Keyboard Shortcuts

Refreshing your screens every month — swapping last month's promo for this month's, adding new media to a playlist, adjusting a schedule — can mean a lot of clicking. Keyboard shortcuts in the dashboard at app.bsgn.cc let you jump between pages, find any playlist or playable by name, create, save, confirm forms and add media to a playlist without reaching for the mouse. And with Tab and the arrow keys you can reach every button, list and card in the dashboard.

They're designed so they don't fire by accident:

• Single-key shortcuts (such as ? or N) never react while you're typing in a field, and you can turn them off completely.
• Nothing is deleted by a single key press. Deleting always opens a confirmation dialog, and that dialog can't be confirmed with a shortcut. The same goes for restarting a display, rebooting a device and deactivating a display.
• Shortcuts don't skip the unsaved-changes check. If a page asks before you leave it with unsaved changes, it asks when you leave with a shortcut too, just like when you click away: Keep editing is highlighted, and only Discard changes throws your edits away.

Reading the keys

• Windows and Linux shortcuts use Ctrl. On a Mac, the same shortcuts use ⌘ (Command). Every table on this page lists both.
• On a Mac, ↩ is the return key and ⌫ is the key labelled delete (the one that deletes backwards). fn+⌫ deletes forwards, like Delete on other keyboards — the shortcuts overview shows it as ⌦.
• Ctrl+K means: hold Ctrl and press K. Shift+Del means: hold Shift and press Delete.
• G then P means: press G, let go, then press P. You have about a second and a half for the second key; a small box at the bottom of the page, next to the sidebar, shows that the dashboard is waiting for it.
• Letters are shown as capitals, but you don't hold Shift — just press the key.
• No Home, End, Page Up or Page Down keys on your Mac? Use fn+←, fn+→, fn+↑ and fn+↓.

See all shortcuts

Press ? anywhere in the dashboard (except while a dialog is open) to open the keyboard shortcuts overview. It lists the shortcuts for the place where you opened it: on a playlist you'll see the playlist's shortcuts, inside a side panel you'll see the panel's. They're grouped into sections such as General, Navigation, This page and List, and pages you can't open aren't listed. Press ? again or Esc, or click outside, to close it.

You can also open the overview without the ? key:

• in the command palette — type shortcuts;
• in Account Settings, in the Keyboard shortcuts section — click Show keyboard shortcuts.

That's handy on a tablet, or when you've turned single-key shortcuts off.

Buttons that have a shortcut show it when you point at them, so you can pick up the keys as you go. Screen readers can announce the shortcut, too.

Anywhere in the dashboard

If there's nothing you can create where you are — for example while you're browsing a read-only department — N shows a short note instead of the palette.

Go to a page

Press G, then the letter of the page:

Page shortcuts are paused while a side panel or dialog is open.

The command palette

The command palette is one search box for the whole dashboard. Open it with Ctrl+K (⌘+K on a Mac) or click Search… at the top of the sidebar — on a phone, tap the magnifying glass in the header. Start typing, then press Enter.

From the palette you can:

• Go to a page — every page in your menu, plus Account Settings and Integrations (if you can open them). Pages with a G shortcut show it next to them, unless you've turned single-key shortcuts off.
• Create something — new playlists, displays, groups, locations, playables and users. You land on the right list with its Add new … form already open. You only see what you're allowed to create, and nothing while you're browsing a read-only department. Press N on any page without its own Add new … button to open the palette straight at the Create… list, which shows just these actions — or type create or new in the palette.
• Find content by name — type at least two characters to search the playlists, playables, displays, groups and locations of your current department (up to five of each). If you manage users, people are found by name or email, too.
• Search this documentation — sections of the knowledge base that match what you type are listed at the bottom and open in a new browser tab. See Results from the documentation.
• Switch department — the same list as the department switcher, with your current department and read-only ones marked.
• Everyday actions — change the language, switch between light and dark mode, show the keyboard shortcuts, open this documentation in a new tab, or log out.

With an empty search box, the palette shows your Recent items first, then your pages and the most common actions; everything else appears as you type. The search ignores capitals and accents. Pages, actions, people and the documentation also forgive a small typo; playlists, playables, displays, groups and locations are found when their name contains what you've typed. You can choose what the palette searches.

Recent, Top hits and the order of results

The palette learns from what you open with it:

• Recent (with an empty search box) lists up to eight pages, items and documentation sections you've opened from the palette — the ones you use most often and most recently first. Something you opened once a while ago gradually makes way for what you use regularly. Items from another department are hidden until you switch back to it, and documentation sections only appear in the language you opened them in.
• Top hits appear at the top as soon as you start typing: up to three pages, actions, items or documentation sections you've used lately, where a word of the name starts with what you've typed. They show up straight away, before the search has finished, and aren't repeated further down.
• Within each group, results are ordered by how well they match and how often you use them. Groups you use more move up, too — for example, Actions can come before your pages. Pages and actions always come first, then the content found by searching, and the documentation last.
• Nothing jumps. The order of the groups doesn't change while the palette is open, and results that take a moment to arrive are added below what you already see, so the row you're about to pick doesn't move away.

Choosing a department or a language in the palette counts as using Switch department or Change language; logging out doesn't count. If you rename an item, the palette shows its new name the next time it finds it. Your history is kept only in this browser, separately for each user, and is cleared when you log out.

Removing items from the history. Point at an item under Recent and click the ✕ at its end, or highlight it with the arrow keys and press Shift+Del (⇧+⌫ on a Mac). Clear all, next to the Recent heading, forgets the whole history at once — Recent, Top hits and the learned order of groups start from scratch. Nothing is deleted except the history: the pages and items themselves stay as they are.

How long the history is kept. Anything you haven't opened from the palette for 90 days is forgotten automatically, and the palette remembers at most 150 items — when it's full, the least used ones make way for new ones. The history can't grow forever.

Results from the documentation

Below your other results, the palette lists up to three sections of this knowledge base whose page title, heading or description matches what you've typed — try pairing, invoice or time zone. Each result shows the section and the page it's on. Press Enter (↩ on a Mac) or click it to open the section in a new browser tab.

When the palette finds nothing else — no page, action or item — it shows up to eight sections instead, including ones that only mention your words in their text. So if you're not sure where something is or how it works, just type it.

The documentation results are in your dashboard language.

Choose what the palette searches

In Account Settings, in the Keyboard shortcuts section, Search in the command palette lists everything the palette can search for you: Playlists, Playables, Displays, Groups, Locations, Users and Documentation. You only see the types you're allowed to search — Users, for example, only if you manage users. Untick what you don't need; with nothing ticked, the palette only finds pages and actions. Things you opened earlier can still appear under Recent — remove them with ✕ or Clear all.

Pages and actions are always found. Your choice is saved in this browser and stays after you log out; dashboard tabs you already have open pick it up straight away.

Keys in the palette

The palette doesn't open while a side panel or dialog is open — close that first.

Lists

On Displays, Groups, Locations, Playlists, Playables, Users and Devices:

• N, F and D only work where you can create items: not while you're browsing a read-only department, and N on Users only if you're allowed to invite people. Where the list's own N doesn't work, N anywhere takes over: it opens the Create… list, or tells you that nothing can be created.
• E downloads the file straight away, like its button. D copies a single selected playlist straight away and takes you to the copy. With more than one item selected — a folder counts with everything inside it — it first asks whether to duplicate them, just like the Duplicate button: confirm with Enter or Ctrl+Enter (⌘+↩), or cancel with Esc. See Duplicating playlists.
• On the Departments page, N opens Create department.
• To move through a list and open its rows with the keyboard, see Moving through lists.

Select and delete on Playlists and Playables

• These keys don't react while you're in the search box: there, Ctrl+A selects the search text, and Esc, Backspace and Delete edit it as usual.
• To pick individual items from the keyboard, move to them with the arrow keys and press Space — see Moving around with the keyboard. You can also tick their checkboxes with the mouse.
• Shift+Del (⇧+⌫ on a Mac) works here too, so the same key deletes in lists and on detail pages.
• Delete with nothing selected doesn't change your selection: it asks about the highlighted item only.
• Deleting always asks first, in one dialog with Cancel highlighted. With several items selected, it lists their names (the first five, then how many more). With more than four, Delete works only after a 3-second countdown. If you cancel, nothing is deleted and your selection stays. See Organizing Playlists and The Media Library for what deleting affects.
• In a read-only department, the delete shortcut does nothing. And if your role doesn't let you select media (your playables have no checkboxes), Space doesn't select them and Delete doesn't delete folders.

Detail pages

The page of a single playlist, playable, display, group, location, user, device or department has keys for its buttons. On the page of a playlist, playable, display, group, location or user, and on the Alerts page, Ctrl+S (⌘+S on a Mac) does the same as Save changes and keeps you on the page.

Letter keys and Shift+Delete

• They do what their button does — no more. A key only works while its button is on the page and you can use it, and the overview lists it only then. In a read-only department, for example, Shift+Del does nothing on a playlist, playable, display, group or location, and N just tells you that nothing can be created there.
• Risky actions only open their confirmation. Shift+Del, R and — on an active display — D open the same dialog as their button, with Cancel highlighted — see Dialogs. Activating a display opens its usual dialog, which you confirm as always.
• Not from a field. While you're typing, the letters type and Shift+Del edits the text.

Saving with Ctrl+S and Ctrl+Enter

• No need to click out of a field first. The value you're typing — for example an item's duration — is saved too. With Ctrl+S, the cursor goes back where it was.
• On an app, both shortcuts also save changes you've made to the app's settings.
• Nothing changed? You'll see a short note and nothing is sent. Ctrl+Enter then keeps you on the page, too.
• Read-only department? You'll see a warning and nothing is saved — see Viewing other departments.
• Something invalid? You get the same error as when you click Save changes, and you stay on the page to fix it — also after Ctrl+Enter.
• Pressing it twice doesn't save twice: while a save is running, further presses are ignored. The same goes for a page that's still loading.
• Where Ctrl+Enter does something else. On a drop-down it works like Enter — it opens the list or picks the highlighted option — and doesn't save, so you can finish picking first. On a link — a row of a table, for example — it opens the link in a new browser tab. And in a side panel, it confirms the panel.
• Enter on its own doesn't save a detail page (see the FAQ).

Adding media to a playlist

This is the quickest way to refresh a playlist, for example at the start of a month:

1. Open the playlist: press Ctrl+K (⌘+K), type a few letters of its name, and press Enter.
2. Press A. The media picker opens with the cursor in its search box.
3. Type part of the name of the playable you want.
4. Press ↓ (or Enter) to move into the results.
5. Use the arrow keys to highlight the right playable.
6. Press Enter or Space to add it. The picker stays open, so you can add more — go back to the search box with /, or with ↑ from the top row.
7. Press Esc to close the picker.
8. Press Ctrl+S (⌘+S) to save the playlist. This also works while the picker is still open. Or, once the picker is closed, press Ctrl+Enter (⌘+↩) to save and go back.

Then set durations and repeats as usual — see Creating Playlists.

All the keys of the media picker:

Side panels and dialogs

Side panels

Side panels are the forms that slide in from the right — for example Add new playlist, a new folder, or changing your password.

• When a panel opens, the cursor is usually already in its first field. When it closes, you're back on the button that opened it.
• Esc goes to whatever is open inside the panel first: an open drop-down or tree list closes, and a search box's text is usually cleared. On a drop-down field, the first Esc just leaves the field. Press Esc again to close the panel. Like the panel's close button, Esc closes it without saving what you've filled in.
• If the main button is greyed out (for example, a required field is empty), the confirm shortcuts do nothing.
• On a drop-down, Ctrl+Enter / ⌘+↩ works like Enter — it opens the list or picks the highlighted option — and in a drop-down's search box it does nothing, so the panel isn't confirmed while you're still picking.
• While a file is uploading, Esc and the confirm shortcuts are ignored, so an upload isn't lost by accident. Use the panel's own buttons to stop it or close the panel.
• When one panel opens on top of another (for example, creating a folder while adding a playlist), the keys only affect the top panel.
• Panels without a main button work differently. In the media picker and the playlist item conditions panel, Ctrl+S / ⌘+S saves the playlist you're editing. Ctrl+Enter / ⌘+↩ does nothing in a panel without a main button.
• While a panel is open, the page's shortcuts (G…, the letter keys such as N or A, the command palette) are paused. ? still shows what you can do in the panel.

Dialogs

Dialogs are the small windows in the middle of the screen that ask you to confirm something. On a computer, the bottom of each dialog shows the keys that work in it — a dialog for a risky action offers only Esc to cancel.

• Ordinary dialogs — activating a display, choosing a video output after you pair a device or duplicating several playlists, for example — start with the confirm button highlighted, so Enter or Ctrl+Enter confirms them.
• A dialog that only tells you something — such as the progress of a device reboot — has a single Close button. Enter and Esc both close it.
• When a dialog closes, you're back on the button that opened it.
• When a dialog opens over a side panel — for example Delete folder while you're editing a folder — Esc closes only the dialog. The panel stays open.

Moving around with the keyboard

Everything you can click in the dashboard can also be reached with the keyboard — only reordering a display's groups by dragging needs a mouse.

• Tab and Shift+Tab. Tab moves to the next button, link or field, Shift+Tab to the previous one. Whatever you're on gets a clearly visible outline. The outline only appears when you use the keyboard, not when you click.
• Skip to content. Right after the dashboard loads, the first Tab shows a Skip to content link in the top-left corner. Press Enter on it to skip the sidebar: the next Tab takes you to the first button of the page.
• Opening a page puts you in its content. When you open a page — from the sidebar, with a G shortcut, from the command palette or from a list — the keyboard focus moves to the start of the new page, so the next Tab goes into the page instead of back through the sidebar.
• Side panels and dialogs keep the focus inside. While one is open, Tab and Shift+Tab go round its fields and buttons and never wander off to the page behind it.
• Read-only departments. Tab skips the buttons and fields you can't change while you're browsing a read-only department.
• Sorting and pages of a table. Column headings you can sort by are buttons — Tab to one and press Enter or Space to sort by it. The page numbers below a table work the same way.

Moving through lists

A list — Displays, Groups, Locations, Playlists, Users, Devices, the displays on a location's page, the upcoming playables on a display's page, and the history lists in Alerts and Billings — is a single stop for Tab. Tab takes you to one row, and the arrow keys move between rows.

The list remembers your row. When you come back from a detail page — with your browser's Back button or the back arrow at the top of the page — press Tab and you're on the row you opened.

The media library

On Playables, the Back tile, your folders and your media are one grid — again a single stop for Tab:

• The folder menu. On a folder's … button, Enter, Space or ↓ opens the menu, ↑ and ↓ choose Edit or Delete, and Esc closes it.
• On a Mac, ⌫ never deletes in the media library — it goes up a folder, just like in the media picker. To delete, use ⌘+⌫ or fn+⌫.
• When you come back from a playable's page, Tab takes you to the playable you opened — inside its folder, too.
• The folder path above the grid and the switch for searching all media files can be reached with Tab as well.

The Overview

On the Overview, the cards of displays awaiting pairing and the cards of devices that need your attention work the same way: each group is one stop for Tab. Move between the cards with the arrow keys, jump with Home / End, and press Enter to open one (Ctrl+Enter / ⌘+↩ for a new tab). The cards with counts and their Add new … buttons are ordinary stops for Tab. When you come back, Tab takes you to the card you opened.

Menus, drop-downs and other controls

• The menu of page buttons on narrow screens. In a narrow window, the buttons at the top of a page (such as Add new … or Delete …) are tucked into a menu button. Enter or Space opens it and moves to the first item, Tab moves through the items, and Esc closes the menu and takes you back to the menu button. The page's letter shortcuts work whether the buttons are visible or in the menu.
• Drop-downs where you pick several items — for example a display's groups, or the displays of a group. Enter, Space or ↓ opens the list with the cursor in its search box. Type to narrow it down, then press ↓ to move into the options and ↑ ↓ to move between them. Space ticks or unticks an option and keeps the list open; Enter ticks or unticks it and closes the list; Esc closes the list. Each chosen item has a ✕ you can reach with Tab — press Enter on it to remove the item.
• Uploading a file. In Add new playable, Tab to the upload area and press Enter or Space to choose a file.
• Tabs on Billings. Tab takes you to the selected tab; ← and → switch tabs, Home and End jump to the first and last one.
• Your company details on Billings. After Edit, the cursor is in the first field. Enter in a field saves the details (except in the EU VAT ID field), Ctrl+S (⌘+S) saves too, and Esc closes the form without saving. See Payment and company details.
• Renaming a department. After Rename, type the new name: Enter saves it, Esc cancels. Either way, you're back on Rename — unless the name can't be saved, in which case the cursor stays in the field so you can fix it.

Turn off single-key shortcuts

Shortcuts made of a single letter or symbol — ?, /, the G page shortcuts, and the letter keys N, F, E, D, A and R — are the quickest, but also the easiest to trigger by accident, and they can get in the way of speech input or other assistive tools. To turn them off:

1. Open Account Settings — from the Settings page, or type account in the command palette.
2. In the Keyboard shortcuts section, untick Single-key shortcuts.

The same switch is at the bottom of the shortcuts overview.

Everything else keeps working: shortcuts with Ctrl or ⌘ (the command palette, saving, save and go back, confirming, select all), Shift+Del on detail pages and in lists, Esc, Enter, Space, Tab, the arrow keys, Delete and Backspace in lists and the media library, and the keys inside the command palette and the media picker (except /). Buttons stop showing the letter keys when you point at them. With single-key shortcuts off, open the overview from Account Settings or the command palette.

Good to know

• Typing is safe. Single-key shortcuts — and Esc, Delete and Shift+Del on lists and detail pages — never react while you're typing in a text field, search box or drop-down. Shortcuts with Ctrl or ⌘ do work there; that's what they're for. Two exceptions: in a search box, Ctrl+A / ⌘+A selects the text rather than the list items, and on a drop-down, Ctrl+Enter doesn't confirm a side panel or save a detail page (see Side panels).
• Any keyboard layout. Letter shortcuts follow the letters printed on your keyboard, so on a French AZERTY keyboard A is the key labelled A. ? and / work however your layout types them, even when that needs Shift (as on Czech, German or French keyboards). On non-Latin layouts, such as Cyrillic, letter shortcuts use the key's position on an English keyboard. No shortcut uses Ctrl+Alt or AltGr, so typing special characters never triggers one.
• Phones and tablets. On touch screens the key hints are hidden — in buttons, side panels and dialogs alike — and side panels don't place the cursor in a field by themselves, so the on-screen keyboard doesn't pop up. With a keyboard attached, the shortcuts work as usual — open the overview from Account Settings or the command palette.
• Your browser's own shortcuts stay. While you're signed in, the dashboard takes over only Ctrl+S and Ctrl+K (⌘+S and ⌘+K), select all on the Playlists and Playables lists, Ctrl+Enter (⌘+↩) on detail pages with Save and go back — on a link it still opens a new tab — and / on pages with a search box, where it jumps to that box (in Firefox, instead of Quick Find). New tab, close tab, find and the rest work as always.
• Where shortcuts aren't available. The sign-in pages (including setting up two-factor authentication) and the Fullscreen live preview of a display (see Display preview) have no dashboard shortcuts.

FAQ

Why doesn't Enter save a detail page?

That's on purpose. A detail page has many fields, and an Enter pressed in one of them shouldn't save half-finished changes. Use Ctrl+S (⌘+S on a Mac) to save and stay, or Ctrl+Enter (⌘+↩) to save and go back. In side panels, Enter in a single-line field does confirm, because a side panel is a short form with a single purpose.

Why didn't Esc close the side panel?

Esc went to something inside the panel first: an open drop-down or list, a search box with text in it, or a drop-down field the cursor was on. Press Esc again. If a file is uploading, Esc is ignored so the upload isn't lost — wait for it to finish or stop it with the panel's button. When panels are stacked, Esc closes only the top one.

I pressed Ctrl+K and my browser's search or address bar opened instead of the palette.

The keyboard focus was outside the dashboard page — in the address bar, a browser panel, or an embedded preview (such as a web page or display preview). Click an empty spot on the page and try again. The palette isn't available on the sign-in pages. With a side panel or dialog open, Ctrl+K does nothing at all — close it first.

Why did Ctrl+S or Ctrl+Enter show a message instead of saving?

Either nothing has changed or you're browsing a read-only department — or, with Ctrl+S, the page has nothing to save (a list, for example; Ctrl+Enter simply does nothing there). The message tells you which, and you stay on the page. If the page is still loading or already saving, the key press is simply ignored.

I pressed Delete without selecting anything, and a confirmation appeared.

On Playlists and Playables, Delete with nothing selected asks about the row, playable or folder you've highlighted with the keyboard. Cancel is highlighted, so Enter or Esc closes the dialog without deleting anything.

On my Mac, ⌫ goes up a folder in the media library instead of deleting.

That's on purpose: in the media library and the media picker, ⌫ goes up a folder, as it does in many file browsers. To delete, press ⌘+⌫ or fn+⌫.

How do I get past the sidebar quickly?

After you open a page, you're already past it: the next Tab goes into the page. Right after the dashboard loads, the first Tab shows Skip to content — press Enter on it.

On my Mac, Tab skips buttons, links and list rows.

That's a setting of your Mac, not of the dashboard. In Safari, turn on Press Tab to highlight each item on a webpage in Safari's Advanced settings — or press ⌥+Tab instead of Tab. In other browsers, turn on Keyboard navigation in the Keyboard section of your Mac's System Settings.

A shortcut doesn't do anything. What's wrong?

Press ? to see what works right where you are. The usual reasons: single-key shortcuts are turned off, a side panel or dialog is open, the cursor is in a text field, the button the key belongs to isn't available right now (D on Playlists, for example, needs a selection), or your role or a read-only department doesn't allow the action.

Keyboard shortcuts don't work at all in my browser.

They need an up-to-date browser. In very old versions (for example, Safari older than 16.4) the shortcuts are switched off, though you can still move through lists and the media picker with the arrow keys and everything else works normally — the Search… button still opens the command palette. Update your browser to get the shortcuts.

Can I turn off the documentation results in the palette?

Yes. In Account Settings, in the Keyboard shortcuts section, untick Documentation under Search in the command palette — see Choose what the palette searches. Opening the documentation stays available among the palette's actions.

Can I change the shortcuts?

Not at the moment. You can turn off the single-key shortcuts if they get in your way.

Does turning off single-key shortcuts affect my team?

No. It only applies to the browser you changed it in, on that device — though anyone else who signs in on that same browser gets it too.

Need help?

If a shortcut doesn't behave the way this page describes, press ? to check what's available where you are, and see Your Account Settings for the rest of your personal settings. Still stuck? Contact our support team — we'll be glad to help.