Why is Alt+F4 the hotkey for closing a window? Why not Alt+F5 or Alt+F3? | Hacker News Reader

Why is Alt+F4 the hotkey for closing a window? Why not Alt+F5 or Alt+F3?

devblogs.microsoft.com

25 pointsrbanffy17 comments

With regards to the idea of function keys, sometimes I wish there were keys reserved such that only the end user was "allowed" to bind them. I often am looking for keys to bind and they are always all taken.

One thing I like about gaming mice is there is no real expectations for what buttons 4+ do, so I can bind away.

The actual method on how you would keep software company out of what they would perceive as "free real estate" on the keyboard I leave to others, I have no clue, the mentioned cua?

But you just override the bindings? Why does it matter that they're taken, not all of them are taken by useful commands so often you don't even lose anything and don't have to move things around

I find f13-f24 keys are useful for exactly that.

You need a keyboard you can reprogram however unless you find a physical keyboard with those.

I use a dygma defy that has those keys programmed in.

If I ever make the hop to building a fully custom keyboard I'm going all out with f13-f24, add some repeats of a-f around the number pad to allow fast hex input + ":" for IPv6 input (and put an equals key somewhere in there!), put the numberpad on the left so it's a bit more balanced, move num/caps/scroll lock all up by each other in the corner as small buttons instead of in the body of the keyboard as various sized ones, turn the normal caps lock into a firmware level layer key, and add a key for shortcutting unicode inputs to the right of the 2 function rows.

This was the initial layout I came up with, there are a few things I'd probably change on the hardware layout side but as far as actual keys I usually go with blank caps so that can be changed without much pain so long as it isn't a special shaped key: https://i.imgur.com/zVJWbC9.png

What would be on the other layers? you seem to have every key you want to press already present.

One thing I would suggest is that if you can split the space bar, it’s soo much real estate for one key, even if you split into 4 keys with 2 keys being space.

I have a split space with shift mapped into one of the keys so I hold shift with my thumb much easier then pinky and makes touch typing flow better.

I just decided that the function keys and right Alt plus a key would be mine to bind to whatever I wanted. I am using a program called Clavier+ on Windows, and some transparent keycaps for labels for function keys. I press F1 for an AI, and Right Alt + E for text editor for example.

"Next available" begs the question about F1, F2, and F3 (which aren't listed, oddly). I think they were help, rename, and search.

Given that he says that F11 and F12 were skipped because they didn't exist on the IBM keyboards at the time and given that he listed them starting from F10, it seems reasonable to assume they started assigning the keys from F10 working down, making F4 the next after F5.

Also unless things were different early on, the functions you're listing are the unmodified ones, not the functions you get when holding alt.

Yes. I regularly use F2 and F3. F1 help I cannot remember the last time I used it. I also get irritated by windows applications that do not use F3 for find next. I do not use F4 without a control or alt combo though...

And over the years, I've had several keyboard where I've physically removed the F1 key from keyboards used on Windows machines because of how annoying the experience was if you ever accidentally pressed F1.

When buying a new keyboard I look at a few things such as funny placements for keys, as well as the position of the F4 key in relation to the numbers below it.

I tend to use Ctrl-F4 quite a lot and I do it by pressing the heel of my left pinky into Ctrl and then pushing F4 with my left index finger.

On some keyboards they like to move the F keys over to right for some reason (ie. past numeric 5) and then the distance becomes too much.

I had to look it up but apparently ctrl + F4 closes a tab.

If you mean a browser tab CTRL+W is a much 'shorter' shortcut.

Right, but it also works in all other programs such as code editors etc.

What is the video referenced at the beginning of the article? The link seems to be broken for me.

yeah, typical MS care for docs...

https://web.archive.org/web/20160310004232/https://sec.ch9.m...

All this Alt+F1-12 ugliness is a reminder that sometimes having Common bad User Access defaults is worse than having none as they guide you into learning very unergonomic keybinds for common operations and hamper experimentation

(and the video explanation doesn't make much sense, you could've just as easily picked "physical lower-lest (Z on a qwerty keyboard) regardless of layout" vs F4, thus losing the keycap mnemonic like with F4, but gaining in ergonomics for such a common operation

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