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Navigating in the IDE

The IDE can be navigated both with the keyboard and with a mouse, if the system is equipped with a mouse.

Using the keyboard

All functionality of the IDE is available through use of the keyboard.

  • It is used for typing and navigating through the sources.

  • Editing commands such as copying and pasting text.

  • Moving and resizing windows.

  • It can be used to access the menu, by pressing and the appropriate highlighted menu letter, or by pressing and navigating through the menu with the arrow keys. More information on the menu can be found in section The IDE.

  • Many commands in the IDE are bound to shortcuts, i.e. typing a special combination of keys will execute a command immediately.

Remark:

  • When working in a LinuxX-Term or through a telnet session, the key combination with may not be available. To remedy this, the combination can be typed first. This means that e.g. can be replaced by .

  • Alternatively, you can try the key combination ESC-X for when working on Linux.

  • A complete reference of all keyboard shortcuts can be found in section The IDE.

Using the mouse

If the system is equipped with a mouse, it can be used to work with the IDE. The left button is used to select menu items, press buttons, select text blocks etc.

The right mouse button is used to access the local menu, if available. Holding down the or key and clicking the right button will execute user defined functions. See section The IDE.

Remark:

  1. Occasionally, the manual uses the term "drag the mouse". This means that the mouse is moved while the left mouse button is being pressed.

  2. The action of mouse buttons may be reversed, i.e. the actions of the left mouse button can be assigned to the right mouse button and vice versa 5. Throughout the manual, it is assumed that the actions of the mouse buttons are not reversed.

  3. The mouse is not always available, even if a mouse is installed:

    • The IDE is running under Linuxthrough a telnet connection from a Windowsmachine.

    • The IDE is running under Linuxin an X-term under X-windows. In this case it depends on the terminal program: under Konsole (the KDE terminal) it works.

  4. On Windows, the console has an option ’Quick edit’, allowing text to be copied to the clipboard by selecting text in the console window. If this mode is enabled, the mouse will not work. The ’Quick edit’ option should be disabled in the console window’s properties in order for the IDE to receive mouse events.

Navigating in dialogs

Dialogs usually have a lot of elements in them such as buttons, edit fields, memo fields, list boxes and so on. To activate one of these fields, choose one of the following methods:

  1. Click on the element with the mouse.

  2. Press the key till the focus reaches the element.

  3. Press the highlighted letter in the element’s label. If the focus is currently on an element that allows editing, then should be pressed simultaneously with the highlighted letter. For a button, the action associated with the button will then be executed.

Inside edit fields, list boxes and memos, navigation is carried out with the usual arrow key commands.

An experiment, built from development snapshots. Not the official Free Pascal or Lazarus documentation.