OS X user here. I'm currently learning both Vim and Vimium, it's been really fun. A major annoyance with Chrome is that I can press Cmd+L to highlight the address bar, but I can't unselect it without clicking on anywhere on the page (and resume to normal navigation). How do I (using the keyboard only) unselect the address bar in Chrome?
P.S. Sorry if this has been asked already. I just cannot find the combination of search terms in Google as what I'm searching for is a bit descriptive
I am not a OS X user, but I think this should be the same as in Windows,press the Tab once or more time after selecting the Chrome address bar with Ctrl+L. In Windows pressing F6 once or more times will deselect the omnibox in chrome, but I don't know if this will work also in OS X, it is worth a try.
Tab, it selects the next HTML element or something. So when I attempt to scroll using j on Vimium, an error beep occurs. I can press j again, and I end up in the SuperUser search box. From there I can unselect it and navigate using keyboard. I would much rather that I just plain unselect the address bar with no side effects such as selecting HTML elements.
Mar 8, 2014 at 20:12
I've had the same issue but I found a simple hack. Just go to your Chrome settings and click manage search engines. Then add a new search engine with 'javascript:' as the url, and whatever word or key you want for the shortcut. I use Vim with jj or kk mapped to esc, so I used those two keys as the shortcut for my Chrome.
map jj <Esc>?
Jun 23, 2015 at 8:29
Since you are presumably a superuser in addition to using OS X, here is my Karabiner .xml that enables me to exit the omnibox with Command_L + ; (ø on Norw/Danish keyboards). Change to whatever keycombo you need:
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
<item>
<appendix>Use ø (;) to exit the satanically moronic omnibox in chrome.</appendix>
<identifier>private.make_up_for_shitty_chrome_behavior</identifier>
<only>GOOGLE_CHROME</only>
<autogen>
__KeyToKey__
KeyCode::SEMICOLON, ModifierFlag::COMMAND_L,
__{ KeyCode::TAB, KeyCode::TAB, KeyCode::ESCAPE, }__
</autogen>
</item>
</root>
What it does is execute the key-sequence TAB TAB ESC when you trigger it. This makes the first HTML element selected so it is kind of a hack.
I'd personally just remap ESC to ESC ESC in Karabiner so that ESC drops out of the omnibox, but that might interfere with your usage/lead to uninteded consequences.
(I could not get Wang's answer to work)
Edit: This seems like a more robust way to do it in karabiner:
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
<item>
<name>Mouse Warping</name>
<vkopenurldef>
<name>KeyCode::VK_OPEN_URL_SHELL_mousetowindowcenter</name>
<url type="shell">
<![CDATA[
/Applications/Karabiner.app/Contents/Library/utilities/bin/warp-mouse-cursor-position screen 0 bottom 0 right 0
]]>
</url>
</vkopenurldef>
<item>
<identifier>private.f14_mousetowindowcenter</identifier>
<name>F14 to move the mouse to the center of the current window</name>
<autogen>
__SimultaneousKeyPresses__
KeyCode::A, KeyCode::K,
KeyCode::VK_OPEN_URL_SHELL_mousetowindowcenter,
KeyCode::VK_WAIT_100MS,
PointingButton::LEFT,
KeyCode::ESCAPE,
</autogen>
</item>
</item>
</root>
My first answer works for most sites, but for sites with many search boxes you need more than x tab clicks.
The code immediately above moves your cursor to the bottom left (i.e. edge of chrome window) and presses the left mouse-key once, selecting the window without any side-effects. This deselects the omnibox. I use A+K (home row, baby!) simultaneously to do this, but you will probably want to choose your own.
trackpad or have no mouse
There are several Vimium feature requests for this BTW with the intention of enabling that for ESC, but the devs said there is no available API:
So I just use the Tab workaround mentioned at https://superuser.com/a/726451/128124 for now.
