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{"description": "I just said what I said and it was wrong. Or was taken wrong.", "feed_url": "http://leancrew.com/all-this/feed.json", "title": "And now it’s all this", "items": [{"title": "Last thoughts on modifier keys", "url": "http://leancrew.com/all-this/2017/11/last-thoughts-on-modifier-keys/", "author": {"name": "Dr. Drang"}, "summary": "The first shall be last.", "date_published": "2017-11-23T21:08:29+00:00", "id": "http://leancrew.com/all-this/2017/11/last-thoughts-on-modifier-keys/", "content_html": "<p>When I wrote the post about <a href=\"http://leancrew.com/all-this/2017/11/modifier-key-order/\">ordering Mac modifier keys</a> a few days ago, I was thinking primarily about the proper order of the <em>symbols</em> when writing about a keyboard shortcut, like ⌃⌥⌘P.<sup id=\"fnref:preview\"><a href=\"#fn:preview\" rel=\"footnote\">1</a></sup>. I mentioned parenthetically that this order isn’t always observed when people speak about keyboard shortcuts or when they write the names of the keys out fully, as in “Command-Shift-3 takes a screenshot.”</p>\n<p>Jason Snell, in both <a href=\"https://sixcolors.com/link/2017/11/the-order-of-modifier-keys-on-the-mac/\">a post at Six Colors</a> and in conversation with John Siracusa on <a href=\"https://www.relay.fm/upgrade/168\">the lastest episode of Upgrade</a>, took a stand against Apple’s ordering:<sup id=\"fnref:hig\"><a href=\"#fn:hig\" rel=\"footnote\">2</a></sup></p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Command is the commander! Command is the monarch of all keys! Command always comes first, in my book.</p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>Siracusa agreed, and so do I. The ⌘ key is, and has always been, the key that signals a keyboard shortcut. While other modifier keys are sometimes used without ⌘—in cursor control and text selection, for example—I can’t think of any Apple applications that don’t use ⌘ to signal a keyboard shortcut for a menu item. And that primacy in shortcuts to menu items is, I think, why Apple puts it last rather than first.</p>\n<p>Keyboard shortcuts are always presented right-justified along the right edge of the menu. The most common shortcuts are just ⌘ and a letter, like ⌘N to start a new document, for example. It’s typically the variations on the basic command that get additional modifier keys, like ⌥⌘N to start a new project. If that were presented in a menu as ⌘⌥N, the menu would look wrong because the ⌘ symbols wouldn’t line up.</p>\n<p>Here’s the <span class=\"menu\">File</span> menu in Safari:</p>\n<p><img alt=\"Safari File menu\" class=\"ss\" src=\"http://leancrew.com/all-this/images2017/20171123-Safari%20File%20menu.png\" title=\"Safari File menu\"/></p>\n<p>There are two different <span class=\"menu\">New</span> commands and three different <span class=\"menu\">Close</span> commands. This, in Apple’s opinion (and mine), wouldn’t be right:</p>\n<p><img alt=\"Altered Safari File menu\" class=\"ss\" src=\"http://leancrew.com/all-this/images2017/20171123-Altered%20Safari%20File%20menu.png\" title=\"Altered Safari File menu\"/></p>\n<p>It’s not just having the ⌘ symbols aligned. The additional modifier symbols go in front <em>because</em> ⌘ is king and must sit next to the N or the W. The importance of the modifier decreases as you move away from the letter.</p>\n<p>It should go without saying—but I’ll say it anyway—that the letter (or number or whatever) key is the most important because <em>nothing</em> happens until it’s pressed.</p>\n<p>Having said all this, and despite agreeing with Apple’s symbol ordering, my ear for shortcut ordering works just like Jason’s and John’s. The main reason I use keyboard shortcut symbols in my posts instead of words is that I can read ⌥⇧⌘W and not be bothered because I don’t “hear” it as I read the symbols. “Option-Shift-Command-W,” on the other hand, gets sounded out in my head, and it sounds wrong.</p>\n<p>I suspect that’s why Apple’s own documentation sometimes gets the order wrong when the modifiers get written out as words. In speakin
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