Whisker Menu Keyboard Shortcut

[Mike]

Good points. So how about Super+Space?

[Jerry]

The difference here seems to be how you hold the Super key. If I do Super + H both quickly, which is how I usually do key combos (quickly) then I get the Menu and Thunar. If like mentioned I hold Super key slightly longer then it's not an issue. Where I can see there being an issue is with 1000's of people using the OS, people will have different 'styles' of pressing key combos. For this reason, I'm reluctant to add it as a feature, as tempting as it is There are all sorts of really good suggestions that can be added as a feature to an OS, like this one by mlsmith, but we must weigh up a number of considerations first.

[Mike]

That works too. 

[anon222]

What's nice about it is that it doubles as an application launcher using just the keyboard. In addition, you could set up more search actions in the Whisker properties. One example could be to search the forums using the following command:

Code: [Select]

firefox -new-tab https://duckduckgo.com/?q="site:https://linuxliteos.com/forums %u"
I set that Search Action to !ll (lowercase L's for Linux Lite). So now when I press Super key the menu pops up and I begin typing !ll and then my search query. Firefox pops up (or a new tab if already open) and searches only the LL forums using DDG. This makes finding what I'm looking for a breeze.

This gave me an idea.
 It would be nice to add a keyboard shortcut that is going to run this script.
It will open a dialog and then you enter a search term.
If you click on Cancel or if you don't enter anything and click OK it stops.

Code: [Select]

#!/bin/bash
ENTRY=$(zenity --entry --text "Search DuckDuckGo" --title="Search")
if [[ "${PIPESTATUS[0]}" -ne "0" || -z $(echo $ENTRY) ]]; then
exit 0
fi

 sh -c 'firefox -new-tab https://duckduckgo.com/?q='"$(echo -n $ENTRY)"''

[Mike]

What's nice about it is that it doubles as an application launcher using just the keyboard. In addition, you could set up more search actions in the Whisker properties. One example could be to search the forums using the following command:

Code: [Select]

firefox -new-tab https://duckduckgo.com/?q="site:https://linuxliteos.com/forums %u"
I set that Search Action to !ll (lowercase L's for Linux Lite). So now when I press Super key the menu pops up and I begin typing !ll and then my search query. Firefox pops up (or a new tab if already open) and searches only the LL forums using DDG. This makes finding what I'm looking for a breeze.

[gold_finger]

While easy to add it on my own, I'd recommend adding a default Whisker Menu shortcut in the distro.

For others interested, I went to Keyboard settings and in the Applications Shortcuts tab I set the Super key to the command xfce4-popup-whiskermenu. Now I can quickly press Super and begin typing an application name.

The Super key alone shouldn't interfere with the combos including the Super key. It's only activated if you press and release immediately. I tested it just now. If I depress the Super key immediately I get the Whisker menu. If I keep it held down and press the h button then Thunar pops up but not the menu.

Edit: More testing...if I hold down the Super key longer than a second the Whisker menu doesn't activate even if I release the key. This tells me that after a second or so, the window manager waits for a combination rather than the single button shortcut. Kind of nice I think.

Not a bad idea.  Nice to have shortcut to pop-up Whisker Menu.

Just tested and confirmed this works well and does not interfere with other shortcuts.  Behavior is exactly as described above.

[Mike]

You can add the whisker menu to your panel.

I know, I just like the keyboard shortcut too.

[Jerry]

You can add the whisker menu to your panel.

right-click panel -> panel -> add new item  .

Scroll down alot.

Sheng-Chieh

The whiskermenu comes by default in LL via our own fork, there's no need to add it.

[shengchieh]

You can add the whisker menu to your panel.

right-click panel -> panel -> add new item  .

Scroll down alot.

Sheng-Chieh

[Mike]

The Super key alone shouldn't interfere with the combos including the Super key. It's only activated if you press and release immediately. I tested it just now. If I depress the Super key immediately I get the Whisker menu. If I keep it held down and press the h button then Thunar pops up but not the menu.

Edit: More testing...if I hold down the Super key longer than a second the Whisker menu doesn't activate even if I release the key. This tells me that after a second or so, the window manager waits for a combination rather than the single button shortcut. Kind of nice I think.

[Jerry]

We already have a few commands tied to the Super key, adding this will cause both commands to run at the same time. See Keyboard shortcuts on the first page in the Help Manual for more info.

[Mike]

While easy to add it on my own, I'd recommend adding a default Whisker Menu shortcut in the distro.

For others interested, I went to Keyboard settings and in the Applications Shortcuts tab I set the Super key to the command xfce4-popup-whiskermenu. Now I can quickly press Super and begin typing an application name.