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In macOS, generally:

Back when I used it, 5 years ago, it was a solid mess IMO:

Jump one word forward or backwards?

Windows/Linux: ctrl + arrow

Mac: depends on which program you are currently using

IIRC our resident Mac enthusiast explained that it was because some was written in carbon and some in cocoa or something but I don't care.

Opening a file upload dialog box in one browser window would block other windows from the same browser forcing me to use two different browsers: one for docs and one for the task at hand.

This went on for 3 years and in the end I looked as much forward to leave as I had once looked forward to get a Mac.

To each their own but Mac users talking about consistency and ease of use still baffles me.



> Jump one word forward or backwards?

> Windows/Linux: ctrl + arrow

> Mac: depends on which program you are currently using

I don't know what the deal is with Carbon - it was already dead 5 years ago, even Photoshop transitioned in 2010 - but everything I use uses option-arrow. Even the terminal.

> Opening a file upload dialog box in one browser window would block other windows from the same browser forcing me to use two different browsers: one for docs and one for the task at hand.

I just checked and at present in Safari, file upload dialogs block the current window (i.e. can't access other tabs) but not other windows. Though to be honest, I don't understand why you needed to keep file upload dialogs open… why would you click the button to pop the dialog if you weren't intending to immediately select a file? But I guess https://xkcd.com/1172/ applies :)


Though to be honest, I don't understand why you needed to keep file upload dialogs open… why would you click the button to pop the dialog if you weren't intending to immediately select a file?

Would finding and copying a somewhat long folder path from the internal wiki qualify as a good reason?


These are the things that bug me the most about macOS. See also: page up / page down, home / end. For an OS that seems to want to care about consistency, to have pretty much every app interpreting the most common keyboard navigation differently is incredibly annoying.




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