Assigning shortcut keys

Getting Started with OpenOffice.org 3.x

Chapter 14: Customizing OpenOffice.org

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• Customizing menu content
• Customizing toolbars
• Assigning shortcut keys
• Assigning macros to events
• Using extensions

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In addition to using the built-in keyboard shortcuts (listed in Appendix A), you can define your own. You can assign shortcuts to standard OOo functions or your own macros and save them for use with the entire OpenOffice.org suite.

Be careful when reassigning your operating system’s or OOo’s predefined shortcut keys. Many key assignments are universally understood shortcuts, such as F1 for Help, and are always expected to provide certain results. Although you can easily reset the shortcut key assignments to the OOo defaults, changing some common shortcut keys can cause confusion, frustration and possible data loss or corruption, especially if other users share your computer.

To adapt shortcut keys to your needs, use the Customize dialog, as described below.

1. Select Tools > Customize > Keyboard. The Customize dialog opens.
2. To have the shortcut key assignment available in all components of OpenOffice.org select the OpenOffice.org button.
3. Next select the required function from the Category and Function lists.
4. Now select the desired shortcut keys in the Shortcut keys list and click the Modify button at the upper right.
5. Click OK to accept the change. Now the chosen shortcut keys will execute the function chosen in step 3 above whenever they are pressed.

All existing shortcut keys for the currently selected Function are listed in the Keys selection box. If the Keys list is empty, it indicates that the chosen key combination is free for use. If it were not, and you wanted to reassign a shortcut key combination that is already in use, you must first Delete the existing Key. Shortcut keys that are greyed-out in the listing on the Customize dialog, such as F1 and F10, are not available for reassignment.

Example: Assigning styles to shortcut keys

You can configure shortcut keys to quickly assign styles in your document. Some shortcuts are predefined, such as Ctrl+1 for the Heading 1 paragraph style and Ctrl+2 for Heading 2. You can modify these shortcuts and create your own.

1. Click Tools > Customize > Keyboard. The Keyboard page of the Customize dialog opens.
2. To have the shortcut key assignment available only with one component (for example, Writer), select that component’s name in the upper right corner of the page; otherwise select OpenOffice.org button to make it available to every component.
3. Choose the shortcut keys you want to assign a style to. In this example, we have chosen Ctrl+9.
4. In the Functions section at the bottom of the dialog, scroll down in the Category list to Styles. Click the + sign to expand the list of styles.
5. Choose the category of style (our example uses a paragraph style). The Function list will display the names of the available styles for the selected category. The example shows some of OOo’s predefined styles.
6. To assign Ctrl+9 to be the shortcut key combination for the Text Body style, select Text Body in the Function list, and then click Modify. Ctrl+9 now appears in the Keys list.
7. Make any other required changes, and then click OK to save these settings and close the dialog.

Defining keyboard shortcuts for applying styles

Saving changes to a file

Changes to the shortcut key assignments can be saved in a keyboard configuration file for use at a later time, thus permitting you to create and apply different configurations as the need arises. To save keyboard shortcuts to a file:

1. After making your keyboard shortcut assignments, click the Save button near the bottom right of the Customize dialog.
2. In the Save Keyboard Configuration dialog, select All files from the Save as Type list.
3. Next enter a name for the keyboard configuration file in the File name box, or select an existing file from the list. If you need to, browse to find a file from another location.
4. Click Save. A confirmation dialog appears if you are about to overwrite an existing file, otherwise there will be no feedback and the file will be saved.

Loading a saved keyboard configuration

To load a saved keyboard configuration file and replace your existing configuration, click the Load button near the bottom right of the Customize dialog, and then select the configuration file from the Load Keyboard Configuration dialog.

Resetting the shortcut keys

To reset all of the keyboard shortcuts to their default values, click the Reset button near the bottom right of the Customize dialog. Use this feature with care as no confirmation dialog will be displayed; the defaults will be set without any further notice or user input.