Shortcut Guide V2

[noraa-junker]

Summary of the Pull Request

shortcutguidev2.mp4

PR Checklist

• Closes: Status: [Fluent UX] Shortcut Guide v2 #890 PowerToys Shortcuts in Shortcut Guide #15405 [Shortcut Guide] Shortcuts list [tracker] #179 [Shortcut Guide] Show All Application Shortcuts #129 New feature idea #22419 More programs in the Shortcuts  #31289 Universal shortcut preview #47297 Shortcut Guide: add language options and per-app shortcuts (Photoshop, Office, CAD, etc.) #47464 List all the hotkeys and assignements in a separate tab #44816
• Communication: I've discussed this with core contributors already. If the work hasn't been agreed, this work might be rejected
• Tests: Added/updated and all pass
• Localization: All end-user-facing strings can be localized
• Dev docs: Added/updated
• New binaries: Added on the required places
  • JSON for signing for new binaries
  • WXS for installer for new binaries and localization folder
  • YML for CI pipeline for new test projects
  • YML for signed pipeline
• Documentation updated: If checked, please file a pull request on our docs repo and link it here: [PowerToys] Shortcut Guide V2 docs MicrosoftDocs/windows-dev-docs#5717

Detailed Description of the Pull Request / Additional comments

Work for future PRs:

• Localization of built-in shortcut files
• Further customization (we can wait on user feedback for that)
• Reimplement holding windows key
• Search bar

Images

Recording.2025-10-27.211717.mp4

Validation Steps Performed

[niels9001]

@check-spelling-bot apply updates

[noraa-junker]

@niels9001 Although the spell checker reports errors, the CI check actually passes so this could be merged

[yeelam-gordon]

A couple of practices worth checking before merge:

1. Telemetry regression (0 ETW events in V2 vs. 2 in V1)

V1 emits two ETW events via src/modules/ShortcutGuide/ShortcutGuide/trace.cpp:

• ShortcutGuide_GuideSession — duration + close type
• ShortcutGuide_Settings — hotkey, opacity, theme, disabled apps, win-key timing

V2 wires up the plumbing but never actually emits anything. ShortcutGuideModuleInterface/dllmain.cpp still calls send_settings_telemetry(), which spawns the UI with the telemetry argument:

cpp virtual void send_settings_telemetry() override { Logger::trace(""Send settings telemetry""); if (!StartProcess(L""telemetry"")) { ... } }

…but ShortcutGuide.Ui/Program.cs just logs and exits without calling TraceLoggingWrite:

csharp if (args.Length >= 2 && args[1] == ""telemetry"") { // Telemetry-only invocation: send settings telemetry and exit silently. Logger.LogInfo(""Telemetry mode requested. Exiting.""); return; }

Result: no session or settings telemetry from V2. Worth porting at least the two existing events so dashboards/data-driven decisions don't go dark.

2. Mixing WPF and WinUI 3 in the UI process

ShortcutGuide.Ui/Program.cs pulls in using System.Windows; and uses System.Windows.MessageBox.Show(...) from inside what is otherwise a WinUI 3 / Windows App SDK app. The MessageBox call also runs before the WinUI dispatcher is created, which means it blocks the launching thread (the module interface's process-start path) on a WPF modal.

Suggest replacing with a WinUI ContentDialog (or just logging + early exit) to avoid pulling WPF into the WinUI3 process and to avoid blocking the spawning thread on startup error.

[noraa-junker]

@yeelam-gordon For 1, does readding the same telemetry events make sense regarding that this Shortcut Guide works very differently from the old one?

For 2, This messagebox is only shown in very rare occasions and it does not matter if it blocks WinUi, because the program exits right after that anyway.

[MuyuanMS]

Addressed telemetry regression and WPF dependency in bc1fdbe:

1. Telemetry regression fixed — V2 now emits both ETW events that V1 had:

   • \ShortcutGuide_Settings\ (hotkey, theme, disabled apps) — emitted when the module interface calls \send_settings_telemetry()\
   • \ShortcutGuide_GuideSession\ (duration, close type) — emitted when the main window closes

2. WPF MessageBox removed — Replaced \System.Windows.MessageBox.Show()\ with \Logger.LogError()\ + early exit. This removes PresentationFramework from the WinUI 3 process (the error message was invisible to users anyway since the process is background-launched by the module interface).

[github-actions]

@check-spelling-bot Report

🔴 Please review

See the 📂 files view, the 📜action log, 👼 SARIF report, or 📝 job summary for details.

Unrecognized words (4)

DWRITE
LWIN
VCENTER
VREDRAW

These words are not needed and should be removed

ABlocked AClient AColumn ACR ADate ADifferent AHybrid ALarger AModifier ANull AOklab APeriod ARandom ARemapped ASingle ASUS bck BNumber BOklab BVal BValue CAtl CCom CContext CDeclaration CElems Chunghwa CImage CMock CPower CSearch CSettings CSOT CStyle CTest CVal CVirtual DArchitectures DComposition defaulttonearest diu DSVG dwrite EAccess EFile EInvalid ENot EProvider ESettings FErase FInc FMask FNumber FRestore GNumber GValue Hann HHmmssfff Hostx HPhysical HSpeed HSync HVal HValue HWP IPREVIEW ITHUMBNAIL IVO kdc LExit LPCFHOOKPROC LPrivate LReader LUMA LVal lwin MMdd MRT MSHCTX MSHLFLAGS Nanjing newcolor NLog oldcolor outsourced PBlob PElems PHL pinboard PStr PToy QDS RAlt RAquadrant rectp RKey RNumber scanled suntimes Tianma UBreak UCallback UError UFlags UHash UMax UMin unsubscribes UOffset UType vcenter VDesktop vredraw VSpeed VSync WBounds WClass workerw WReserved XAxis XButton XDeployment XDimension XDocument XElement XFile XIncrement XLoc XNamespace XPels XPixel XPos XResource XSpeed XStr XTimer YAxis YDimension YIncrement YPels YPos YResolution YSpeed YStr YTimer

To accept these unrecognized words as correct and remove the previously acknowledged and now absent words, you could run the following commands

... in a clone of the git@github.com:microsoft/PowerToys.git repository
on the feature/shortcutguidev2 branch (ℹ️ how do I use this?):

curl -s -S -L 'https://raw.githubusercontent.com/check-spelling/check-spelling/cfb6f7e75bbfc89c71eaa30366d0c166f1bd9c8c/apply.pl' |
perl - 'https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys/actions/runs/26222650830/attempts/1' &&
git commit -m 'Update check-spelling metadata'

OR

To have the bot accept them for you, comment in the PR quoting the following line:
@check-spelling-bot apply updates.

If the flagged items are 🤯 false positives

If items relate to a ...

• binary file (or some other file you wouldn't want to check at all).

  Please add a file path to the excludes.txt file matching the containing file.

  File paths are Perl 5 Regular Expressions - you can test yours before committing to verify it will match your files.

  ^ refers to the file's path from the root of the repository, so ^README\.md$ would exclude README.md (on whichever branch you're using).

• well-formed pattern.

  If you can write a pattern that would match it,
  try adding it to the patterns.txt file.

  Patterns are Perl 5 Regular Expressions - you can test yours before committing to verify it will match your lines.

  Note that patterns can't match multiline strings.

[noraa-junker]

The number to keyboard letter does not seem to work anymore.

[niels9001]

The number to keyboard letter does not seem to work anymore.

Lets address in a follow up pr!