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Efficient Xcode Interface Shortcut Tips

Introduction

A colleague came over to review my code and sighed, "Your screen is completely taken up by navigation bars, toolbars, and the debug area — doesn't that feel cramped?" I fumbled around pressing command+0 frantically to adjust things. Then it occurred to me: it would be great to have some way to quickly switch between different modes — for example, maximizing the editor area in editing mode, and automatically showing the debug area in debug mode.

Areas and Shortcuts

Xcode Interface Areas:

Xcode Interface Areas

  • The Toolbar: Where you select views, run the app, and switch between different layout interfaces.

  • The Navigation Area: Where you navigate your entire project, warnings, errors, etc.

  • The Editing Area: Where all the magic happens, including the Jump Bar above it.

  • The Utility Area: Contains inspectors and various libraries.

  • The Debugging Area: Includes the debug console and variable inspector.

Xcode Keyboard Shortcuts:

First, the modifier keys:

  • command (⌘): Used for navigation and controlling the navigation area.

  • alt/option (⌥): Controls things on the right side, such as the Assistant Editor and utility editor.

  • control (⌃): Interacts with the Jump Bar in the editing area.

Note: the symbol for shift is ⇧.

Combinations with number keys:

  • command 1~8: Jump to different sections of the navigation area.

  • command 0: Show/hide the navigation area.

  • command alt 1~6: Jump between different inspectors.

  • command alt 0: Show/hide the utility area.

  • control command alt 1~4: Jump between different libraries.

  • control 1~6: Jump between different tabs in the Jump Bar.

Keyboard shortcuts

Additional shortcuts:

  • command + enter: Show the standard single-window editor.

  • command alt enter: You can probably guess this one — it opens the Assistant Editor.

  • command + shift + Y: Show/hide the debug area (Y is my code not working?).

Defining Behaviors

Open Behavior preferences via Xcode -> Behaviors -> Edit Behaviors. The left side shows all events, and the right side lists the actions that can be triggered for each event.

Running

Settings for a single screen:

With dual screens, you can move the debug area to the second screen:

Custom

You can also define custom behaviors, which lets you implement the different mode switching I mentioned at the beginning. The only painful part was trying many keyboard combinations before finding ones that worked.

Editing

Pressing command + shift + X enters full-screen editing mode.

Pressing command + control + X exits full-screen editing mode and shows all the toolbars.

Give it a try — it's impressively cool!

Reference:

Supercharging Your Xcode Efficiency

Note: the shortcut diagram in the link above contains errors.