Remap curved quotation marks in OS X?
So, the default key combinations to manually insert curved quotation marks (“” and ‘’) in OS X are:
-
option + [
for “ -
option + ]
for ‘ -
option + shift + [
for ” -
option + shift + ]
for ’
Possibly due to muscle memory and the mental association with the keys ([
being an "opening" symbol and ]
being a "closing" one) I find this specific setup very confusing, so I'll always get it wrong when inserting curved quotation marks manually. And have to try all combinations until I get the right quote.
What I would like to achieve is the (IMO) more intuitive setup:
-
option + [
for “ -
option + ]
for ” -
option + shift + [
for ‘ -
option + shift + ]
for ’
What setting/file/app I need to fiddle with to remap these characters? Is there a special keyboard layout I can download that will do this for me? Thanks in advance.
PS: I'm aware of the "smart quotes" feature, but I'd like to have more fine grained control, that's why I want the manual insertion to be intuitive for me.
You can use KeyRemap4MacBook with a private.xml such as this:
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<root>
<item>
<name>Manual Smart Quotes</name>
<identifier>ManualSmartQuotes</identifier>
<autogen>
__KeyToKey__
KeyCode::BRACKET_RIGHT, VK_OPTION | ModifierFlag::NONE,
KeyCode::BRACKET_LEFT, ModifierFlag::OPTION_L | ModifierFlag::SHIFT_L
</autogen>
<autogen>
__KeyToKey__
KeyCode::BRACKET_LEFT, VK_OPTION, | ModifierFlag::SHIFT_L,
KeyCode::BRACKET_RIGHT, ModifierFlag::OPTION_L
</autogen>
</item>
</root>