Alt-arrow annoying quirk

[t2jd1967]

This has been bugging me for a long time and I have yet to find a satisfactory answer somewhere. Alt-left arrow and Alt-right arrow do not work in some Apple applications, most notably Safari and TextEdit. It has never worked for me and this is across different set ups (Late 2013 MacBook Pro 15" which was my companion for 7 years, 2012 Mac Mini i5, 2020 Mac Mini M1, 2021 MacBookPro M1 Max 14" which is my current machine) and various incarnations of macOS, running Ventura now. Alt-left arrow and Alt-right arrow work fine in other apps like Word and Brave, moving the cursor between words. But not in Safari, where it is greatly annoying, I just can't get it to work. I did check for any keyboard setting modifications, but despite running a number of utilities like BetterSnapTool (indispensable!!!), I don't think that these are the culprit. I am just dumbfounded. Even the Apple documentation says Alt-left arrow and Alt-right arrow should work. It is on an every keyboard I have used, the full size wired, the full size wireless, and both of the laptop keyboards.

Suggestion welcome!

Edit: Just realized Apple Mail suffers from the same fate, sigh!

 

[galad]

It works on both Mail and Safari on my Mac, running 13.0.1.

 

[chabig]

Working for me (M1 MacBook Pro, Ventura 13.0.1).

OP, you referred to an alt key. This tells me you're likely coming at this from another operating system. Please confirm that you're using the Mac's option key. If you are and it still isn't working, have you changed any of the standard keyboard shortcuts in settings? Even if you say no, consider putting everything back to default and trying again.

 

[t2jd1967]

Working for me (M1 MacBook Pro, Ventura 13.0.1).

OP, you referred to an alt key. This tells me you're likely coming at this from another operating system. Please confirm that you're using the Mac's option key. If you are and it still isn't working, have you changed any of the standard keyboard shortcuts in settings? Even if you say no, consider putting everything back to default and trying again.

Yes it is the Option key, I worked with PCs and Windows computers for 30 years before switching to Macs about 10 years ago. So for me it always stays as the Alt key.

I will have a look to see what is the default for the keyboard, perhaps I missed a trick there. The current macOS was a factory install from when I got the MBP M1 and I have not done anything strange I think.

 

[t2jd1967]

Well, I figured it out, finally!!! I have been using the Unicode Hex Input mode for a quite some time and you have to enable the keyboard shortcuts separately. OMW! It also goes to show my memory is playing tricks with me, the Unicode input I only used for the last 3 to 4 years, so before that it must have worked ok.

A big thanks to @chabig for pointing me in the right direction, you have no idea how happy I am 😃 !

 

[chabig]

That's great! I doubt any of us would have figured that out beyond the general recommendation to check your keyboard settings.