Command key

The command key is a key on keyboards of Apple computers. For Mac users it is also called apple key. Colloquially, there are also terms such as propeller, trefoil or cauliflower button. In the text, she is often depicted with the following symbols: ⌘, command ⌘.

Currently ( as of February 2014) are supplied by the manufacturer Apple keyboards with the labels cmd ⌘ in Germany and the U.S. command ⌘.

• Mac OS 2.2.1 and Mac OS X
• 2.2.2 Mac OS X

History

On Apple's earliest computer models, the Apple I in 1976, the Apple II in 1977 and the Apple II in 1979 there is no such key. She first appears on the 1980 published Apple III and the 1983 and published in 1984 Apple IIe and Apple IIc. These machines have two such keys are called open and closed apple. They are shown on the keys through a drawn in outline only and a fully filled apple. The keys were the same internally wired to the two keys on the joystick (this because the Apple keyboard was not working with scan codes, but directly with ASCII codes, and the apple - keys can not be assigned to ASCII code ). The Apple Lisa had just such a key, "closed" with the apple symbol. From the closed Apple Macintosh was later when the Option key.

Appeared in 1984 with the Apple Macintosh for the first time the loop square (⌘ ) still in use today on the Services key, without the company logo, the apple. First the unique assignment of keystrokes and menu items to be achieved by the use of a special, used on the screen for any other purpose symbol. The use of the company logo on the labeling of keyboard shortcuts on the screen liked Apple co-founder Steve Jobs not because of the too-frequent use; he feared a devaluation of the logo by inflationary use. Then, the active at Apple designer Susan Kare was the Swedish locating signs attractions in an international symbol dictionary. This sign has been standardized since 2012 (Amendment 1 of ISO / IEC 9995-7:2009 ) internationally as a keyboard icon "operating system key" for a button, its function is up to the operating system.

In 1986, Apple introduced the Apple IIgs, who possessed the first time on the new Apple Desktop Bus for keyboard and mouse connections. The same bus reported as of this time, the new Macintosh models. Apple's keyboards were thus interchangeable between the Apple II series and Macintosh series. The closed apple key rarely used was IIgs as previously renamed on the on the Macintosh in "Option", but the open apple key had to be preserved, as many Apple II programs they used and also named as; otherwise, user confusion would have been predetermined. Therefore, the new keyboards were on their Command both symbols, the "open apple " of the II series, and also the "Shamrock " of the Mac series. This combination was also obtained when the Apple II series was set in 1993.

Depending on the model of the computer has one or two of the keys, each of the spacebar. The command button is used with operating systems from Apple for calling functions via the keyboard as part of keyboard shortcuts (eg ⌘ Q " Quit the application ").

Use

In general, the command button the introduction of command sequences which serves the same kind So it is the basis for ( almost) all the keyboard shortcuts on Macintosh.

Many users who work several years and almost daily with the Macintosh, almost exclusively use keyboard shortcuts, including many with the command button. This can usually achieve a much higher speed than the mouse.

The Mac OS can be almost entirely without mouse control and provides for virtually any action shortcuts. By defined by Apple in the early 1980s, Human Interface Guideline, as a specification for the design of user interfaces, these key combinations do not change. For example, the most well-known press ⌘ Q still current, and led in 1984 to the first Macintosh to exit the current program.

Navigation

Mac OS and Mac OS X

In texts can the command button for quick navigation use the cursor:

• ⌘ ← / →: The cursor moves a step forward / backward.
• ⌘ ↑ / ↓: The cursor jumps to the beginning / end of the text.

In the Finder, locate the command button is used for quick navigation in the ( hierarchical ) directory structure. For directories ( " folders " ):

• ⌘ ↑ / ↓: From the selected object one reaches higher / deeper into the folder structure.

When applied to files:

• ⌘ ↓: The selected file is opened.

Mouse actions

Mac OS and Mac OS X

• Performs one drag and drop while holding down the Command and Option key, that person will not be moved, but creates an alias of the object at the destination. In the classic Mac OS, this function is integrated for Mac OS 8.0.
• A building under background window of a program can be moved while holding down the Command key, without the associated program fetched from the background ( ie activated) is.
• If you click while holding down the Command key in the name of a Finder window, then open a menu with the representation of the current directory path.

Mac OS X

This help for the visual representation of the storage path works in almost all programs from Apple itself, and many third-party programs. In Safari, however, the path of the currently displayed page is shown relative to the domain. Since Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard), this is also possible with the right mouse button or a Ctrl-click.

• Dock: If you click Command-click on a dock icon in the Finder then the folder contained the object is opened.
• Clicking Command-click on an object in the sidebar of a Finder window, the object is in a new window (or since OS X 10.9 in a new tab ) is opened; the previous remains open.
• Safari: If you click with command-click on a link, this will open in a new tab.

Trivia

As part of the introduction of a new model iMacs on 7 August 2007, a new keyboard, simply Apple Keyboard was called, presented which no longer offered this ancient, popular symbol combination. After more than 21 years of use by the Mac users that for this key so typical and eponymous company logo was not replaced abandoned and replaced on German keyboards in "cmd " in the United States by the advertised word "Command". Other models followed this change with that hardware upgrade. The distance of the Apple logo sparked some vertebrae and an online protest wave at die-hard fans of Apple products who saw an unnecessary Fort acquisition of a beloved design element.

Even with keyboards NeXT there was the Command key and partially similar to the Mac keyboard shortcuts. Again Command was announced.