I have a new iMac with Boot Camp and XP SP3. I used to use Mac OS (1986-2002) but switched to Windows XP because I was working in web development and I regularly needed to verify the sites I was working on.
I have gotten used to Windows shortcuts, and find that I can navigate very quickly using just my keyboard. For example, if I want to modify the track number of a song in iTunes, I can just select the song, type ctrl-i, alt-t and the number.
This is one example of many hundreds. In Windows, virtually all menu items or dialog boxes are accessible this way. Another example is changing my Documents window view from list to thumbnail view: I hold down alt and type v-d for detail view or v-h for thumbnail view.
The shortcuts are all underlined when I hold down the alt key, which means that I don't have to memorize long lists of shortcuts or go looking elsewhere when it's time to use them. Integrating them into my habits is easy because of this.
I bought this iMac (and another one before it) because I genuinely believe that it is a great computer, much better built overall than any PC. However, each time I start using Mac OS, I go nuts because I just cannot figure out how to do things quickly without the alt shortcuts. I either spend all my time looking at long lists of shortcuts trying to memorize them or using the mouse. So, I end up using XP with Boot Camp (it's been three years now!).
There are many cases (the iTunes track number above), where I cannot find any shortcut at all. If I need to give track numbers to an album of 20 songs, I can do it in 60 keystrokes without using my mouse in XP. On Mac, I can't see how this would be possible.
I have looked at QuickSilver, but have not found any way to select individual fields in a multi-field dialog box (again, the iTunes example). And, it requires lots of memorization to keep track of all the shortcuts.
I have activated the keyboard setting to tab through all fields, but this is not a usable solution when I have to tab through 6-8 fields to get to the one I want in a repetitive task.
Can anyone suggest an effective way to navigate in Leopard or Snow Leopard using only the keyboard (hopefully without having to tab through all the fields in iTunes to change fields)? Is there some aspect of QuickSilver that I'm missing that would enable me to do this?
I love my iMac, and this single issue is keeping me from using Snow Leopard full time.