Default "Cmd+\" shortcut has a conflict on macOS Monterey

I didn't find this thread when initially investigating the ⌘\ issue, so I started a new one 🤦. To tie things together, I'm posting a link to my new thread here, as I've added further details. tldr is that several other apps and the System Preferences Keyboard pane all allow setting this shortcut, so there must be a solution. rudy please, please, could the developers look at this again and find a way to allow ⌘\ once again!

Further details:

https://1password.community/discussion/comment/620799/#Comment_620799

Hi @ag_ana, thanks for replying to me. I'm not sure why I didn't find that thread when searching for this issue 🤦. It's not just Pastebot that can assign ⌘\, as I said you can also assign it in the Keyboard System Preferences:

Both there and with Pastebot, it's not just that I can assign it, but ⌘\ then works properly to perform the action. For further data points, I can also assign it to https://www.mowglii.com/itsycal/ to show/hide its menubar calendar:

And to https://www.pcalc.com/mac/index.html's menubar widget:

So at least on my Mac, 1Password is the outlier. And it's clearly possible to use ⌘\ as a shortcut to activate 1Password, as this is one of the defaults on a clean install of 1Password (and I assume for people who are upgrading that already have it set).

Could you ask your developers to look at this again, especially given its widespread ability in other apps. Maybe even if they just make an exception and if someone tries to set ⌘\ as a shortcut, 1Password bypasses the code to check if a shortcut is in use. Given it's such a common shortcut for people to use to activate 1Password, and that's it's widely available to other apps and they system settings for use, I urge AgileBits to find a solution for this particular shortcut.

Hi @"Jolin Warren"!

Our developers recently looked at this too, and it seems like something in Monterey is preventing this from working. I am not sure why Pastebot would behave differently, but you can see what our developers wrote about this https://1password.community/discussion/comment/618948/#Comment_618948.

A quick follow-up… It seems that this is a 1Password issue (even if 1Password might not be the only app with it). After further experimentation I found that I can easily assign the ⌘\ shortcut in the System Preferences Keyboard pane and in the preferences for Pastebot:

So it's something specific in 1Password (on MacOS 12?) that's triggering the warning and preventing setting the ⌘\ shortcut.

For the many years I've used 1Password, I have ⌘\ set to "Show 1Password" and ⌘⌥\ set to "Fill Login or Show 1Password". This is the reverse of the defaults, so when setting up on a new computer or clean install, I would go into the 1Password preferences, clear the default shortcuts, and then set them to my preference.

I recently set up a new computer running MacOS 12 Monterey and went to do the same thing. However, after clearing the defaults, when trying to set "Show 1Password" to ⌘\, MacOS gives the following error:

The key combination ⌘\ can't be used!
The key combination "Command + \" can't be used because it's already used by a system-wide keyboard shortcut. (If you really want to use this key combination, most shortcuts can be changed in the Keyboard & Mouse panel in System Preferences.)

It's bizarre, because as far as I can tell this is not a system-wide shortcut. I haven't found anywhere that it does anything (always gives a 'no' beep when I press it), and I've gone through everything in the Keyboard system preference pane and it doesn't appear there either. Furthermore, it's clearly possible to set this as a shortcut, as the default 1Password installation had ⌘\ assigned to "Fill Login or Show 1Password". I've not been able to find any reference or solution to this issue, except for https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/430314/cant-assign-normal-keyboard-shortcuts-on-monterey-because-its-already-used-by/430526#430526. That was solved by editing the plist file directly.

I was wondering if there is a defaults command I could use to restore the ⌘\ shortcut to "Show 1Password". I notice the 1Password preference file (com.agilebits.onepassword7.plist) contains the keys ShortcutRecorder BrowserActivation and ShortcutRecorder GlobalActivation, but I'm not sure if those are the correct ones to edit, and what values I need if so.

Any help with this would be hugely appreciated. I have a decade or more of muscle memory pressing ⌘\ to activate 1Password, and it's driving me crazy constantly getting beeped at when I do so!

1Password Version: 7.9.1
Extension Version: 7.9.1
OS Version: MacOS 12.0.1

@branok,

Unfortunately the public API that lets us get a listing of in-use global keyboard shortcuts doesn't have any information about what app or process has claimed it. There are only 3 values for each hot key: the key itself, the modifiers (command, control, option, shift) and whether or not its enabled. I don't think there are material flaws in the logic we're using to check this state, but this API call is what we're using to verify that you're not trying to assign an in-use keyboard shortcut: https://github.com/agilebits/shortcutrecorder/blob/master/Framework/Source/SRValidator.m#L73

"in-use" by what??? :-O nothing is hanged on this shortcut, nothing is executed ... apple doesn't respond, I expect. :(

danco,

It is claimed by the OS as in-use on a stock install with no 3rd party applications other than the one i'm running to test register the shortcut.

@ysh4312:

We will be happy to post back here should there be any updates in the future :+1:

Way back when, I recall that something, I think Safari, already used Cmd-\ . As a result, I changed my default keystroke to Ctrl-. Of course, if you are really used to Cmd-\ , having to change it is a poor solution. Really, we need to know why the problem is not fixable, has Monterey actually introduced a new keyboard shortcut.