I spilled coffee on a vintage Mac keyboard that I bought off eBay and really loved. It stopped working. Tragedy.

I ordered a new one but it won’t come for a week, so I bought a twelve dollar PC keyboard at Walmart. I told myself I’d never use one of these PC keyboards on my Mac and hack it to work, but maybe “confident beliefs, loosely held” applies.

I had to change Mac settings to switch around the “Windows” and “Alt” keys to map to normal Mac keys properly, and it does mostly eliminate the annoyance of using a PC keyboard on a Mac.

I am still a curmudgeon about having to do it and it feels icky, but it’s only temporary.

Steps:

1.  → System Settings → Keyboard → Keyboard Shortcuts → Modifier Keys

2. Select keyboard – select the external keyboard from select box – if using an external attached to a laptop be careful not to switch the laptop’s keyboard

3. Commands to switch: Option -> Command; Command -> Option (basically just flip these around)

I then printed little labels on paper and pasted them over the keys to make me feel like this is a Mac keyboard. (See resources below to copy my label)

I realize AI can deliver better “how tos” than this and writing this up may be a waste, but I am doing it anyway as a form of punishment for me spilling coffee.

Resources:

Google Doc for labels: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ghYtu4MMaWSGn3He0nXThw7t5ZQZcscfLaPPVqZsXNI/edit?usp=sharing