Command Palette and Shortcuts

Command palette & shortcuts

Gubbins has a command palette for jumping anywhere and finding anything without hunting through menus — the fast, keyboard-first way to drive the app.

Where to find it: the quick-search / command palette, available from anywhere in the app.

The command palette

Open the palette and start typing to:

• Jump to any screen — type > to switch into screen-jump mode, then filter by name. It reaches every screen, not just the ones on the navigation menu: Inventory, Reports, Contacts and Settings, but also tucked-away views like the Catalogue and Insurance schedule reports and the Manage modules screen.
• Search your items — the same full-text search as the inventory box, from wherever you are.
• Run common actions quickly.

It's the quickest route around Gubbins once you know your way — no reaching for the menu.

Screens that have a keyboard shortcut show it beside their name, both here and in the navigation menu — so you pick the shortcut up naturally on your way to clicking the thing.

💡 Tip When you want something specific and don't care which screen it's on, reach for the palette first. It searches items and destinations together, so you often get there in a few keystrokes.

Keyboard shortcuts

A single key press can take you straight to a screen or start a job. Gubbins ships with a small set of shortcuts and lets you change every one of them.

The cheat sheet

Press ? anywhere to see every shortcut that works right now — including the ones that depend on which screen you're on. It's the quickest way to learn what's available, and there's a Change shortcuts button on it that takes you straight to the settings.

💡 Tip The cheat sheet only lists shortcuts that can actually do something. If a module is switched off, or a screen offers no search box, those rows simply aren't there.

Going to a screen

Shortcut	What it does
F1	Open your Inventory
F2	Open the Dashboard
F3	Open Projects
F4	Open Purchase orders
G then R	Open Reports
G then C	Open Contacts
G then B	Open Bookings
G then U	Open Upcoming
G then A	Open Activity
G then L	Open Alerts
Ctrl + /	Open the command palette
Ctrl + ,	Open Settings
?	Show the shortcut cheat sheet

Two-key sequences are written with a space: G then R means press G, let go, then press R. They exist because there simply aren't enough comfortable single keys to give every screen one. Pressing G on its own does nothing visible — it just waits a moment for the second key, and forgets about it if you don't press one.

Shortcuts that depend on where you are

Two shortcuts mean whatever the screen in front of you says they mean:

Shortcut	What it does
N	New — adds an item on Inventory, creates a project on Projects, starts an order on Purchase orders
/	Focus the search box on the current screen

On a screen that offers neither, the key is left alone and behaves normally.

Actions you can bind

These ship without a key so the default set stays small, but they're in the list ready for you to give them one: Add item, Start a scan, New project, New purchase order, Toggle full width and Toggle light/dark.

Changing a shortcut

Where to find it: Settings → Keyboard shortcuts, or the Change shortcuts button on the cheat sheet.

Each row shows its current key. Select it, then press the combination you want — you don't type it out. To record a sequence, press a second key straight after the first and the shortcut is extended for you. Press Escape to back out without changing anything, or use the × beside a row to remove its shortcut altogether. Reset to defaults puts the whole list back.

If you give two actions the same key, both are marked with a warning and the one higher in the list wins — and the row offers to unbind the other action so you can settle it in one go. Turning the Keyboard shortcuts switch off hands every key back to your browser.

Ready-made schemes

Rather than rebinding a dozen rows by hand, pick a shortcut scheme and apply it:

• Gubbins default — the set described above.
• Vim-flavoured — g-prefixed sequences for every screen, / to search, and i / o for creating things.

Applying a scheme replaces every shortcut, and you can still adjust any individual row afterwards.

Do shortcuts follow me between devices?

Your shortcuts are saved on this device, and they're included in a backup — so restoring onto a new machine brings them with you.

ℹ️ Note Shortcuts never fire while you're typing in a text box, or while a dialog is open — so they can't interrupt you mid-edit.

⚠️ Heads-up A few keys belong to your browser and can't be reassigned: F5 (reload), F11 (fullscreen), F12 (developer tools), and chords like Ctrl + W. Gubbins will tell you if you try one.

Keyboard & accessibility

Gubbins is built to be driven by keyboard and assistive technology throughout:

• Skip-to-content link to bypass navigation.
• Focus trapping in dialogs, with focus restored on close.
• Arrow-key navigation in the location tree and menus.
• Live announcements for status changes, and accessible, associated form errors.
• Reduced-motion support — all decorative animation respects your system setting.

ℹ️ Note Because the palette and shortcuts respect your enabled modules, you'll only be offered destinations and actions that are actually switched on.

Related pages

• Search overview — the search behind the palette.
• Modular UI — what the palette can reach.
• Appearance & theming — reduced-motion and other accessibility aids.