Do You Use The Ctrl-W Keyboard Shortcut?

By default, Ctrl-W is mapped to "Select word at caret".
Do many people use this?

I can't speak for others, but I use that a lot since ages. After having used
it a couple of years, I realized that it seems to be a common short-cut for
editors (or browsers) to close the current file.

Close active tab in IDEA is mapped as Ctrl-Shift-F4.

Ctrl-Shift-F4 is a very common shortcut to close editors, too, and seems to
originate from Windows' MDI.

Tom

it's probably most used shortcut I use within Intellij ;-)

I just noticed that Ctrl-Shift-F4 doesn't actually work anyway!
Turns out that Ctrl-F4 works and is the MDI default
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/126449

No!
Select word at caret???
Surely Ctrl-N is the shortcut king! :^O

yeah. but I use it quite often

According to our statistics Ctrl+W is the most frequently used feature (among features listed in the Productivity Guide). Note that it isn't just
'Select Word', you can press it again and again to select expanding areas of the source code.

--
Nikolay Chashnikov
Software Developer
JetBrains, Inc
http://www.jetbrains.com
"Develop with pleasure!"

On Mon, 31 Oct 2011 16:02:01 +0400, Nikolay Chashnikov (JetBrains) wrote:

According to our statistics Ctrl+W is the most frequently used feature
(among features listed in the Productivity Guide). Note that it isn't
just 'Select Word', you can press it again and again to select expanding
areas of the source code.

Is it described as "Syntax aware selection" in the Productivity Guide? 
That's my second most used feature ("Basic code completion" comes first).

--
Mark Scott
mark@codebrewer.com

just checked, in my case:
Syntax aware selection (ctrl+w): 70.097
Basic code completion: 26,238

Turns out that Ctrl-F4 works and is the MDI default

You are right, it's Ctrl+F4 without Shift.

Tom

Productivity Guide? What's that?

Tom

see help > productivity guide (statistics + tips)

One of my standard setups for IDEA is to remap ctrl-w (on Mac, cmd-w) to close the current editor tab...

Thanks. It was grayed out the last time I skimmed this menu and hence I
overlooked it.

Tom

Use it ALL the time. Long live CTRL+W :)

• Syntax Aware Selection (Ctrl+W): 34,556 times (once in 6 minutes)
  
• Basic Code Complete: 32,526 times (once in 6 minutes)
• Smart Completion: 4,815 times (once in 25 minutes)
• Variable name completion: 8,419 times (once in 9 minutes)
  
• Go to Class (Ctrl+N):  6,374 times (once in 28 minutes)

Mine is completely blank. Everything says Never.
Are these stats gathered from zero each time you open IDEA or is it from since you installed IDEA?
What happens if you are an EAP user installing new versions all the time? Do the stats reset each time or are they saved between versions?

I believe you have to enable it , search for "Usage statistics" in settings window

this was replay to "Mine is completely blank. Everything says Never." post

Hello opticyclic,

The stats are stored in the config file directory. If you import your config
files when installing a new version, they will be collected across versions.
If you start with a new config directory, they'll be reset.

Mine is completely blank. Everything says Never.

Are these stats gathered from zero each time you open IDEA or is it
from since you installed IDEA?

What happens if you are an EAP user installing new versions all the
time? Do the stats reset each time or are they saved between versions?

--
Dmitry Jemerov
Development Lead
JetBrains, Inc.
http://www.jetbrains.com/
"Develop with Pleasure!"

On a Mac I thought it was Alt-Up arrow, at least that is what it is on mine...maybe that has something to do with me using the IdeaVIM plugin and it changing the keymap.

I think that there is a bug in the statistics.
Mine now says 875 for Syntax Aware Selection, however, I only pressed Ctrl-W 3 times to see how it works.

Is Syntax Aware Selection gathering something else and labelling it as Ctrl-W?

http://youtrack.jetbrains.net/issue/IDEA-76465

What is the shortcut to select word at caret for mac?

Please check here:

No, I have never used it to select text, at least not on purpose!

I find it annoying that you chose CTRL-W for this.

CTRL-W was almost universally acknowledged as the 'close window' combination, later used as 'close tab', on both Mac and Windows.

CTRL-F4 is not particularly convenient because it's a stretch with the left hand.

Big 'thumbs down' from me, I'm afraid.

Looking at the settings, I can't find a keystroke for 'Close active editor tab', only 'Close active tool window tab' (not the same) and 'Close all editor tabs'. Where can I find this?

Here, you can filter by shortcut:

Awesome, thank you!

This is probably the shortcut that I use most

I wonder, in JetBrains statistics, how many of those Ctrl+W are failed attempts to close the window. I know how many times I used Ctrl+W to close window just to find out it doesn't work :)

The only thing Ctrl-W is good for is: delete the last word in the terminal.
So, no. But now I understand where that decision of closing things with Ctrl-W comes from…

> CTRL-W was almost universally acknowledged as the 'close window' combination, later used as 'close tab', on both Mac and Windows.

Why do you even need to close tabs? What's the point? Do you want to look at empty screen? What for?
Tabs in JetBrains products are limited, you cannot even open more than a handful.

Why do you even need to close tabs? What's the point? Do you want to look at empty screen? What for?

That seems like an odd statement. 

I think most people would need to close a tab when they've finished working on a file. I open and close multiple tabs daily and it's much quicker to close a tab with a simple key combination, rather than a mouse click or a stretched palm.

Jetbrains doesn't close the previous file automatically when you open a new one.

Or am I missing your point?