Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 30 posts

Re: Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

#21

Post by vapemaster »

coreyw56 wrote: post #13
Someone wrote: post #11

So, you trained your pinky for years, possibly decades, so that it became second nature to exert enough pressure on the control key even though that requires a “pinky stretch”, while letting your thumb atrophy by only using it to press the space bar, and now are surprised that it is easier for you to hit control than command? Can you imagine that other people who did the reverse may have a different opinion? I’m firm…

Personally, I think it's the stretching a finger in the direction it's pointed towards vs. bending a finger that crosses under other fingers. I find the first to feel much more natural. Although I've been a Mac user for years now and have gotten used to the cmd key, ergonomically, I think ctrl makes more sense.

agreed, the fold under makes me use the side of my thumb on command which is much less natural or tactile than stretching my pinky to use the pad.

Re: Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

#22

Post by vapemaster »

nextos wrote: post #15

> Windows is so much more consistent for what the ctrl key does [...] On Macs, Cmd is for GUI and Ctrl is for sending control sequences in a terminal, as originally intended by Unix. As a Linux user, I found this separation fairly consistent and a good idea.

except that you still use command to copy and paste in the terminal

Re: Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

#23

Post by dekhn »

greazy wrote: post #14
dekhn wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

but with the thumb on command, you have to contort your fingers to hit any of the alphabet keys.

I agree you still have to contort your hand but it is significantly less movement than using your pinky. IMO you should remap your keys: https://karabiner-elements.pqrs.org/ Every system will not be 100% to your liking, so make it work for you.

So, I don't remap keys anywhere. This is because I move between Linux, Windows, and Mac OS on both laptop and desktop and multiple external keyboards connected to montiors. No mapping actually obtains a sane behavior that is consistent across all platforms, terminal applications, and others. I've tried and it always ends up messing one of M- (meta key prefix) or control keys.

Re: Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

#24

Post by Someone »

coreyw56 wrote: post #13
Someone wrote: post #11

So, you trained your pinky for years, possibly decades, so that it became second nature to exert enough pressure on the control key even though that requires a “pinky stretch”, while letting your thumb atrophy by only using it to press the space bar, and now are surprised that it is easier for you to hit control than command? Can you imagine that other people who did the reverse may have a different opinion? I’m firm…

Personally, I think it's the stretching a finger in the direction it's pointed towards vs. bending a finger that crosses under other fingers. I find the first to feel much more natural. Although I've been a Mac user for years now and have gotten used to the cmd key, ergonomically, I think ctrl makes more sense.

Looking at the N=1 of ‘me’, I 100% disagree. I can’t reach the control key without also moving my ring finger away from the home row (just checked a couple of different keyboards)

Command, on the other hand, is easy. It’s a one cm or so motion of the top of my thumb (whose natural resting position is at the edges of the space bar)

(I also think that, for the N=1 that’s ‘me’ “the stretching a finger in the direction it's pointed towards” is not a good description of reaching for the control key. With my fingers on the home row, the direction my little finger is pointed to is the Q. To reach the control key, I have to change that direction by about 30 degrees. I can’t easily reach it without also rotating my wrist and/or fold my little finger to hit it with my nail. For command, the ends of my thumbs rotate by about half that)

Re: Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

#25

Post by VoodooJuJu »

vapemaster wrote: post #22
nextos wrote: post #15

> Windows is so much more consistent for what the ctrl key does [...] On Macs, Cmd is for GUI and Ctrl is for sending control sequences in a terminal, as originally intended by Unix. As a Linux user, I found this separation fairly consistent and a good idea.

except that you still use command to copy and paste in the terminal

Clipboard is provided by the X server, so it's still consistent with the separation.

Re: Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

#26

Post by bediger4000 »

lesserknowndan wrote: post #17
bediger4000 wrote: post #12

What I can't get used to is no mouse button paste in either MacOS or Windows. The X11 all-mouse copy-n-paste is so much more efficient.

Here’s one weird trick that will break the Internet. In macOS, if you highlight text, you can then paste it using Shift + Command + “v”. Kind of like X Windows middle button.

Thank you for the insight! I'll try this!

Re: Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

#27

Post by ed9200 »

It is very easy to switch the keys using in Mac OS options. You can have them exactly as it is in Windows / Linux. I'm currently on Windows but please let me know if you won't be able to find it -- I will tell you exactly where it is, once I log to my Mac. That option is right there in the GUI but very few people know about it.

Re: Mac's command key is worse than Window's ctrl

#30

Post by lesserknowndan »

eager_noob wrote: post #18
lesserknowndan wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here’s one weird trick that will break the Internet. In macOS, if you highlight text, you can then paste it using Shift + Command + “v”. Kind of like X Windows middle button.

Is this copy/paste with highlight available globally or limited only to terminals? I can do this with text highlighted in iterm. Highlighted text can be copied in other apps as well with Shift + Command + “v”. Or with terminal app, where the shortcut only works when used within terminal app itself.

Hmmm, seems like it is just within Terminal. It just so happens that is where I mostly use that functionality.

In other situations, often Command + Shift + ‘v’ is paste without formatting (which I wish was the default!).

Post reply on HN