Select Cells to End of Notebook

Question

I'd like to create a keyboard shortcut that will allow me to select all of the cells from the current cell until the end of the notebook, similar to how ShiftCtrlEnd functions when editing text in most Windows applications.

By editing KeyEventTranslations.tr, I've already created a shortcut using ShiftCtrlA that allows me to select the current cell (rather then pressing Ctrl. repeatedly). I'd like to then use another shortcut that would allow me to avoid having to hold down Shift and press ↓ over and over until I reach the bottom.

Any ideas?

Answer 1

Building on Albert's answer I added code such that Ctrl Shift End will select all cells downwards. Just execute this code in a notebook and restart Mathematica:

   mymenuitems="
         (* Select all cells downwards *)
         Item[KeyEvent[\"End\", Modifiers -> {Control, Shift}], 
         KernelExecute[
          Module[{ enb = EvaluationNotebook[],
                   tag = StringJoin[\"tmp\", ToString[Round[AbsoluteTime[]/$TimeUnit]]],editable 
                   },
                editable = ReplaceAll[Editable, Options[enb, Editable]];
                SetOptions[enb, Editable -> False];
                SelectionMove[enb, Next, Cell, AutoScroll -> False];
                MathLink`CallFrontEnd[FrontEnd`SelectionAddCellTags[enb, {tag}]];
                SelectionMove[enb, After, Notebook, AutoScroll -> False];
                SelectionMove[enb, Previous, Cell, AutoScroll -> False];
                While[FreeQ[ReplaceAll[CellTags,Options[NotebookSelection[]]], tag],
                      MathLink`CallFrontEnd[FrontEnd`SelectionAddCellTags[enb, {tag}]];
                      SelectionMove[enb, Previous, Cell, AutoScroll -> False]
                ];
                NotebookFind[enb, tag, All, CellTags, AutoScroll -> False];
                MathLink`CallFrontEnd[FrontEnd`SelectionRemoveCellTags[enb, {tag}]];
                SetOptions[enb, Editable -> editable]
            ]
            ], MenuEvaluator -> Automatic ]
            ";
    Quiet@CreateDirectory@FileNameJoin[{$UserBaseDirectory,"SystemFiles","FrontEnd","TextResources",$OperatingSystem}];
    mykeyeventtrans=FileNameJoin[{$UserBaseDirectory,"SystemFiles","FrontEnd","TextResources",$OperatingSystem,"KeyEventTranslations.tr"}];
    If[FileExistsQ[mykeyeventtrans],DeleteFile@mykeyeventtrans];
    CopyFile[FileNameJoin[{$InstallationDirectory,"SystemFiles","FrontEnd","TextResources",$OperatingSystem,"KeyEventTranslations.tr"}],mykeyeventtrans];
keytext=Import[mykeyeventtrans,"Text"];
mykeytext=StringReplace[keytext,"EventTranslations[{":>StringJoin["EventTranslations[{\n(* User defined *)\n",mymenuitems,",\n"]];
Export[mykeyeventtrans,mykeytext,"Text"];

I only tested this on Windows. No idea if it works on MacOSX and Linux.

Answer 2

I also don't know a straightforward way to do what you want, so Mr.Wizard could well be right. But there are workarounds as e.g. the following which is "abusing" CellTags. It is however somewhat hacky and not very fast and reliable and I'm not sure whether it is good enough for your every day use:

Module[{
  enb = EvaluationNotebook[],
  tag = StringJoin[
    RandomChoice[
     Join[CharacterRange["A", "Z"], CharacterRange["a", "z"], 
      CharacterRange["0", "9"]],
     30]
    ],
    editable
  },
 editable = Editable /. Options[enb,Editable];
 SetOptions[enb, Editable -> False];
 SelectionMove[enb, Next, Cell, AutoScroll -> False];
 MathLink`CallFrontEnd[FrontEnd`SelectionAddCellTags[enb, {tag}]];
 SelectionMove[enb, After, Notebook, AutoScroll -> False];
 SelectionMove[enb, Previous, Cell, AutoScroll -> False];
 While[FreeQ[CellTags /. Options[NotebookSelection[]], tag],
  MathLink`CallFrontEnd[FrontEnd`SelectionAddCellTags[enb, {tag}]];
  SelectionMove[enb, Previous, Cell, AutoScroll -> False];
  ];
 NotebookFind[enb, tag, All, CellTags, AutoScroll -> False];
 MathLink`CallFrontEnd[FrontEnd`SelectionRemoveCellTags[enb, {tag}]];
 SetOptions[EvaluationNotebook[], Editable -> editable]
 ]

It should be relatively clear what this does, nevertheless I think some remarks might be helpful:

• I'm using a random tag to mark the cells to be selected (a common strategy to create global unique identifiers GUIDs), you could probably think of something smarter and e.g. check whether the tag you want to use is already present in the notebook to be on the really save side. I think it would, for almost all use cases, also be good enough to work with a constant unique identifier, though...
• to temporarily add tags without destroying already existing ones, I'm using the undocumented frontend functionality SelectionAddCellTags and SelectionRemoveCellTags which I know from the excellent talk "The joy of Tagging" given by David Reiss at a Wolfram User Conference some years ago. You should be able to find the corresponding notebook in the web which is a good read if you try to do any kind of advanced notebook manipulating...
• except for the random tag generation it should be possible to do this completely in the frontend which might be a good idea if you want it to be executed from a keyboard shortcut or button.
• as suggested by Rolf Mertig I did set the notebook to not be editable while the code is running so that it should be relatively safe against user input.
• there might well be other features, especially undocumented ones, which might let you do the same thing more reliable and faster, so don't accept this answer too early...