. When you do, you get this menu:
There have been numerous gestures that I’ve loved on my Magic Trackpad, but were inconvenient (frequently triggered accidentally) when using my MacBook Air’s built-in trackpad. I’d ditch those gestures and stick with the lowest common denominator. With this setting, I can keep the cool ones on my Magic Trackpad, and disable them on the built-in. Awesome.
Now, since I know a bunch of people will ask again, here are a few of my BetterTouchTool gestures1. There’s a method to my madness, and I try to keep the list trim and the gestures consistent between apps. These are the ones that have stuck; I’ve deleted ones I’m still toying with so as not to cause anyone undue pain.
Global
Gesture
Action
Note
Custom Tap Sequence
Q
2,1,4,3
Three Finger Swipe Up
Enter fullscreen (if supported)
Four Finger Click
Minimize Window Below Cursor
Three Finger Click
CMD - Click
Three Finger Clickswipe Right
Hide All Windows
Two Finger TipTap Left
[
Tab switching
Two Finger TipTap Right
]
Tab switching
Corner Click Bottom Right
W
Close a window with the side of my palm
Two Finger TipTap Middle
Mute
Three Finger Clickswipe Up
Show Dashboard
Single Finger Tap Top Middle
R
Set to require a double-tap
Three Finger Clickswipe Down
T
Opens my Terminal Visor
Custom Tap Sequence
Show menubar in context menu
4,1,2,3
Rotate Left
Rewinds song (Simplify)
Rotate Right
Skips song (Simplify)
Two Finger Swipe From Left Edge
Play/Pause (Simplify)
Custom Tap Sequence
Maximize Window Right
1,2,3,4
Custom Tap Sequence
Maximize Window Left
4,3,2,1
Chrome & Finder
Gesture
Action
Note
Three Finger Swipe Left
]
Three Finger Swipe Right
[
iTerm
Gesture
Action
Note
Three Finger Swipe Left
U
Two Finger Swipe Left
Three Finger Click
Middleclick
Three Finger Swipe Right
Y
Mail
Gesture
Action
Note
Three Finger Swipe Left
N
Fetch new mail
Three Finger Swipe Down
,
Next message (two-part action, works even when message list isn’t focused)
Three Finger Swipe Up
,
Previous message
My keyboard actions are mostly for launching apps via my Hyper key. I do like this one: “Hyper-z” is assigned to refresh/update actions in certain apps. For example, in Mail it sends “N”, in Chrome and Safari it hits “R”, in Reeder it hits “R”. Why? Because I have most of my app launching keys (as well as Mission Control navigation) assigned to the left half of my keyboard. With Hyper-z, I can quickly jump to an app with just my left hand, refresh it and then decide if I need my other hand on the keyboard. Handy when you’re half on the keyboard, half on the trackpad, eating a sandwich, drinking coffee… c’mon, you must take your hand off the keyboard for something.
Yes, I did manage to script a Markdown table from the PDF of your gestures that BetterTouchTool exports when you hit “Print your gestures.” It was an ugly battle. ↩