Keyboard shortcuts

Everything you can press in an interactive syntic session, and how to change the keys. Type /keybindings in a session for the live list, including any keys you changed.

Ctrl+X Ctrl+E means: press Ctrl+X, release, then press Ctrl+E. On a Mac, Alt is the Option key (see Mac keyboards).

Anywhere

In the prompt box

Menus and pickers

Menus pop up for / commands, @ mentions, command arguments and : emoji. Pickers include /model, /theme, /resume, /rewind, /config, /permissions, /mcp, /plugin and more.

Extra keys in some pickers:

Permission prompts

No single letter approves by default, so a stray keypress never says yes for you.

Questions from the agent

When the agent asks you to choose, use ↑ / ↓ or 1–9, Space to tick options in a multi-choice question, Tab / Shift+Tab to move between questions, Enter to answer and Esc to dismiss.

Transcript view (Ctrl+O)

Vim mode

Turn it on with /vim, the vim row in /config, "vimMode": true, or SYNTIC_VIM_MODE=1. The prompt then starts in normal mode.

To leave insert mode by typing two letters quickly, add for example "vimInsertModeRemaps": { "jk": "<Esc>" } to your settings. The yank register is remembered across sessions (text that looks like a secret is never saved); set "vimRegisterPersist": false to stop that.

Terminal and mouse

Getting Shift+Enter and the Alt shortcuts to work in your terminal (including Option as Meta on a Mac and /terminal-setup) is covered on Terminal setup. How the mouse selects, copies and scrolls in each view, and how to hand it back to your terminal with SYNTIC_DISABLE_MOUSE=1, is on Full-screen mode.

Change the keys

Your own bindings live in ~/.syntic/keybindings.json (or keybindings.json inside SYNTIC_CONFIG_DIR when that is set). The easiest start:

/keybindings edit

This creates the file filled with the current bindings and shows its path. An existing file is never overwritten; you just get its path. Edit and save: the file is checked again on your next key press (at most every 300 ms), so changes apply without a restart. /keybindings on its own shows the live table, including your changes and any problems found.

File format

The simple format groups bindings by context. Each entry maps a key to an action:

{
  "Global": {
    "Alt+M": "Choose model",
    "Ctrl+Q": "Quit"
  },
  "Composer": {
    "Ctrl+E": "Edit in $EDITOR",
    "Alt+S": "chat:stash"
  },
  "_comment": "Keys starting with _ or $ are ignored, so you can leave notes."
}

The second format is a list of blocks. It can also remove a key (null) or make a key run a slash command ("command:<name>"):

{
  "bindings": [
    {
      "context": "Composer",
      "bindings": {
        "Ctrl+G": "command:compact",
        "Ctrl+S": null,
        "Alt+Enter": "Insert line break"
      }
    },
    {
      "context": "Global",
      "bindings": { "Alt+R": "command:rewind" }
    }
  ]
}

• A binding replaces whatever that key did in that context.
• null unbinds the key in that context. If nothing was bound there, you get a note saying so.
• command:<name> runs /<name> when the key is pressed, as if you had typed it. The key’s previous action in that context is removed.
• Only the list format understands null and command:. Use one format per file.

Contexts

Bindings live in a context, which says where focus is. A key is looked up in the most specific context first, then in Global.

Context names are not case sensitive. While you are typing free text into a dialog field (for example the note after t on a permission prompt), no key is remapped.

Key names

Write a key as modifiers and one key joined with +, in any order and any letter case: Ctrl+E, alt+enter, Shift+Tab.

Only single keys can be bound. The two-step Ctrl+X sequences (Ctrl+X Ctrl+E, Ctrl+X Ctrl+K, Ctrl+X Ctrl+S) are fixed.

Every action

Write an action by its name (first column) or by its id (second column). Both are matched without regard to case.

Two notes on the table:

• Allow once and Allow always have no key by default, so that no single key approves a tool call by accident. You can bind one yourself, for example {"context": "Approval dialog", "bindings": {"y": "Allow once"}}, but think about whether you want that.
• An action only does something in the context where it makes sense. Binding Approve plan in Composer, for instance, has no effect.

Keys you cannot take

A binding for one of these is refused, and null cannot unbind Ctrl+C or Ctrl+D either.

These are accepted, with a warning, because something else usually gets them first:

When a binding is not accepted

Problems are listed when Syntic Code starts and in /keybindings. The rest of the file still applies.

/keybindings also has a Warnings section for conflicts your file introduces: for example, a key in Composer that now hides a different Global action.