Assigning a Keyboard Shortcut to Launchpad in OS X Lion
Assigning a Keyboard
Shortcut to Launchpad in OS X Lion
Published
:
July 29, 2011
Last Updated
:
July 29, 2011
Introduction
Apple latest operating system, OS X Lion, introduced
over 250 new features. One of these new features is the
Launchpad. In this article I will be showing you how to assign a keyboard shortcut to
Launchpad, so that you can easily open it.
The Launchpad icon looks like this :
and it is located inside the Dock by default. Launchpad
shows you all of the applications installed on your
computer, including applications downloaded from the Mac
App Store.
To run it, you
have to click on its icon inside the Dock. However,
Launchpad in OS X Lion does not have any keyboard
shortcut assigned to it. So without this, you can only
run it by clicking on its icon in the Dock. To assign a
shortcut to the Launchpad, follow the below steps :
Open System Preferences;
this is done by clicking on the Apple Logo
in the top left side of the Menu bar,
then clicking on System
Preferences...
Click on the Keyboard icon
The Keyboard panel will open, click on the
Keyboard Shortcuts tab
From the left side pane, click on
Launchpad & Dock
As you can see, the Show
Launchpad options is not
enabled and does not have any shortcut
assigned to it by default.
To assign for it a shortcut, select the
checkbox beside Show Launchpad
and then press the combination of keys
that you wish to assign them as a
shortcut to run Launchpad. The keyboard
shortcut will be written inside the
empty textbox that was shown once you've
selected the checkbox of Show Launchpad.
I pressed
keystrokes
together, so now when these keys pressed
together, the Launchpad will be opened.
If you want to adjust the shortcut and
change it to something else, then double
click the shortcut and press the new
keys.
Note : If you've selected a keyboard
shortcut and this shortcut was already
assigned to another action, then a
yellow triangle will be displayed and
you will be able to see with which
action this new shortcut is in conflict.
For example, if I pressed
, then by default, this shortcut is
assigned to Spotlight (Show
Spotlight search field ) as
shown in the below snapshot.
Once everything is set and you are
satisfied with your new keyboard
shortcut, lets test it. Click the
keystrokes that you've selected to be as a
keyboard shortcut to run Launchpad, and
Launchpad will be opened.
I have produced a small clip to show you
this article in short, watch it :
Summary
Launchpad is a cool new feature from OS X Lion.
By default, it does not have any shortcut to quickly
open it. In this article I have shown you how it is easy
to assign a shortcut to Launchpad.