One feature of OS X that causes me pain is the keyboard. Aside from it's
compactness (My old hands seem much too big for this keyboard), I miss
the ability to have full control over the keyboard cursor. I cannot hold
down the spacebar nor the arrow keys and have the cursor race across the
text or speed up and down the page. Holding the options key and arrow
keys moves a word at a time but that's not quite the same thing.
Have I missed something here? Does anyone know how to restore this
feature or know of any software utility that will make this possible?
Everything else is near perfect.
Hap

In article <AkUXh.132$C35.65@bignews4.bellsouth.net>,
"A. Willard Reese" <awreese@bellsouth.net> wrote:

> One feature of OS X that causes me pain is the keyboard. Aside from it's
> compactness (My old hands seem much too big for this keyboard), I miss
> the ability to have full control over the keyboard cursor. I cannot hold
> down the spacebar nor the arrow keys and have the cursor race across the
> text or speed up and down the page. Holding the options key and arrow
> keys moves a word at a time but that's not quite the same thing.
> Have I missed something here? Does anyone know how to restore this
> feature or know of any software utility that will make this possible?
> Everything else is near perfect.

So buy a different keyboard.

On Apr 25, 2007, A. Willard Reese wrote:
> One feature of OS X that causes me pain is the keyboard. Aside from it's
> compactness (My old hands seem much too big for this keyboard), I miss
> the ability to have full control over the keyboard cursor. I cannot hold
> down the spacebar nor the arrow keys and have the cursor race across the
> text or speed up and down the page. Holding the options key and arrow
> keys moves a word at a time but that's not quite the same thing.
> Have I missed something here? Does anyone know how to restore this
> feature or know of any software utility that will make this possible?
> Everything else is near perfect.
> Hap

The behavior of the I-beam is set by the application. Sounds like you're
comparing today's I-beam to a DOS cursor.

In article <AkUXh.132$C35.65@bignews4.bellsouth.net>,
"A. Willard Reese" <awreese@bellsouth.net> wrote:

> One feature of OS X that causes me pain is the keyboard. Aside from it's
> compactness (My old hands seem much too big for this keyboard), I miss
> the ability to have full control over the keyboard cursor. I cannot hold
> down the spacebar nor the arrow keys and have the cursor race across the
> text or speed up and down the page. Holding the options key and arrow
> keys moves a word at a time but that's not quite the same thing.
> Have I missed something here? Does anyone know how to restore this
> feature or know of any software utility that will make this possible?

Have you tried changing the key-repeat delay or rate settings in System
Preferences > Keyboard & Mouse? There are also a few more shortcuts for
the arrow keys: for example command-(left or right arrow) goes to the
beginning or end of a line, and option-(up or down arrow) to the
beginning or end of a paragraph.

--
Odysseus