Hacking FinderHack: CMD-DEL for System 7.1

[JDW]

Last night, I mentioned the need to hack FinderHack in my FaceBook post here in order to change its CMD-T keyboard shortcut the more commonly known and widely used CMD-DEL. The reason to use FinderHack is to bring the file-delete keyboard shortcut to System 7.1.

Matt Sephton (aka Gingerbeardman) chimed in with "CMD-DEL" hack that you can now download from the Garden, which is fantastic! The only thing left to do is to eliminate the bothersome confirmation dialog that appears when you select a file and then press CMD-DEL.

The author of FinderHack is Donald M. Brown, which interestingly enough was a programmer and founding partner of CE Software's QuicKeys. Who better, I thought, to eliminate that confirmation dialog box than the creator of FinderHack. I Googled like mad and found the following links to Donald:

1. Personal web page (with an old email address) — seems to have gone down in the last couple years.
2. Blog site
3. Linkedin (only Premium members can contact him)
4. Twitter (not sure how to initiate contact these days)
5. AppleInsider Forums (I sent him a message)
6. YouTube (sadly, he never enabled his email address via Business Contacts)

I sent an email to the address mentioned on Don's personal web page, but it came back saying his inbox was full. That warning sign, combined with the fact his Blog site went down sometime after Feb. 2023 indicates he may have passed away only a year or two ago. Just like Paul C. Pratt, we have another valued member of the community who has possibly gone missing.

REQUEST FOR HELP: If any of you have ideas on how to HACK old Mac software, maybe you could chime in with a proposal about how to eliminate the confirmation dialog that appears after pressing CMD-DEL

Thanks!

 

[Volvo242GT]

Click on the new message icon in the lower right corner where it says "Messages", then type in his username. Should be able to get ahold of him that way. According to the Eamon Wiki page, he looks to still be alive.

Donald Brown - Eamon Wiki

eamon.wiki

 

[JDW]

Click on the new message icon in the lower right corner where it says "Messages", then type in his username. Should be able to get ahold of him that way.

Unfortunately, it's not possible...

 

[Volvo242GT]

Unfortunately, it's not possible...

View attachment 16206

Hmmm, that blows.

 

[JDW]

Hmmm, that blows.

Indeed. It blows like a thread with few replies! (I get antsy when few people reply to important threads.)

Thankfully, I am having an ongoing conversation with Gingerbeardman over on FaceBook, and he is proposing some solutions via KeyQuencer. We haven't gotten there yet, but if the work does work out, then I can post it here for all to read.

I actually much prefer this forum over FaceBook groups. You can post lots of test and inline pics here, whereas FaceBook doesn't lend itself to that. Even so, you've gotta go where the replies are, and that's what I do out of sheer desperation often times.