Use number of fingers touching the trackpad as modifier for keyboard shortcuts

Tutorials
21

@Andreas_Hegenberg if you don't give an answer, either the question is stupid :rofl: or the answer is No. Since I don't think the question is stupid, I'll ask it again, more specifically, to be sure the answer really is No. :wink:

Is it possible to add a setting to the "conditions" that restricts thumb recognition to, say, the trackpad quadrant in the upper left?

Then BTT would not register the palm of the hand in the lower right as a thumb. That would make "thumb_recognized" really useful. I'm sure I won't be the only one who has this problem.

22

currently not, but I’m thinking of adding conditions for the coordinates of the touching fingers. As soon that is added you can create such a condition.

23

This was a nice feature, probably one of the better ones added in a long time.. but something broke in this recent update (well the newest update that I got.)

All of a sudden now when I'm typing things are getting triggered when they should not. I haven't adjusted any sensitivity settings or anything else since I first installed BTT, so I don't know what changed besides the update.

I have a trigger for Shift+A.. if no finger is touching then sends a Capital A (as it should anyways) but if finger is on trackpad, then Shift+A highlights the last word (so I can retype incase of spelling error - hate having to backspace/delete a bunch, easier to just start over)..

Anyways, now if I'm typing and I go to hit Shift+A to send the Capital A, it thinks a finger is touch, and highlights instead. My thumb sometimes rest on the trackpad (MacBook Pro) just below the space bar.. so this is triggering my secondary action... It never did this before the update.

same for down arrow, sends normal down arrow to scroll down a page, but if finger is on trackpad it jumps down a full page.. its detecting my thumb on the trackpad when pressing down arrow, when I only want to use arrow as normal..

Please revert any sensitivity changes you might have made in recent update, its not ignoring my thumb as much as it use too..

24

There haven't been sensitivity changes, but there was a bug if specific gestures were used (edge taps). Maybe you added one of these.

That should be fixed in 3.849

25

by the way @Frank1 you can now exclude thumb touches e.g. on the right side by using the thumb_x_percent variable in a condition in 3.863

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26

Following the instructions I have this working, but there's one strange anomaly: I use Alfred and have it configured to start when I double-tap the command ⌘ button.

When I press Command-A now (with no fingers on the track pad), everything is selected as expected, but Alfred is invoked too!

Somehow my ⌘A is also triggering ⌘⌘. I'm running BTT 3.842.

27

There are things / bugs that you never really understand. I can tell you.... anyway :slight_smile:

I have no idea what is causing this, but if you want try this as a workaround :

Enter a complex shortcut in pref. of Alfred to start it. For example.

⌘⌥⌃⇧+F12

Then in BTT set up a Key Sequence double-tap ⌘ = the shortcut above. Maybe this helps. :man_shrugging:

1 Like
28

That's brilliant, Frank. Works great. BTT is so flexible, it's really incredible.
Appreciate your reply.

29

You're welcome, but it only works because you worked around the bug that you might not have found in 100 years. :rofl:

30

hehe, this is not really a bug but so hard to figure out.

The problem is, when you press cmd+a now, both alfred and BTT see the first cmd key (and alfred doesn’t seem to care about the a). Now you have configured BTT to send cmd+ a again afterwards- leading to a second cmd press generated by BTT.

1 Like
31

Sounds plausible, but I would not have thought of it. My solution in such cases is always to make a wide curve around the problem. Most of the time that helps too :slight_smile: