codewhale/docs/KEYBINDINGS.md

Keybindings

This is the source-of-truth catalog of every keyboard shortcut the TUI recognizes. Bindings are grouped by context — the focus or modal state they fire in. A binding listed under "Composer" only takes effect when the composer is focused; one under "Transcript" only when the transcript has focus; and so on.

Bindings are not (yet) user-configurable — tracked for a future release (#436, #437). This document is the contract that future config-file overrides will name into.

Global (any context)

Chord	Action
F1 or Ctrl-?	Toggle the help overlay
Ctrl-K	Open the command palette (slash-command finder)
Ctrl-C	Cancel current turn / dismiss modal / arm-then-confirm quit
Ctrl-D	Quit (only when the composer is empty)
Tab	Cycle TUI mode: Plan → Agent → YOLO → Plan
Shift-Tab	Cycle reasoning effort: off → high → max → off
Ctrl-R	Open the resume-session picker
Ctrl-L	Refresh / clear the screen
Ctrl-T	Toggle the file-tree sidebar
Esc	Close topmost modal · cancel slash menu · dismiss toast

Composer

Editing the message you're about to send.

Chord	Action
Enter	Send the message (or run the slash command)
Alt-Enter / Ctrl-J	Insert a newline without sending
Ctrl-U	Delete to start of line
Ctrl-W	Delete previous word
Ctrl-A / Home	Move to start of line
Ctrl-E / End	Move to end of line
Ctrl-← / Alt-←	Move backward one word
Ctrl-→ / Alt-→	Move forward one word
Ctrl-V / Cmd-V	Paste from clipboard (also bracketed-paste auto-handled)
Ctrl-Y	Yank (paste) from kill buffer
↑ / ↓	Cycle composer history (also selects popup/attachment items)
Ctrl-P / Ctrl-N	Cycle composer history (alternative)
Ctrl-S	Stash current draft (/stash list, /stash pop to recover)
Alt-R	Search prompt history (Alt-R to exit)
Tab	Slash-command / @-mention completion (popup-aware)
Ctrl-O	Open external editor for the composer draft

@ mentions

Type @<partial> to open the file mention popup. ↑/↓ cycle the entries, Tab or Enter accepts. Esc hides the popup. As of v0.8.10 (#441), completions are re-ranked by mention frecency — files you mention often + recently float to the top.

# quick-add (memory)

When [memory] enabled = true, typing # foo and pressing Enter appends foo as a timestamped bullet to your memory file without sending a turn. See docs/MEMORY.md.

Transcript (when transcript has focus)

Chord	Action
↑ / ↓ / j / k	Scroll one line (v0.8.13+: bare arrows also scroll when composer empty)
PgUp / PgDn	Scroll one page
Home / g	Jump to top
End / G	Jump to bottom
Esc	Return focus to composer
y	Yank selected region to clipboard
v	Begin / extend visual selection
o	Open URL under cursor (OSC 8 capable terminals)

Sidebar (when sidebar has focus)

Chord	Action
↑ / ↓ / j / k	Move selection
Enter	Activate the selected item (open / focus / cancel)
Tab	Cycle to next sidebar panel (Files → Tasks → Agents → Todos)
Esc	Return focus to composer

Slash-command palette (after Ctrl-K or typing /)

Chord	Action
↑ / ↓	Move selection
Enter / Tab	Run / complete the highlighted command
Esc	Dismiss palette

Approval modal (when a tool requests approval)

Chord	Action
y / Y	Approve once
a / A	Approve all (auto-approve subsequent calls)
n / N / Esc	Deny
e	Edit the approved input before running

Onboarding (first-run flow)

Chord	Action
Enter	Advance to next step (Welcome → Language → API → …)
Esc	Step back one screen
1–5	Pick a language (Language step)
y / Y	Trust the workspace (Trust step)
n / N	Skip the trust prompt

v0.8.13 audit notes

• Ctrl-S is stash, not history search. Fixed in this revision — Alt-R is history search.
• Phantom Alt+Up removed. The "Edit last queued message" binding was listed in README but never existed in the key dispatch code.
• Bare Up/Down arrows scroll transcript when composer empty (v0.8.13). Previously the should_scroll_with_arrows gate was hardcoded to false, meaning bare arrows always navigated composer history even when the composer was empty. Users in virtual terminals (Ghostty, Codex, Kitty-protocol) were especially affected because they couldn't use Cmd+Up / Alt+Up shortcuts.
• Configurable keymap (#436) and tui.toml (#437) remain deferred. The TuiPrefs struct and loader exist in settings.rs but are not wired at startup. The named-binding registry that would let ~/.deepseek/tui.toml override individual entries is still pending.
• No other broken bindings found. Every other chord listed above resolves to a live handler in crates/tui/src/tui/ui.rs (key-event dispatch) or crates/tui/src/tui/app.rs (mode + state transitions).