Just generally curious about what the community thinks of how these two tools can or should work together.
I was a mild/moderate Auto Hot Key user before getting my UHK and now I have moved several functions directly to the UHK. I am not a programmer and it’s taking me some time to fully internalize all of the macro capabilities. So it’s still unclear if my UHK can take over all aspects of what I am accomplishing with. Am I in the right headspace thinking that eventually I will be able to move away from AHK entirely?
If you want to move away from AHK is a question of your goals. UHK works at each computer attached, but can surely not replace all what AHK can do [1].
AHK on the other hand needs to run locally, but has the advantage that it will work with a laptop keyboard. I was using AHK in the past and now move “everything” which can be moved to UHK, with many changes and improvements, while at the same time starting to use a custom layout I came up with (based on ADNW’s KOY/ XOY variant). After that I will try to get that functionality to AHK again, because both approaches have advantages and disadvantages.
[1] maybe it can replace what you did. But AHK can do “everything”, while UHK is a keyboard in the end
It’s not that moving away from AHK is a specific goal. But if I can consolidate tools, I will.
And I see much feature parity between AHK and UHK.
Key mapping is an obvious one.
But I also see application launching is there but very limited (Email Client and Calculator)
Macros are where I still have much learning to do but seem like will handle most of my use cases (automating window management, input standard template text {email responses}, etc,)
I would love to see what others are coming up with on the Application launching and automation perspective. I learn better from seeing useful examples, and not just technical references. Or maybe I am mistaken in the role that UHK plays and need to continue to use AHK for much of my automation.
I trigger my own, self-built menus via AHK. They are app-specific, meaning the same shortcut brings up a different menu, depending on what app I am sitting in. My menus perform app-related functions, things that I need often. This way, I don’t have to memorize mod-key shortcut combinations, but can simply press the first letter of my menu captions (or the &-prefixed trigger letter).
For typing, I use letter sequences that never occur in real words, to trigger symbols and hard-to-reach keys (like “ß” in my native German). For instance, I press +# to trigger “>” and #+ to trigger “<”. Or I press äö to trigger “ü” and äö to trigger “Ü”.
I do not hold down the first letter to accomplish this, like you would do with a mod-key. I just type them in rapid succession, which makes for a really fast and fluid typing experience.
Same with my abbrevation-letter functions from 1) — it has become second nature: my menu comes up, I don’t even look at it, just press the corresponding first letter (that I often know by heart) and the function fires.
I use AHK to turn CapsLock into a modifier key (to double the home row as navigation keys). When typing on the UHK, none of these will fire at all, since UHK handles it by itself. The modified CapsLock only triggers my AHK on other machines, where I run my compiled AHK to imitate the nav-key home row and other UHK comforts.
