A key-stroke observer for Svelte, focussed on simplicity
<script>
import Keystroke from "svelte-keystroke";
</script>
<Keystroke on:stroke={ ({ detail }) => console.log(detail) } />
Want to try it out real quick? Here's a basic demo, and here's a busier, comprehensive demo.
Keystroke offers four ways to respond to keyboard input, all through Svelte's on:<foo>
events. The first three are pretty straightfoward.
on:stroke
Reports single, printable characterson:combo
Only reports combinations involving modifier keys (Shift, Control, Alt, and Meta)on:heldKeys
For when you need raw details about which keys are currently depressedThe third option — let's call it "Binding Mode" lets you bind a function to whatever character you like.
on:<key>
Runs the associated function every time the given key is pressed, regardless of its involvement as part of a stroke or comboFor examples, see on:Enter
, on:Escape
, on:q
, & on:Q
in the comprehensive demo.
svelte-keystroke pauses whenever the Meta key (⌘ on macOS) is depressed.
This is intentional. Why?
Well, it turns out that the ⌘ key — reported as "Meta" by keydown and keyup events, exibits some funky behaviors, that make it rather torturous to work with. In this first release (and perhaps indefinitely), svelte-keystroke
"handles" this weirdness by simply pausing operations until the ⌘/Meta key is lifted again.
As compared with most js keystroke-handling libraries, svelte-keystroke
's most obvious feature is that it's a Svelte* component.
*If you're not using Svelte, stop reading now and go play for a few minutes!.
svelte-keydown
svelte-keystroke
owes its basic design to svelte-keydown
, and there's significant overlap between the two.
Same
on:<key>
…e.g., on:Enter
, on:Tab
Similar
These events behave in similar ways, with the differences best observed by experimenting in the REPL:
on:key
≈ keystroke: on:stroke
on:combo
≈ keystroke; on:combo
Unique to svelte-keystroke
on:heldKeys
Why svelte-keystroke?
> TL;DR — It does exactly what I need it to, no more, no less.
I was working on a Svelte app (link TBD) — a typing trainer, with the need to directly manage basic ASCII input (letters & basic punctuation), as well as keyboard combinations like Control+R. svelte-keydown
seemed perfect at first, but there were subtle issues that made it unsuitable for my specific needs. (Don't ask what issues…I've since forgotten.) But it was close!
Luckily, svelte-keydown
is simple enough that it was fairly trivial to create my own component and make it do exactly what I want. Now, as I prepare to for the first release of that typing app, I'm pausing to separate out this generic component. It works for me, but ymmv. Enjoy!
Title image — "Alone on the keyboard" — slightly modified from the original