brpaz/quickeys

Linux GTK application that provides an overlay window with the list of shortcuts for the current focused application. Its a shortcut for shortcuts.

Quickeys

Linux application that provides an overlay window with the list of shortcuts for the current focused application. Inspired by Mac OS applications CheatSheet and pretzel.

This was tested on Ubuntu 18.04.

System Requirements

• Python 3
• GTK > 3.14
• AppIndicator3

Install

For now the only way to install this application is installing from source. I would like to provide flatpak, snap, deb support in the future. If you know how to package Python apps in these formats, PRs are welcome ;)

make install

Supported Applications

Right now, this application supports displaying shortcuts for:

• Gedit
• Google Chrome
• Visual Studio Code
• JetBrains Applications
• Firefox
• Pinta

More applications will be added later. Contributions are always welcome.

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FAQ

How do I add / change shortcuts?

Shortcuts are configured in YAML files in the data/shortcuts directory of the source code. The files in that directory are copied to ~/.config/quickkeys/shortcuts when starting the application for the first time.

As a user, you can change / add shortcuts directly to the .config directory as the application reads from it at runtime.

The filename should be the name of the executable of the application. In general you can get it from the command line like so:

• Get the pid of your application. (Ex: ps ax | grep firefox)
• Run cat /proc/{pid}/comm. The value displayed there should be the name of your shortcuts file.

Some applications like Java applications doesnt work like that and returns a generic "Java" from the previous command. In that case we need to modify the source code to be able to identify the application in other away. Workarounds for Jetbrains and Pinta are already implemented. Please see the function "get_active_application" in "quickeys/application.py" for details.

The yaml file should have the following structure (taken from Gedit shortcuts file):

Tabs:
  - Switch to the next tab to the left: <Control><Alt>Up
  - Switch to the next tab to the right:  <Control><Alt>Right
  - Close tab:  <Control>W
  - Save All tabs: <Control><Shift>L
  - Close All tabs: <Control><Shift>W
  - Reopen the most recently closed tab: <Control><Shift>T
  - Jump to nth tab: <Alt>N
  - New Tab Group: <Contol><Alt>N
  - Previous tab Group: <Shift><Ctrl><Alt>Up
  - Next tab group: <Shift><Control><Alt>Down

• This format is the same from Pretzel.
• The shortcut combination should follow a pattern supported by "gtk_accelerator_parse" Ex: “a” or “F1”.

How do I start quickeys at start-up?

• Create a new startup application and use "quickeys" as command.

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Todo

• Build a proper installer (pip, deb, flatpak).
• Add more applications. (Contributors welcome)
• Is there any way in Linux to get an application registered shortcuts automatically??
• Improve docmentation on accelerators.

Contributing

• All contributions are welcome. Please read CONTRIBUTING.md for more details.

License

MIT

quickeys's Issues

Java based applications not working (Ex: PHPStorm)

The way I am doing to get the active application window doesn't work fine with PHPStorm for example and I guess other JAVA based apps.

Investigate ways to handle it. A possible workaround would be to get the window title and do some mappings for common applications.

Package application as flatpak, deb, snap

I have done some research but couldn't give any good guide how to do this. If anyone has experience packaging Python GTK applications, any help is welcome.

Fancier application name

"Shortcuts Overlay" is a pretty dull name. I would like something more fancy.
Ideas welcome.