Re: Design for Keyboard Shortcut Behaviour: Quasimode Command System

On May 23, 2004, at 3:13 am, Andrew Suffield wrote:

> Chording more than three keys is usually awkward. That probably isn't
> a good idea.

I'm not sure if you have grasped the way I envisaged QCS working. The 
user wouldn't be required to chord more than two (possibly three) keys.

The user holds down the COMMAND key (probably with a thumb), and types 
the rest of the command. Although in some cases this may be as awkward 
as excessive chording, hopefully any cases like this can be minimised.

> Fortunately it doesn't have to be. I think this idea is nuts, but it's
> also well-timed, because it validates some recent design decisions;
> the YKB model can handle this just fine, without special application
> support.

Does still still hold true?

> Not a line of C code required; this can be implemented entirely in the
> keymap. That's all you need, once widgets have been converted.
> [...]
> That's just an extended input method (and a fairly easy one to
> implement, even if you do need a little ingenuity to compute the list
> of available commands).

If this is still possible, do you think this is the best way to go 
about things? I was just planning to implement QCS as a module. Whats 
your take on this?

Karl