Using Function Keys and Shortcut Keys

You can use the keyboard to perform functions in the JADE development environment.

You can change most of the development environment and editor shortcut keys to values of your choice; for example, changing the editor Ctrl+S key binding (Insert Syntax) to the Save function. The exceptions are editor pane accelerator key bindings, standard Windows functionality shortcuts (for example, for copy, paste, and undo actions), and Windows form shortcuts. In addition, you cannot:

Visual Studio uses the F9 key to set breakpoints, by default, and uses the F5 key to run and continue debug execution. JADE uses the F5 key to set breakpoints and the F9 key to run and continue debug execution. Switching between the two development environments can lead to confusion and frustration when using the F5 and F9 keys. You can swap the F9 and F5 accelerator key bindings, by checking the Swap F5 (Toggle Breakpoint) and F9 (Execute/Continue) accelerators check box on the Short Cut Keys sheet on the Preferences dialog. This check box is unchecked by default (that is, false).

You can swap the F11 and F12 accelerator key bindings (for example, if you want the F12 key in the JADE editor pane to have a similar meaning to F12 in Visual Studio, where the definition of the selected symbol is displayed), by checking the Swap F11 (Show Symbol/Open class browser) and F12 (New Window/Bookmark) accelerators check box on the Short Cut Keys sheet on the Preferences dialog. This check box is unchecked by default (that is, false).

The key bindings are saved in your user profile and can be extracted to a preferences initialization file by using the existing Export Preferences functionality provided on the Miscellaneous sheet of the Preferences dialog.

For details about configuring JADE shortcut keys, see "Maintaining Shortcut Keys" under "Setting User Preferences", later in this chapter. For details about using the F9 function key to run a unit test, see "Running a Unit Test", in Chapter 4.