Leopard Moments 3 - Dialog Boxes

As a switcher (coming from Windows to Mac) I was used to “Tab” along different dialog boxes in order to choose buttons.

In Mac I struggled (first you have to give up with old habits, then to learn new ones!) doing it somehow till I finally figured it out.

The figure pretty much shows how to do that but just to mention that you need to make sure that keyboard setting is correct and then by ^+F7 enable tab navigation. Then tabbing will navigate you through the buttons. Note that to select a bordered (selected by tab) button you need to “SPACE” it and for blue button you need to “ENTER” it.

Weired, isn’ it?! I personally didn’t get the point of going through all this hassle though!

Sphere It January 6th, 2008

3 Comments Add your own

1. Pierre Bernard | January 6th, 2008 at 20:53

You may enable “Full keyboard access” in the “Keyboard & Mouse” preferences. You can then tab to all controls.

On the Mac you don’t actually need “tabbing” all that much. Most buttons have shortcuts. ENTER for the default (blue) button. ESC for the Cancel button. CMD-D for the “Don’t save” button,… Actually CMD-First Letter works for most dialog buttons.

Best,
Pierre Bernard
Houdah Software s.à r.l.
2. Ali | January 6th, 2008 at 22:33

Wow, quick and so useful, that explains my confusion!

Cheers!

Neat site though
3. Kristian | November 7th, 2008 at 1:20

I had been looking for this too. Thanks!