How can create a keyboard shortcut for trimming or uniting / merging that actually works?

Forum|Forum|13 days ago
March 23, 2026
2 replies
53 views

All of my other keyboard shortcuts work 100% of the time, but I cannot get the ‘effects / pathfinder’ sets to work. I’ve tried every combo, but I cannot get divide, trim, unite / merge to work. Can you assist, please?

how-to

Correct answer DavGraphArt

@DavGraphArt Back story, I’m creating all new shortcuts for my 32 button Elgato Stream Deck… The deck has exceeded my expectations and I love how it switches keyboard shortcuts automatically as I jump between apps.

After taking a beat, I realized that I was trying to cleanly stuff the Pathfinder window options (shape modes and pathfinders) into the standard keyboard shortcut, which is not an option.

However, you can also create keyboard shortcuts for Actions as well. I forgot that I had already set up more than a dozen actions, but I preferred to use the button mode instead.

After this realization, I assigned new keyboard shortcuts to my Pathfinder Actions and everything works perfectly. Thanks to the universe. Stay Gold, Kurt! 👍

CarlosCanto

Community Expert

I would have loved being @Kurt Gold’s apprentice

Kurt Gold

Community Expert

Does that mean that the custom shortcuts do not work at all or does it mean that you don’t get the expected result when using the shortcuts.

If the latter, do you get any warning message and, if so, what does it say?

DavGraphArtAuthor

Participant

Hey KG,

Only the Effects / Pathfinder shortcuts don’t work. All the other custom shortcuts do work. I’ve tried configuring them to different keys to no avail. I’ve never received a message.

Kurt Gold

Community Expert

So you are applying the corresponding Pathfinder effects to groups or layers via custom shortcuts and nothing happens at all?

I also use custom shortcuts for Pathfinder effects and they all work as expected.

Can you please do a litte experiment:

Assign a custom shortcut to the Pathfinder effect “Unite”.
Draw two stroked, but unfilled overlapping circles and group them.
Select the grouped circles and apply the custom Pathfinder effect shortcut.

What happens?

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