I fucking hate the mapping of select_all onto CTRL A. Why, because when typing and hitting the A and CTRL button at the same time you suddenly have selected all your text. The moment you type the next character all your text becomes deleted and doesn’t even end up in the copy buffer. I have lost too many long posts and emails to this control character combination. Fucking why have such a potentially damaging key combo attached to two adjacent keys, fuck it.
(please pit this or any other keyboard hates you have, like the Solaris OFF key in the top right corner of the keyboard just where it can easily get knocked)
If you are using Solaris I would hazard a guess that you have rights (maybe not / but some sort of control at least). Why not remap the thing? It may be that you have no admin control over your environment, in which case you get to contact IT and get them to alter it, or swap our for another kb.
Try hitting ctrl-z. That’s the “undo” function, and it has saved me in similar situations to the one you describe.
In fact, i just tried it while typing this post. I hit ctrl-a, then the “delete” button. This obviously erased all my text. Then i just hit ctrl-z, and there it was again.
Yes, but on the Solaris keyboard layout the Ctrl key is in the place where the Caps Lock key is on Windows keyboards. So fat-fingering the Solaris ‘a’ will get you Ctrl-a and then the next keystroke will do you in, just as the OP describes. Ctrl-z will save you for a little bit but the undo buffer only holds the data for a few keystrokes. Easy to exhaust that window of opportunity if you are a fast typist.
I swap back and forth from Solaris to Windows keyboards all the time at work and I know how annoying it can be.
I could not agree with this more. The only possible excuse I can think of is that Microsoft thought the keyboard would be too large if they made that key arrangement in the traditional 3-keys-across style. I can think of no excuse at all for the omission of insert.
Happy with the moved insert key. It’s terribly annoying to hit ‘insert’ by accident when you’re after home or delete, and then end up overtyping everything if you want to add/change something in the middle of a word or sentence.
I hate how in FreeBSD, I can’t use the alt codes or similar key combinations to type extended ASCII characters that aren’t on my keyboard. This is actually a software feature, but kind of related.
Yeah, the layout itself isn’t too obnoxious, it’s just the fact that it’s completely different to all the other keyboards in the world, and switching between the two is a monumental pain in the arse. It means I’m never entirely comfortable with either layout, so I’m always hitting insert when I meant home, or page up when I mean end, etc.
I’m pretty disappointed in the bottom row on my iBook. Function ket where the Ctrl key should be, and certain modifier keys are only on one side of the keyboard, not both.
