

Ask HN: How can you make a MacBookPro keyboard productive for programming? - apphrase


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alexmorse
Type code on it, productively.

Seriously though, where do you feel it's failing compared to other keyboards?
As far as laptop keyboards go, it's one of the best I've used.

~~~
apphrase
Lack of single key Home/End and forward delete etc. All are somewhat possible
with the Fn key, but that makes crazy combos and go to start/end of line also
is a pain...

~~~
haney
There are keyboard shortcuts for much of this behavior:

ctrl+a goes to the beginning of a line ctrl+e goes to the end ctrl+k deletes a
line

~~~
jcutrell
I've been very productive with these key bindings. Ctrl+d is forward delete.

There's also a lot of other possibilities with plugins for a given editor,
like Vim-style bindings in Sublime.

I haven't yet found any real restrictions in my workflow once I learned some
of those.

Take a look at the shortcuts in nano; pretty simple stuff can help a lot. Ctrl
+ Y = page up. Ctrl + v = page down. Ctrl+x = exit.

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kmf
Someone else mentioned Keyremap4macbook
([https://pqrs.org/macosx/keyremap4macbook/](https://pqrs.org/macosx/keyremap4macbook/)).
There's a huge amount of customization there, enough that you should be good
to go just by looking through the options there. My favorite is remapping Caps
Lock to Left CTRL. Then you can remap Left CTRL to be escape by itself, and
CTRL+<yourkey> when pressed with other keys. It's very handy in Vim,
especially.

A couple other recommendations, however:

BetterTouchTool: The MBP trackpad has a surprising amount of complexity in
terms of recognizing gestures. BTT adds to that .
[http://www.boastr.net](http://www.boastr.net)

Keyboard Maestro: Scripting and advanced keyboard shortcuts. Includes support
for per-app shortcuts, which is pretty phenomenal.
[http://www.keyboardmaestro.com](http://www.keyboardmaestro.com)

TextExpander: Less practical when you're programming, but TE can be great for
automating things you write often (email address, email responses, URLs, etc.)
[http://smilesoftware.com/TextExpander/](http://smilesoftware.com/TextExpander/)

~~~
floatboth
"A Modern Space Cadet" [http://stevelosh.com/blog/2012/10/a-modern-space-
cadet/](http://stevelosh.com/blog/2012/10/a-modern-space-cadet/) is my
favorite KeyRemap4Macbook/PCKeyboardHack/etc. setup

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typografy
Get
[https://pqrs.org/macosx/keyremap4macbook/](https://pqrs.org/macosx/keyremap4macbook/)
, then pick the keys you need. I have my right side command and option as page
up and page down, eject as (forward) delete, and PC style home/end on the
arrow keys (I think that removes some inconsistencies between programs).

I had been using Windows for the previous 17 years or so, so I also switched
control and command.

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bcl
Use a different keyboard. Seriously, I've had to take mine in 3 times now
because the keys keep breaking their hooks and flopping around. Right now my 6
key is feeling like it is about to go.

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mattwritescode
Make the thing using the keyboard more productive by not asking question on
HN.

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benologist
Learning the relevant keyboard shortcuts and building that muscle memory.

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Randgalt
Use a great IDE like IntelliJ IDEA. I use a MBP solely.

