10.5: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior

Developer / Product Page: Kevin Gessner / Product Page
Price: Free

Do you have a Mac laptop with the multi-function Function keys (i.e. controlling brightness, keyboard illumination, media playback)? A setting in System Preferences controls how these keys work -- you can either have them work directly, or only when holding down the Fn button. But what if you want some of them (brightness, for instance) to work just by pressing the function key, and would prefer others (that you'd rather not press by accident, or what rather use for other commands) work only when holding down the Fn key?

The answer is this week's Pick of the Week, FunctionFlip. It's a simple System Preferences panel that lets you specify which keys react with or without the Fn key held down, and it works quite well. Dan Frakes wrote about it in detail in this recent Mac Gems entry, in case you want more information. (Dan wrote about version 1.1, and his biggest complaint was that FunctionFlip took up space in his crowded menu bar for a program he rarely used after setting it up. Version 1.2 fixes this, as it's now a System Preferences panel.)

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10.5: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior
Authored by: palahala on Mon, Sep 15 2008 at 6:41PM PDT

Nice!

As a side note: I'd like to map the lower-right Enter key (on old MacBook keyboards) to Fn -- which is nice on laptops, especially to get forward-Delete (fn-Delete).

http://doublecommand.sourceforge.net/ seemed to help me out, but like the feature list actually states "Enter key acts as an fn key (partial support, cursor keys only)" it does not support fn-Delete.

http://www.kodachi.com/software/fKeys/ is next on my list to try. However, uninstalling DoubleCommand needs me to reboot first -- one day ;-)

10.5: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior
Authored by: palahala on Tue, Sep 16 2008 at 11:49AM PDT

Ok, I didn't try fKeys, but am happily using http://www.pqrs.org/tekezo/macosx/keyremap4macbook/ now. KeyRemap4MacBook can also map Enter to Ctrl for easy Spaces access -- hmmm, too many choices ;-)

Odd: the settings are done using checkboxes instead of radiobuttons :-) More important: one might not like the icon always sitting in the menu bar.

I guess my next little quest is to map Cmd-Delete to forward delete (that needs some other application I think), and then use KeyRemap4MacBook to map Enter to Ctrl for easy Spaces usage.

10.5: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior
Authored by: asmeurer on Mon, Sep 15 2008 at 6:46PM PDT

What I would like is to switch the Control key and the Fn key on my MacBook Pro. Changing spaces is much easier when the control key is the left most key. Also, I wish there was a Control over by the arrows to switch spaces with one hand, but software can't really help that.

Swap Fn & Ctrl?
Authored by: hypert on Mon, Sep 15 2008 at 7:13PM PDT

I second this. I'd love to know how to do this!

10.5: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior
Authored by: palahala on Mon, Sep 15 2008 at 10:54PM PDT

I wish there was a Control over by the arrows to switch spaces with one hand

DoubleCommand does this.

10.5: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior
Authored by: palahala on Mon, Sep 15 2008 at 10:56PM PDT

...but might only be helpful if your keyboard has an Enter key next to the cursor keys.

10.5: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior
Authored by: asmeurer on Mon, Sep 15 2008 at 7:06PM PDT

This maps the volume keys on my older, non-function key keyboard to what they are on my laptop. Imagine my surprise when I try to lower to volume and instead get expos� all windows.

10.5: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior
Authored by: Esprezzo on Sun, Sep 13 2009 at 9:12PM PDT

Anybody's using it on 10.6?

I can not install in on 10.6.1

Using FunctionFlip 2.0 on 07'MBP

10.6: FunctionFlip - Toggle laptop's function key behavior
Authored by: MtnBiker on Thu, Oct 1 2009 at 10:02AM PDT

FunctionFlip 2.0.2 working.

I just installed SnowLeopard two days ago and found this posting as I was looking to reinstall FunctionFlip. I'd forgotten how I had achieved the function flipping. I had done an erase and install on my laptop. Probably not necessary, but my laptop isn't mission critical, so I tend to try things out on it. Haven't rebooted since installing, so that's the final test.

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Hermosa Beach, CA USA

10.6: FunctionFlip Update
Authored by: MtnBiker on Sun, Oct 4 2009 at 7:54AM PDT

Update. I don't think FunctionFlip is working very well on 10.6. I'm using Butler to define shortcuts. On my iMac with 10.6, Butler works as before. But not so on my MacBook. I have F1 set to switch to the Finder. I sometimes see the Brightness symbol (or whatever you call it, kind of 1-in. square image of the brightness control) pop-u, but also switch to the Finder. This doesn't happen every time. fn-F1 also activates the Brightness. Since this is erratic it's hard to test. And I don't use the brightness control often.

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Hermosa Beach, CA USA

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