F1 - F7 keys on Powerbook

[Viro]

I've been using a mac for about 2 months now, and I've found that when I program, I'm constantly needing to use F1 - F7, but on my Powerbook, these keys are mapped to the brightness control, volume control, numlock, etc. To actually get to F1, I need to press fn + F1.

This is ok if you use those keys infrequently, but I use them almost all the time. My question, is there a way to change the way the F1 - F7 keys are implemented, so that if I press F1, it is interpreted as F1 and not lower brightness? To lower brightness, I would then have to hit fn + F1.

Hope that made sense....

 

[Cheryl]

You are not alone. There are several third party shareware and freeware programs that may do what you want. I must warn you that what I checked out assigns a different key rather than using the fn or it assigns the keys to launch a program. You can check it out by doing a search at www.macupdate.com or www.versiontracker.com

In checking the Apple Knowledge base:
To use a function key as a function key instead of a volume or brightness control, hold the Function (fn) key while pressing the key (for example, Function-F1).

Alternatively, if your application allows, you may be able to "reassign" the software function to be associated with a different key. For Mac OS X 10.3, the Exposé preference allows you to assign Exposé functions to different function keys or some other keys (such as Right Control or Shift-F12), or to a mouse button if you have a third-party mouse which has multiple buttons.

I hope this helps you.

 

[voice-]

Still, this should be a part of the keyboard preferences be default.
Good idea for OS X programmers...

 

[Viro]

Thanks for the responses. Guess there is no way to actually remap the function keys the way I want. No biggie. It was just something that was good to have, but not essential.