Controlling Retrospect by keyboard shortcuts

[ullistrator]

I recently found out, that you can use the keyboard to jump to a certain tab and even start actions assigned to buttons or select options (i.e. actions that are not listed in Retrospects menus).

 

Let's assume you want to configure a selector (Retrospects main window being the frontmost). The selector's button sits on the sixth tab as the first button. So you type "61", and the selectors window pops up immediately.

 

Dialogs that have lists of user defined elements (like the selectors, scripts, subvolumes etc. windows) can be controlled in the same manner, type the first (or the first few) letters of the element, and it becomes highlighted.

 

Sometimes you'll need to experiment a little, as in the case of the "Select the restore type" window. For the third option "Search for files/folders" you can type "ss" and the dialog gets closed additionally as if you'd press Enter.

 

I use this above all to let Retrospect act like any normal application you can execute searches in. The usual cmd-F keystroke is then handed out to iKey (QuicKeys or whatever you prefer) which executes all the necessary 354 steps to bring me directly to the actual search window, where I only need to enter the search criteria. Nice!

 

BTW In dialogs where new ejectable media is requested by Retro, you have to return to using a modifier for a change, in order to control the Eject-button: cmd-E.