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for goodness sake is there a backspace AND delete function??

M

maikeru

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 7, 2004
31
0
hiya.

new to mac

i've got a pb with a japanese keyboard.

there is a delete key that does what, in the windows world, we call a backspace funtion

how do you delete text in front of you ??

please don't tell me that you have to use that apple key plus another combination ! however, if this is the case, how would someone go about REMAPPING THEIR KEYBOARD ?

many thanks,
 
It's in the same place as it is on windows. In the upper right hand corner-ish area. It says "delete" (without the quotes) on the button.

JOD8FY
 
i am sorry i was not clear...

i know there is a key with "delete" written on it.

however, this key is the traditional backspace function (it will erase text behind the cursor)

i want a SINGLE KEY on the keyboard that deletes text IN FRONT of the cursor and i DO NOT WANT to have to use any function key combinations to do this.

am i missing a key? i hope so.
if not, is there a WAY TO RE-MAP A KEYBOARD ?
 
is there a key with a little box, pointed on one end, with an X in it?

i don't think they would simply leave backspace off the keyboard, both delete and backspace are on almost all keyboards over here... certainly all desktop OEM...

paul
 
maikeru said:
i know there is a key with "delete"tten on it.

however, this key is the traditional backspace function (it will erase text behind the cursor)

i want a SINGLE KEY on the keyboard that deletes text IN FRONT of the cursor and i DO NOT WANT to have to use any function key combinations to do this.

am i missing a key? i hope so.
if not, is there a WAY TO RE-MAP A KEYBOARD ?
Click to expand...

i dont know about japanese but there is a key on the american keyboard that says delete its by the home help page up etc ones i think it does what u want
 
keep in mind that he's talking about a PB keyboard..

Mine has the mac style delete(Win backspace), but not the windows style delete(mac fn + delete)
 
You'll have to Fn+Delete. Keep in mind you have to do this on some win-tops too (or some models have like a block of 'impossible to press' keys which are too small to press with anything other than accuracy).
 
Jiminy Jillikers! I guess he has to spell out "PowerBook" instead of just saying "pb" to convey the fact that he's working with a laptop keyboard. I don't have one anywhere near me, but a quick look over at Apple's site (e.g. http://www.apple.com/powerbook/gallery/powerbook15top.html) reveals what I suspected--there's no secondary delete key, nor any home, page up, etc. keys either (not as standalone keys, at least).

maikeru, I've found it helpful to refer to the key you want as "forward delete" to help differentiate it from the backspace/backwards delete key.

And no, there is no single key that does what you want. You'll have to use fn+"delete" or...

I searched VersionTracker (memorize this URL: http://www.versiontracker.com) for "remap keys" and found two results. Here's the search results page. I've never used either program, nor do I have any reason to at the moment, so I'll let you or someone else figure out if one can do what you want it to. Good luck!
 
delete text in-front, delete text behind ... give me a break, move the cursor over and be done with it ...

wish i had your life if my biggest concern was which way i can delete text
 
uControl includes Power-Delete

Maikeru,

I've been using uControl for some time now on my 1Ghz G4 Powerbook, and I just wanted to let you know that it does include an option called Power-Delete which enables you to do a forward delete with one hand by pressing Shift-Delete. This isn't exactly what you asked for but it works very well for me. I also use uContol to change the enter key to the left of the arrows into another option key so that I can use Universal Access Zooming with one hand and, with SizzlingKeys4iTunes, control iTunes one-handed from any application.

Cheers

P.S. I don't use it but I just found iKey and it seems that it may allow you to remap the F12 key (or any key) to a Fn+Delete keystroke. Its shareware so you can just download it and try it out, and it only costs $20.
 
revenuee said:
delete text in-front, delete text behind ... give me a break, move the cursor over and be done with it ...

wish i had your life if my biggest concern was which way i can delete text
Click to expand...

Hey! That's not very nice... :( And I'm maikeru has some much worse problems, just none we're likely to help with. ;)

To be honest, this was a big annoyance to me when I first got my iBook, and I still don't find fn-del to be very intuitive, especially since fn is so hard to reach from the home row.

FWIW I would nominate the Enter key down by the right-hand apple key as the key to go "buh-bye" and become a forward delete, as I find it pretty useless outside of numlock mode.

Maikeru --- if you do try out a mapping utility and like it, please let us know!
 
thank you for all the helpfull replies from places not canada !

and actually, yes, this is the biggest and most dire problem in my life right now. ain't it grand?
 
maikeru said:
and actually, yes, this is the biggest and most dire problem in my life right now. ain't it grand?
Click to expand...


must be nice to live in LALA land ... LOL ... sorry it was unfair of me to attack you like that i suppose ... just had a bad day

i don't know ... i've been using my mac for so long that i never got in the habit of using the forward delete since i was a PC user for a short amount of time before i went to mac.

good luck finding your solution
 
actually most window people complain about not having a forward-delete button on the keyboard, and it took me a day to get used to pressing both "fn" and "backward-delete" together. a whole day! think about the productivity loss... :D

seriously, it's not a big deal. you don't complain about having to press two keys to save a document, do you? should apple implement a "save document" button because it takes two keys now?

[begin rant]

windows keyboards are something i don't ever want to use again. in the 80's there was a need to have function keys, so they were there, problem solved. today, the stupider the people get, the more buttons they seem to add to a keyboard. for example, these compaqs we have at work, they have another row of function keys and a little software to map functions into them. why on earth can't that software map functions to function keys which are now left unused? stupidity. when you want to have a function pressing function keys you have to press two keys and the single function key press does nothing. do you complain about that? no, but you insist on having another set of function keys that you can map with an extra software.

and then the people in the office are so depressed when their "open email" button doesn't do what it's supposed to do - and they have to call it support for instructions how to open email. stupidity.

[end of rant]

maybe you should just think about that delete button thing again. it's really as intuitive as it gets to have one "backwards delete" button (backspace) which will turn into a "forwards delete" by pressing the function button. i mean... before you press that button, you know what way you wish to delete, and pressing that another button is easier than trying to find where is that dedicated "forwards delete" button located in the keyboard.
 
JFreak said:
seriously, it's not a big deal. you don't complain about having to press two keys to save a document, do you? should apple implement a "save document" button because it takes two keys now?
Click to expand...

Okay, okay, I'm starting to warm to your (and revenuee's) point. :) But then again, I delete a lot more than I save. :( I totally agree with you, by the way, on the row of special buttons at the top of a lot of Win kb's. I thought it was cool for the first ten minutes and I never used it since, except maybe for the volume keys and the eject key, which Apple handles very nicely.

Oh, and maikeru, what's with the weird comment about Canada? I thought you were in Japan? :)
 
revenuee said:
must be nice to live in LALA land ... LOL ... sorry it was unfair of me to attack you like that i suppose ... just had a bad day
Click to expand...

i don't blame you, partially... it's often quite annoying the tone used in a post like this - i just switched, i'm new, why can't i do this on a Mac that i could do on windows, etc. etc.

the point is, Mac is not windows. if you find something different about a Mac, don't make it sound like it's utter stupidity on Mac's part to have such differences. (and the same thing applies the other way around.)

anyway, i hope one of the remapping solutions work for the orig. poster.
 
7on said:
You'll have to Fn+Delete. Keep in mind you have to do this on some win-tops too (or some models have like a block of 'impossible to press' keys which are too small to press with anything other than accuracy).
Click to expand...
This is one of the most annoying and difficult keyboard issues to deal with when converting from Windows to Mac. Windows has backspace and delete keys that do two different things with a single keypress. That said, I love my MS Keyboard, especially the Home/End section especially because the keys are NOT tiny, and the Delete Key is even double size.
012C000000054495.jpg

I also thought that the media keys were worthless for the last 4-5 years or so when I saw them on Compaqs and such, but I found these to be very useful. I commonly use My Docs, Mute, Volume, Pause, Calc, and Logoff/Lock. I enjoyed this keyboard so much I bought 2 more for work. Basically where ever I have to use Windows.
 
If you want to have a delete key that deletes the letter to the right, without holding the fn key down, my suggestion is to get an external keyboard. I know the reason to get a laptop is portability, but most people use their computer in one place for a large portion of time. So, for example, if you use the powerbook at your office every day, get a keyboard and mouse, and that way you can be comfortable and have all the keys like you are used to. Then if you are using the computer away from the office, you can just use the fn+delete combo.
 
wow quite a spirited exchange we have here...!

in response to mkrishnan's question: yes, i am in tokyo. the snarly comment about canada referred to a snarly comment from a fellow in canada.
but i believe we've both now resolved our differences in a civil manner :)

as to my original post with its "annoying tone" (jxyama)....apologies to all.

now, way off topic, but has anybody seen this:

http://myoldmac.net/webse-e.htm
 
maikeru said:
as to my original post with its "annoying tone" (jxyama)....apologies to all.
Click to expand...

sorry, i didn't mean to say your tone was annoying. i didn't think it was, but i can see how some might feel annoyed. so i thought it was understandable that some may get peeved.

i'm glad you found a solution. that's what we are after - solutions to problems. :)
 
maikeru said:
snarly comment about canada referred to a snarly comment from a fellow in canada.
but i believe we've both now resolved our differences in a civil manner :)
Click to expand...

agreed, no temper tantrums, and no flames were issued ...

based on what i've been reading you seem to have solved the delete/backspace issue ... guess now your life is truly grand ... LOL ... good luck man, and enjoy your new mac
 
Apple's support of some emacs keybinds everywhere lets you do this with one hand

Hi, I'm new to the Mac too. I switched from Linux, which I've been using for 8 years or so. Before Linux I was a Mac user back in the System 7 days. Anyway, I've been reading Apple's developer info (software developer by trade) and I came across something that made my day, and might be what you're looking for too: Apple supports a number of emacs's keybings wherever you can enter text. This is great for UNIX/Linux people who use emacs all the time. Also it is great for power-users willing to remember a few extra things. Anyway, in emacs (and Mac OS X) you can do a forward delete by pressing the "ctrl" button and the "d" button at the same time. This would be spoken as "control d" and sometimes written as "^d". Here is a list of such emacs bindings supported by Mac OS X you might find of interest:

^d = delete the character in front of the cursor position (forward delete)
^a = move cursor to the start of the current line
^e = move cursor to the end of the currrent line
^k = delete all the text from the current cursor position to the end of the current line

For alll those just press "ctrl" and the indicated letter at the same time to actuate the specified behavior.

Again, these are emacs key bindings but they should work everywhere in MacOS X provided the developers of an app did not do something strange. Try it out in TextEdit, Safari (when posting to this forum), dialog boxes, etc!!!
 
mdakin said:
Again, these are emacs key bindings but they should work everywhere in MacOS X provided the developers of an app did not do something strange. Try it out in TextEdit, Safari (when posting to this forum), dialog boxes, etc!!!
Click to expand...

*trying this in safari* Wow, this is really sweet! Dunno if I'll ever use it since I didn't get to know emacs all that well, but nonetheless. As a *shudder* win switcher, I am always scared of doing control key combos instead of apple key ones by mistake and who-knows-what happening. :)
 
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