Docs / Switching and shortcuts
Switching and shortcuts
DeskSay gives you several ways to reach a desktop: open the Board and pick one, say its name, press a key you recorded for it, jump back to where you were, click a strip at the top of the screen, or drag a window onto the desktop it belongs on. This page lists them all and explains how a switch behaves once you ask for one.
Every way to switch
The menu bar dropdown also lists your desktops and switches to the one you pick. See the menu bar.
Per-desktop shortcuts
A per-desktop shortcut takes you to one named desktop with one key press, with no Board and no speaking. You record them in Settings, Desktops, in a recorder beside each name. Record the combination there and it is stored against that desktop.
Some combinations belong to macOS already. Control and a number is the obvious example. DeskSay refuses those and shows you a message saying so, rather than recording a shortcut that would never fire.
You should seeThe recorder fill with the keys you pressed, beside the name of the desktop it belongs to.
Names, aliases, icons and colours are set in the same part of Settings. See naming desktops.
Jump Back
Jump Back returns you to the desktop you were on before the last switch. It is useful when you have gone somewhere to check one thing and want to carry on where you were.
There are two ways to trigger it. You can give it its own shortcut, or you can press the Board shortcut twice within 350 milliseconds. Two quick presses of Option and 1 take you back; one press still opens the Board as usual. Jump Back is also in the menu bar dropdown.
Instant switching
macOS normally slides the screen sideways when you change desktop. Instant switching skips that. DeskSay posts a synthetic Dock swipe, so the desktop changes without the animation, in about 200 milliseconds. It needs Accessibility permission.
With instant switching off, or when the swipe fails, DeskSay switches the normal animated way instead. You still arrive at the right desktop, it just takes the usual slide to get there.
Return the pointer afterwards
The swipe acts on the display under the pointer, not on the display you were looking at. So when you switch a desktop on another screen, DeskSay moves the pointer to that display for a moment to make the swipe land, then puts it back where it was. That is what the "Return the pointer afterwards" setting does.
If your desktops are linked across displays, one name moves both screens at once, the pointer's display first. See more than one display.
Drag a window to another desktop
You can send a window to another desktop while you are dragging it. Start dragging the window, hold Option, and the Board opens on every display as a drop surface. Move the pointer over the desktop you want and release. The window goes there.
The key is a setting: Option, Shift or Control, whichever suits the rest of your habits. If you would rather not have the full Board appear mid-drag, Settings, Switching offers a one-row strip as the alternative drop surface. Dragging a window needs Accessibility permission.
If it does not workCheck that DeskSay has Accessibility permission, and that the modifier you are holding is the one DeskSay is set to use.
The notch strip
Push the pointer to the top of the screen and hold it there for a quarter of a second. A strip of that screen's desktops appears: under the notch on a MacBook that has one, and as a pill at the top of the screen elsewhere. Click a desktop in the strip to switch to it.
The strip shows the desktops of the screen you are hovering, so on a multi-display setup each screen gives you its own. A setting limits the strip to the built-in display if you only want it on the laptop.
The Mission Control key
F3 opens Mission Control by default. DeskSay can take it over so that F3 opens the Board instead, which is a setting you turn on rather than something DeskSay does uninvited.
Mission Control itself is still reachable. Control and Up opens it as always. F3 with a modifier held is left alone, so anything you have bound on top of F3 keeps working. This option needs Accessibility permission.
What needs Accessibility
Three things on this page need Accessibility permission: instant switching, dragging a window to another desktop, and the F3 option. Without it, switching still works the normal animated way, and every other route on this page (the Board, a spoken name, a recorded shortcut, Jump Back, the notch strip) is unaffected. Permissions are listed in Settings.