Desktop Keys
On a clear desktop, the keyboard steers the wallpaper: plain keys, no modifiers (in the Mac App Store edition, most of them with Command - see below), for as long as you hold them. They act on the display under the pointer.
A clear desktop
The desktop is clear when no app window covers it: you see your cameras, your desktop icons and widgets, and nothing else. To get there:
- Click the wallpaper - macOS moves the windows aside (if it does not, set System Settings ▸ Desktop & Dock ▸ Click wallpaper to show desktop - on macOS 15 Click wallpaper to reveal desktop - to Always).
- Press F11 (on many keyboards fn-F11), or spread your thumb and three fingers apart on the trackpad - macOS's Show Desktop.
- Switch to a Space that has no windows.
- Use Full Screen: the cameras cover everything, and the keys work there too.
Click a window, or press F11 again, and your windows come back - the keys are your apps' again.
| Key | Action |
|---|---|
| ← → ↑ ↓ | Move around in the picture, or turn the view or the camera, while held |
| + / - | Zoom in / out while held |
| 0 | Back to the start: the whole picture, or a 360° camera's widest view |
| Option with the keys above | A PTZ camera itself: turn it, zoom its lens, Option-0 sends it Home |
| 1 … 9 | Switch to the camera with that number in the menu bar panel |
| ` (§) | Switch to All Cameras - the key left of 1; press it again to go back to the camera before |
In the Mac App Store edition, hold Command on a clear desktop with every key above except the arrows: Command-1 … 9, Command-+, Command--, Command-0 and Command with the key left of 1. macOS keeps the plain keys that type for the app you are in. In Full Screen the plain keys work in both editions.
+, - and 0 are the keys that type them in your keyboard layout; the key that types + also zooms in without Shift (on a US keyboard: =). The numeric keypad's +, -, 0 and digits work too.
When the keys work
The keys are PanoPaper's only while you are not using a window:
- At least one display has a clear desktop showing a camera or All Cameras - after Show Desktop (clicking the wallpaper, F11, a hot corner, or spreading your thumb and three fingers on the trackpad), or on a Space with no windows - and the cameras are not hidden.
- The app in front has no window open on any display, and nothing floats above the windows: no Spotlight, no launcher, no open menu.
So typing in an app - on this display or another - is never affected. When you open Spotlight, the keys are Spotlight's again right away.
In Full Screen the keys work too, on every display that shows a camera.
The arrows, +, - and 0 steer the display under the pointer if its desktop is clear and it shows a camera - not All Cameras' grid, which has no single camera to steer. The numbers switch the display under the pointer if its desktop is clear, even if it shows no camera yet.
What the keys move
- An ordinary camera - the arrows move around in the zoomed picture, up to half the display a second; + and - zoom in and out, up to twice as close every second and up to 8 times in all. The camera itself is not touched. See Zooming and Looking Around.
- A flattened 360° camera - the arrows turn and tilt the view; + and - zoom. 'Slowly look around' waits while you steer, and carries on three seconds after. See 360° Cameras.
- A PTZ camera - digitally, like an ordinary camera. With Option held, the camera itself turns and zooms, for everyone who watches it and in its recordings, if your account may move it; Option-0 sends it Home. See PTZ Cameras.
The arrows, + and - start gently, so a quick tap makes a small adjustment, and speed up while you hold them - to full speed within a moment. Let go, and the view glides to a stop. 0 glides back to the start just as gently.
Where you steer to is remembered, just like changes made in the Displays preview.
Switching cameras with 1 to 9
The first nine cameras in the menu bar panel show a number. Press it on a clear desktop and the display under the pointer switches to that camera - in the Web Edition, on the Space you are looking at. A box on the screen names the camera, with "Connecting…" under the name until its picture shows.
- On a clear desktop, each picture shows its camera's name and number - a display showing one camera lists every camera along the bottom, with its key (Settings ▸ General ▸ Video turns either off).
- On a display showing All Cameras, each tile shows its number and its camera's name; the number switches to that camera, and the key left of 1 brings the grid back.
- An offline camera is not chosen; the flash says "camera is offline".
- A number with no camera just beeps.
- The key left of 1 shows All Cameras: every camera at once. On most keyboards it is `; on UK, German, French and other European keyboards it is § or ^. The All Cameras picture in the menu bar panel shows it. Press it again to go back to the camera you watched before. On the numeric keypad, its decimal key (. or ,) does the same.
The numbers follow the panel: NVRs in the order you gave them, each NVR's cameras in the order you gave them in Settings ▸ Cameras. Only signed-in NVRs count, so while one is signed out, the numbers after it move up. A camera that shows both under IP Cameras and under a UniFi NVR counts once, as the IP camera, which also plays its audio: under the NVR in the menu bar panel it has no number, and All Cameras shows it once.
The Finder's desktop icons
While the keys are PanoPaper's, the Finder cannot use them for your desktop icons: the arrow keys do not select icons, and while you rename an icon on a clear desktop, digits, the key left of 1, +, - and the arrow keys do not reach the name.
