Using the Favorites Toolbar
Global Mapper’s Favorites toolbar offers a convenient alternative for accessing tools quickly and efficiently. By automatically bookmarking recently used actions, and allowing you to create a list of favorite commands and tools, the Favorites toolbar makes it easy to repeat or locate commonly used commands. Additionally, an option in the toolbar allows the setup of custom keyboard shortcuts for further customization of Global Mapper.
The Favorites toolbar has a single dropdown list menu and one adjacent button. The top half of the dropdown list contains favorited, or bookmarked actions and recent actions; the bottom has options to edit the favorites list and set up keyboard shortcuts. The Favorites toolbar button 
executes the action selected in the toolbar’s dropdown menu.
Find the Favorites Toolbar in your Global Mapper interface. The top half of the Favorites dropdown will contain some different options than the image of the Favorites Toolbar on the right.
Recently Used Commands
If you have already worked in Global Mapper, or you have completed the first topics in this course, you may see some actions populating the top of your Favorites dropdown list.
To add a recent command to the dropdown, perform a function in Global Mapper: Click the on-screen text Load Default Data button. After loading the default, or sample data, open the Favorites Toolbar dropdown list again and you should see a new entry: Open Sample Data.
Recording the recent commands in the Favorites dropdown list, Global Mapper makes it easy to repeat an action. For example, if you need to reopen and view the feature measurements, it is much easier to access this recently used action via the Favorites toolbar instead of searching through the Global Mapper menus for this function. To execute a command from the Favorites dropdown list, select the command from the menu and click the Favorites toolbar button or use the Ctrl+Enter keyboard shortcut to run the command.
Setting Up and Managing the Favorites List
The Favorites List allows you to bookmark specific commands in Global Mapper and station them in the Favorites dropdown list as a shortcut. Commands added as Favorites will appear with the Recently Used Commands list in the Favorites dropdown, and the manually added favorites will be denoted with an asterisk.
Follow along with the video below to add a command to the Favorites List. We’ll also cover how to remove commands from the Favorites (this video has no commentary).
As shown, commands can be added to and removed from the Favorites List using the same Set Up Favorites List option from the toolbar dropdown. Once added, commands will remain in the Favorites list until they are removed. So, if you have some commonly used commands you would like to add as favorites in your Global Mapper installation, you can do it now, knowing that you can always edit the list later.
If there are too many items in your Favorites List, you may want to consider returning to the Favorites List set up to edit, or use the Search Favorites List option. Search Favorites List allows you to begin typing the name of a command in the favorites dropdown in order to locate the favorite command you are looking for.
View the short clip below to see how to search the Favorites List and run a command after adding all possible commands to the list (this video has no commentary).
Set Up Favorites Shortcut Keys
Global Mapper contains many built-in keyboard shortcuts that make working with the program easier. The following are some examples:
- Ctrl+O is the shortcut to import a data file
- Ctrl+U unloads all data from a workspace
- Ctrl+S saves the workspace
- F1 opens the program help files
- Alt+G enables the Pan tool
- Alt+D enables the Digitizer tool for feature selection
While there aren’t built-in shortcuts for all the commands in Global Mapper, the program does provide a method to create custom keyboard shortcuts. From the Favorites Toolbar dropdown, the Set Up Favorites Shortcut Keys allows you to create custom shortcuts for any command that can be found in the extensive Global Mapper menus.
Work through the steps below to add a custom keyboard shortcut that you’ll have the chance to use later in the course.
- From the Favorites Toolbar dropdown, select the Set Up Favorites Shortcuts Keys option.
- In the resulting dialog, use the first dropdown menu and select the command for which to create a shortcut, in this workflow select View Properties. Tip: The commands are listed alphabetically, and typing the first letter of the item you are looking for will jump to that section of the list.
- After selecting the command, choose the key to use for the shortcut. The Key dropdown list several options and the checkboxes to the right allow modifiers to be applied. For this shortcut View Properties shortcut select the Equal key with no modifier.
- With the shortcut set up, click the button to Add/Update Shortcut. You should see the custom shortcut populate the window at the top of the dialog box. The dialog box can then be closed as the custom shortcut has been added.
Selecting an existing shortcut key combination for a new shortcut will overwrite the original when the Add/Update Shortcut button is clicked.
As you may have noticed, the list of available commands for custom shortcuts is extensive. Just like the Favorites list, this functionality is best when the commands added are useful to you and will be easily remembered. You can always return to the Shortcut Keys Setup to create more shortcuts or remove a shortcut by selecting it in the top portion of the dialog and using the Delete key on your keyboard.
Note that none of the commands with built-in shortcuts are available for custom shortcut creation. Similarly, no shortcut key options used by a built-in shortcut are able to be selected for a custom shortcut.
Summary
- The Favorites toolbar provides two convenient ways to access frequently used tools: the Favorites list and custom keyboard shortcuts
- The Favorites list will be populated automatically but can also be manually set up
- Custom keyboard shortcuts supplement those that are preconfigured in the software
- Click here for more information