# Shortcut Keys

Help ▸ Shortcut Keys… lists the pattern editor's keyboard chords, grouped by
what they do, with the mouse actions after them. The chords that appear on no
menu are here too: the transport, cursor movement, octave and instrument
selection. Windows MED's Help menu has the same item.

## How the list is made

It is built from the keys as they are bound, each time the window opens, so it
cannot fall behind them. Each chord is described in the words of the menu item
that runs the same command, or of the right-click menu's, so the list and the
menus never disagree.

With the **Command modifier** setting on ⌘ (on the Interface tab of the
Settings window; Auto picks it on a Mac), the chords are written the Mac way.
The [settings reference](../docs/settings.md#command-modifier) explains that
setting, and the few chords that differ on macOS.

## The right-hand column

Some chords only work at certain times, and the right-hand column says when:

- **edit mode**: the chord enters something into the pattern, so EDIT has to be
  on (**Esc** switches it). Only entry needs it. With EDIT off the note keys
  play notes instead, and everything else, including the clipboard, transpose,
  the generators and the delete keys, works either way, as in MED.
- **on the note column**: the cursor has to be on a note, not a digit, for the
  chord to do this.

A chord can need both.