Shortcuts (using Cmd+Shift+...?) not working anymore

Question

Shortcuts (using Cmd+Shift+...?) not working anymore

Hi!

I'm relatively new to the Mac ecosystem (half a year maybe) but already had and still have a very frustrating experience involving shortcuts that just won't work anymore on my Macbook Pro (M1/Big Sur).

Several shortcuts including Cmd+Shift are affected. At the moment, Cmd+Shift+U ([Mark as read] or however it's called in English in Mail) as well as Cmd+Shift+P ([Show All Commands] in Visual Studio Code) come to mind.

I have fiddled around with the system preferences, especially for the keyboard as well as the region/language settings (I'm running a German system so I'm not 100% sure about the English terms). I have set stuff back to its defaults, added and deleted stuff, and of course restarted my machine a couple of times in the process. Nothing worked.

It's not the keyboard. It doesn't even seem to be the combination of keys. When I manually add a shortcut to the respective list in the keyboard section of the system preferences, it recognizes that I enter Cmd+Shift+U, for example. It saves and displays it. But when I want to use it in Mail, it doesn't work. (One curious detail: I added Cmd+U for the same command and it worked. It worked even after I had deleted it again, which is also not quite what I want it to do. Of course not...)

I even started following advice elsewhere that I should get rid of certain apps. Since I can live without them, I uninstalled Zoom and Lightroom, even though I wasn't sure they even bring global shortcuts. I am not aware of having any other software installed that meddles with shortcuts in other programs. (I'm not a big fan of 'productivity tools' that are configured differently on every machine. Further, and more fundamentally, I am also not willing to wipe my entire system because a couple of shortcuts aren't working. That's behavior I would expect from a PC running Windows 98, but not from a Mac.)

So does anybody have more ideas about possible reasons and solutions? I typically rely heavily on shortcuts for repetitive commands so this issue is a real pain. :(

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 11.2

Posted on May 28, 2021 5:56 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Corrie84

Community Specialist

May 29, 2021 2:12 PM in response to EmanNoitasinagro

Hello EmanNoitasinagro,

If we're understanding you right some of the default keyboard shortcuts are not working in Mail and other apps on your Mac. We know how convenient keyboard shortcuts are for completing tasks, and we'd like to help.

We'd like for you to start by installing all macOS updates available: How to update the software on your Mac. If the issue persists after that, see if the same thing happens after restoring your default shortcuts. You can do this by selecting Restore Defaults in System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts.

Next see if the same thing happens in a new user account, and then try it in a safe mode. Testing it like this will help narrow things down.

Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.

Take care.

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Answer 2

May 30, 2021 12:46 PM in response to Corrie84

Thanks, this ultimately made me stumble upon the solution: I found out that my password manager had three global shortcuts, two of which were Cmd+Shift+U (to auto-fill user names) and Cmd+Shift+P (passwords). -_-'

In any case, I think it would be helpful if such things appeared in the system preferences shortcut list. If the system allows programs to listen to certain shortcuts all of the time and across all other apps, it should be possible to display these listeners (i.e., shortcuts) in the shortcuts tab.

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Answer 3

Corrie84

Community Specialist

May 31, 2021 7:45 AM in response to EmanNoitasinagro

Hello again EmanNoitasinagro,

We're happy to hear you got it sorted out. As for application shortcuts appearing in the Shortcuts section of System Preferences, we recommend leaving feedback about it here: Product Feedback.

Cheers!

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Shortcuts (using Cmd+Shift+...?) not working anymore

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