keyboard navigation

[jason]

I have two questions about keyboard navigation in Bookends - these are newbie question, so apologies if I missed any obvious documentation somewhere.

Is it possible to use a key stroke to add a referene to the hit list while in the list view?

And is it possible to, using just the keyboard, select multiple references which are not necessarily sequential in the internet search so that they can all be copied to the current database?

[Jon]

Is it possible to use a key stroke to add a referene to the hit list while in the list view?

Hm, no. Wouldn't be hard to add...

And is it possible to, using just the keyboard, select multiple references which are not necessarily sequential in the internet search so that they can all be copied to the current database?

No. You can hold down the Shift key and use the up/down arrows keys to accumulate references, but of course they will be sequential. I don't know of any Mac OS convention for doing this non-sequentially.

Jon
Sonny Software

[jason]

Is it possible to use a key stroke to add a referene to the hit list while in the list view?

Hm, no. Wouldn't be hard to add...

That would be most excellent.

And is it possible to, using just the keyboard, select multiple references which are not necessarily sequential in the internet search so that they can all be copied to the current database?

No. You can hold down the Shift key and use the up/down arrows keys to accumulate references, but of course they will be sequential. I don't know of any Mac OS convention for doing this non-sequentially.

How about adding something like the checkboxes for hits in the regular list-view? Combined with adding keyboard navigation as listed above, that would be tremendously convenient for those who prefer using the mouse as little as possible.

[Jon]

How about adding something like the checkboxes for hits in the regular list-view? Combined with adding keyboard navigation as listed above, that would be tremendously convenient for those who prefer using the mouse as little as possible.

No, that's not a good idea. You can't have checkboxes mean "this is a hit" in one window and "select me" in another window. Sorry, you'll have to use a mouse to select discontinguous rows (unless you know of a Mac-standard keyboard method for this).

Jon
Sonny Software

[cz]

I like the idea for a key stroke to add a referene to the hit list while in list view. This, in combination with arrow keys and groups would make it much easier to select needed references.

[Jon]

I've already added it to 8.0.5 (alpha): Command-M (the same as the keyboard shortcut for marking/unmarking a reference when the reference window is in front).

Jon
Sonny Software

[jason]

How about adding something like the checkboxes for hits in the regular list-view? Combined with adding keyboard navigation as listed above, that would be tremendously convenient for those who prefer using the mouse as little as possible.

No, that's not a good idea. You can't have checkboxes mean "this is a hit" in one window and "select me" in another window. Sorry, you'll have to use a mouse to select discontinguous rows (unless you know of a Mac-standard keyboard method for this).

Fair enough. But let me explain my rationale for wanting this type of selection, and I'll then leave it to you to decide whether there is a way of implementing it.

If I have a search resulting in, for example, 100 returns from PubMed, odds are I'll only be interested in about 15 or so. The way I decide that is usually by reading through the abstracts provided. Now, if I use the mouse to select multiple references, I do not get to see the abstract of the newly selected reference. So I have to copy them to my library one by one. Each time I do that the focus switches to the list view, resulting in a midly tedious process of going back and forth between windows.

I suppose an alternate solution would be to reverse the logic: allow me to delete search results in the search window which don't interest me.

On a related note: is it possible to copy search results directly into a static group? If I have that group selected in the list view, it appears to not copy it to that group if I just drag the reference over the window.

These are, of course, just minor gripes - this is a wonderful piece of software!

Jason

[tom]

I suppose an alternate solution would be to reverse the logic: allow me to delete search results in the search window which don't interest me.

I think this would be a nice solution since checkboxes do not work (see discussion "A small request" april 07)

tom

[Jon]

Deleting rows would be easy to implement.

Jon
Sonny Software