QuicKeys X3 review

QuicKeys is the Mac's leading automation utility, enabling the recording and playback of shortcuts - from opening a file or folder to building up complex sequences of actions.

When QuicKeys made the leap from OS 9 to OS X, virtually all it retained was the name: everything else had to be rewritten from scratch. QuicKeys X3 brings back the last of the 'missing' features, as well as new tools and techniques, including subscopes, speech triggers, text formatting and, at last, variables.

Subscopes allow shortcuts to have different effects in different parts of an application. In Mail, for instance, you might use control-A as a shortcut to save attachments to a specified folder, but if no outgoing message window is open, you could use control-A to add an attachment to the current message. And while you're replying to messages, you can clean up the text - removing quote indents, stripping extra line feeds, and so on.

Variables allows you to carry out mathematical and logical operations during shortcuts. For example, you might wish to view a series of web pages ending in 001.jpg, 002.jpg, and so on. You can now select and copy the numerical part of the expression, add one to it and paste the result back into the URL. Variables can also hold text strings, allowing you to, for example, concatenate a 'first name' and 'last name' field from a database into a single entity.

Logical shortcuts enable you to check for pre-existing states before performing actions. So if, say, you want to reassign the enter key in Mail so that it sends the current message, it's easy to write a shortcut that would use Enter as the trigger and then check if a Send button was active on the current window. If so, the button would be pressed and the shortcut stopped; if not, the action would be ignored and the keystroke passed on to Mail as a standard keystroke.

The reintroduction of printer-switching coincides nicely with event triggers, which allow shortcuts to be activated when specified conditions are met. Perhaps you use a mono laser printer for all your letter writing, but have a colour inkjet you use exclusively for printing photographs. A QuicKeys shortcut could automatically switch to the inkjet when iPhoto is launched, and switch back to the laser when it quits.

As well as accepting standard keyboard shortcuts, QuicKeys recognises triggers from add-on devices. While proprietary software may offer similar functionality, QuicKeys' implementation is easier to control.

If you dislike learning keyboard shortcuts, the return of speech triggers allow shortcuts to be executed by spoken commands, and the ability to store QuicKeys actions in floating toolbars means you can now have them in button form on the desktop, within folders or in the dock.

The interface has been redesigned to make QuicKeys more intuitive and easier to use. Steps are clearly delineated: the display of triggers and shortcuts is easier to read at a glance. When viewing multistep shortcuts, the view can be expanded or contracted to show just the name of each step or the process in full, making navigation and editing much easier. And for the first time, you can drag and drop steps between shortcuts.

There are many minor enhancements, such as the ability to reassign the scope of a set of shortcuts from one application to another. This is particularly useful when a new version of an application appears. To run both old and new versions, just duplicate the shortcuts before reassigning their scope. X3 also introduces 'public shortcuts', which allow you to subscribe to shared shortcuts over a server, as well as a Password Vault for storing sensitive information.