Taming Hot Key Context Shifting When Running A Windows VM In Virtualbox On OSX

Nov 16, 2012   //   by Craig Maslowski   //   Blog  //  No Comments

We do a lot of Windows development on Mac hardware here at Fairway. Some of us prefer to run Windows via Bootcamp while others prefer to run Windows in a Virtualbox VM. Our developers who use a VM constantly have to dance the “hot key context shift” as we move back and forth between OSX and Windows. Which OS are we in? Do I press Ctrl+C or Command+C to copy? This can greatly interrupt our flow when coding.

For those of us used to the Mac hot key combinations, there’s an easy way to remap our keys inside of Windows to behave more like OSX.

First we make sure the Virtualbox host key is set to the Right Command key. To do this, open Virtualbox’s preferences. Change to the Input tab, press the Right Command key, and click Ok.


Next we remap keys in Windows to swap the function of the Left Ctrl and Left Command keys. This is easy to do with an open source program called SharpKeys.


Once the Windows VM is rebooted, we’re able to move between OS’s without having to make that context shift anymore.

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