January 29, 2012 — Hans

Show Keyboard Accelerators When Needed

Explanation

Keyboard accelerators are letters with an underscore that you see on buttons, labels etc. This feature is very useful for people who prefer to use the keyboard. For example, instead of using your mouse, you can click on OK by pressing Alt+O.

The downside is that it makes applications appear more cluttered. But not anymore. Starting from 4.8 (or did I just not notice this awesome feature until now?), you can configure Oxygen, the default style for KDE applications, to hide keyboard accelerators until you hold down the Alt key, or make them disappear completely.

So how do I do that?

Open the System Settings module to configure Style

(System Settings → (Common Appearance and Behavior →) Application Appearance → Style)

(System Settings → (Common Appearance and Behavior →) Application Appearance → Style) Make sure you’ve selected the widget style “ Oxygen “

“ Click on Configure…

Click on Show Advanced Configuration Options

In the first tab (General), select an option for Keyboard accelerators visibility Show Keyboard Accelerators When Needed (only shown when holding down Alt) Always Hide Keyboard Accelerators

Click on OK (or press Alt+O if you want to be fancy)

Enjoy your underline-free applications!