Woohoo! It seems that this is already possible! I just read this comment on an SO question
http://askubuntu.com/questions/124815/how-do-i-enable-emacs-keybindings- in-google-chrome#comment332725_233539 System Settings - Keyboard - Shortcuts tab - Windows section - Disable "Activate the window menu" Although this is only alt+space initially, disabling it removes all the alt+<key> window menu shorcuts. Since this is the case, this bug report can be aimed at making that description clearer. -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Desktop Packages, which is subscribed to nautilus in Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1113420 Title: Alt+<key> window menu shortcuts cannot be disabled Status in “nautilus” package in Ubuntu: New Bug description: I find the <alt> key ergonomically very useful (it can be pressed with a thumb without moving any of the "letter" fingers) and I would like to use it for many custom keyboard shortcuts (there is a reason why it plays such a big role in Emacs and the whole OS X for that matter). Currently, though, <alt> is hardcoded to activate window menu entries (such as <alt>+F for the file menu, <alt>+E for the edit menu) and there is no way to surpass this functionality in all the applications. Personally, I find these shortcuts quite useless - they take you to "copy", "paste", and "open file" which have standard shortcuts anyway (with the exception of preferences, which for some reason don't have a standardized shortcut even though that's often the only thing a person looks for up there). Expected behaviour ----------------------------- What I would like to see is a global option to disable these alt+<key> menu shortcuts to free up the <alt> key for other uses (similar to the option already available in gnome-terminal, only global). Preferably, activating this option would also remove the first-letter underlining in the menu to indicate to users that they can't acess it through shortcuts. (I marked nautilus for apport to collect my version numbers, but this affects most applications - didn't know what the right target is) ProblemType: Bug DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.10 Package: nautilus 1:3.5.90.really.3.4.2-0ubuntu4.1 ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.5.0-23.35-generic 3.5.7.2 Uname: Linux 3.5.0-23-generic x86_64 ApportVersion: 2.6.1-0ubuntu10 Architecture: amd64 Date: Sat Feb 2 13:22:32 2013 ExecutablePath: /usr/bin/nautilus GsettingsChanges: b'org.gnome.nautilus.window-state' b'geometry' b"'931x626+1+80'" b'org.gnome.nautilus.window-state' b'start-with-status-bar' b'true' InstallationDate: Installed on 2012-10-19 (106 days ago) InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.10 "Quantal Quetzal" - Release amd64 (20121017.5) MarkForUpload: True SourcePackage: nautilus UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install) To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/nautilus/+bug/1113420/+subscriptions -- Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages Post to : desktop-packages@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
