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The one thing that really annoys me about my Macbook is that it's missing the Home, End, Page Up and Page Down buttons. The latter ones I especially miss when interacting with particular console applications (less, for example). Is there any way to assign them to keys I don't actually use, like the buttons up top bring up Dashboard (I have that disabled) and such?

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4 Answers

up vote 7 down vote accepted

On a MacBook:

  • Home is Cmd + ↑
  • End is Cmd + ↓
  • PageUp is Fn + ↑
  • PageDown is Fn + ↓
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2  
Also Fn + [right arrow] for end and Fn + [left arrow] for home. I find that easier to remember, since the modifier key is the same as for page up and down. – Scott Nov 23 '11 at 8:46
On a macbook with win7, Cmd + ↑ and Cmd + ↓ work like Win + ↑ and Win + ↓, ie. cycle through maximixe, restore and minimize. – Zom-B Jul 17 '12 at 9:40

You can use PgUp and PgDwn with 'Fn'+'Up' and 'Fn'+Down'.

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Indeed, the missing keys on Macbooks (and many Windows notebooks) are something extremely annoying.

Normally, on Macbook keyboards, you get

Home / End with fn-Left / fn-Right

and

PgUp / PgDown with fn-Up / fn-Down

However, as you noticed, this doesn't work in Terminal apps like nano, Midnight Commander, less, etc.

In Terminal, you need to add Shift to let them "pass through" to Terminal.

Home : Shift-fn-Left

End : Shift-fn-Right

PgUp : Shift-fn-Up

PgDn : Shift-fn-Down

Of course, when what you really need happens to be Shift-Ctrl-Home ... forget it! (Or connect a real keyboard)

And Midnight Commander users will want to know that the missing Insert key can obtained with Ctrl-T

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What about applications that want you to press PgUp and PgDn at the same time? (Second Life is the one I'm thinking of...) – David Jul 16 '12 at 7:26

In text editors such as TextEdit or Pages:

  • Page Up (reposition cursor) is Fn
  • Page Down (reposition cursor) is Fn or V
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