The correct shorthand for writing keyboard shortcuts

[Avraham Makeler]

Hi all,

   RE: The correct shorthand for writing keyboard shortcuts


I have a general question on writing keyboard shortcuts - but no
particularly connected to FM. So I was referred to this forum sicne there is
the general impression that FM users are the champions of extremely long and
complex keyboard shortcuts.

So here is my question: It is a surprising problem to have: a simple enough
issue that I should have already come across years ago, but for some reason
I am bumping into it only now. I have asked a number of experienced
technical writers about this, but have had no convincing answer.

I am documenting a GUI, that has a certain command called 'Merge Forms',
whose keyboard shortcut is, *as the SME writes it*:

    Ctrl M+F

The SME means to say: press Ctrl+M and then with the Ctrl key still pressed,
then press the F key.

And this does in fact successfully invoke the required operation.  (Not of
negligible importance: Ctrl+M followed by Ctrl+F will also work.)

But is 'Ctrl M+F' the correct way to write this?
I think not. For a start, the custom seems to be to write a plus (+) immed.
after the 'Ctrl'.
But 'Ctrl+M+F' means something else: to press all three keys at once.
---------------

Ctrl+M, F is not correct, since it means: Press Ctrl+M, then release the
Ctrl key, and then press the F key

---------------

And another surprise I had is that when I tried a few experiments typing
keyb sequences in the MS Word 'Customize Keyboard' dlg box, I found lots of
bugs. But since this is an FM forum and not a Word forum I wont detail the
 issues here.

Thanks all,

- avi