The 'x' and 'v' are visual metaphors, reinforced by their proximity to the 'c' (copy) equivalent.
Command-x ==> 'Cut' ==> Looks like a pair of scissors. Command-c ==> 'Copy' ==> Abbreviation for (C)opy. Command-v ==> 'Paste' ==> Looks like the typesetter/editor's symbol for 'insert here'. others: Command-w ==> Close (W)indow The Command-z came along much later, along with Undo, and I can't justify it. The others I remember reading explanations of long ago. The title that comes to mind is "The Macintosh is not a Typewriter!", but that may not be the right book. It is worthwhile to read the Wikipedia article related to this subject. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_shortcut . Note that one of the two images used to illustrate the concept is a screenshot of WorldWideWeb.app running on NeXTStep :-D . Note that they plainly state that "shortcuts" are not localized, but "mnemonics" are. Honestly, I still prefer mnemonics/accelerators to key-equivalents/shortcuts. The most productive menuing systems I ever used were the Lotus-style menus in the old Borland products. Just hit [F10] (menu), and start typing accelerators. Effectively, *everything* was quickly navigable from the keyboard, whether a shortcut was defined or not. Even if an accelerator was missing for a menu entry, you could get there quickly with the arrow keys. It is amazing how fast those sequences became muscle memory, and allowing sequences of characters means a much greater "namespace" for keyboard menu access inside an application. Contrast that to even the best thought-out Mac application, where 4 or 5-key "chords" are often necessary to get adequate shortcut coverage in any decently-sized application. --Robert On Jun 24, 2010, at 1:06 PM, Nicola Pero wrote: > I'm not sure, but our of interest I looked at the Apple Human Interface > Guidelines > and they seem to require 'Command-q' for 'Quit' regardless of the language. > ;-) > > I actually happen to agree with you that 'Command-q' is not a particularly > good > choice for quit in most languages since there is no relationship between 'q' > and > the word for quit in most languages ... On the other hand, even in English, > there > doesn't seem to be a particular logic in the choice of Command-v for Paste > (other > than x, c, v are in a row in the keyboard), Command-z for Undo and Command-w > for > close (other than it's near q). There seem to be some logic in some other > choices, > such as Command-s for Save. > > But a reasonable point of view is that the key equivalents are actually > semi-random > letters ... in all languages, including English ;-) _______________________________________________ Discuss-gnustep mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss-gnustep
