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Is it possible to assign a menu key to File/Open Recent?

It seems that Nisus Writer Express will only help me assign a key command to Open Recent/Clear Menu.

Do you mean that you want to assign a keyboard shortcut to a particular file in the Open Recent menu? For example, File > Open Recent > My Life With Banana Slugs? If so, you are correct that this is not possible.

The reason for this is actually a little bit esoteric: Apple manages the Open Recent menu for most applications (including Nisus Writer) and for some reason they do not implement it using standard menu items. Instead they chose to implement it using some special internal code that doesn't use normal menus but fakes them instead. I'm not sure why they did this, but it prevents Nisus Writer's keyboard shortcuts from interfacing with those items.

If you'd like to assign a keyboard shortcut to a recently (or often) accessed file, I'd recommend you use the menus on File > Open From Document Manager instead. There we provide our own recently opened file list, plus a variety of other categories, which can include any custom fixed document lists you'd like to populate.

Thanks for your answer, Martin. Please let me clarify. I want to be able to get to File/Open Recent strictly from the keyboard. I was hopeful that NWE would allow me to do that simply. In System Preferences/Keyboard /Keyboard Shortcuts/Keyboard Text & Input, there is a default system command (^F2) to "Move the focus to the menu bar." Actually, that does not work for me, but I successfully changed it to ^Option Command m (m for menu bar), which works system wide. It's not a great help because I still must use the right arrow key to get to File and then the down arrow key to get to Open Recent, the right arrow key to get to the recently opened file list, and finally the down arrow key to pick the file. Perhaps I could write an AppleScript to accomplish this or more likely, I'll just continue to take my hands off the keyboard and use the mouse to select Open Recent.

All is clear now Harvey, but unfortunately you can't assign keyboard shortcuts for menus that are intermediates along the path, sorry.

I don't know if it would be any faster than your other workaround, but you could summon the Document Manager window using a keyboard shortcut, and then use combinations of the tab and arrow keys to access the Recently Opened file list. If you left the Document Manager window with the recent file list active all the time, this might be pretty convenient, as you'd only have to use the arrow keys at that point (and Return/Enter to open the desired file).

That is a brilliant idea Martin and I will try it for a while. I've set Command-Option-^-d to open the Document Window. It seems to work pretty much as I would like. I can easily select and open recently saved files. Great. Thank you very much!

You can also place Recently Opened in the Toolbar as a Custom Toolbar Item: This allows to use arrow keys (or the first one or more letters of the names of files) to select any file from the list.

Hamid wrote:This allows to use arrow keys (or the first one or more letters of the names of files) to select any file from the list.

I am just trying this. And the arrow keys work. But if I type a letter it always selects Clear Menu…

phspaelti wrote: I am just trying this. And the arrow keys work. But if I type a letter it always selects Clear Menu…

The menu item in question is
File:Open from Document Manager:Recently Opened

Got it.
Hey, that is pretty cool, Hamid.