How to implement keyboard shortcuts in a Windows Forms application

You can capture keyboard input at the form or control level by handling the KeyDown or KeyUp events. These events allow you to detect when a key is pressed, and you can then map that to a specific action.

Set the form's KeyPreview property to true to capture keyboard events before they're sent to the focused control.

For example, Implementing a simple shortcut (Ctrl+S) to save

private void Form_KeyDown(object sender, KeyEventArgs e)
{
    // Check if Ctrl + S is pressed
    if (e.Control && e.KeyCode == Keys.S)
    {
        // Perform save action
    }
    else if (e.Control && e.KeyCode == Keys.O)
    {
        // Perform open action
    }
}

You can also override the ProcessCmdKey() method as the generic solution for keyboard shortcuts in a Windows Forms application.

protected override bool ProcessCmdKey(ref Message msg, Keys keyData) {
  if (keyData == (Keys.Control | Keys.S)) {
    MessageBox.Show("Ctrl+S");
    return true;
  }
  return base.ProcessCmdKey(ref msg, keyData);
}

For VB.NET

Protected Overrides Function ProcessCmdKey(ByRef msg As Message, keyData As Keys) As Boolean
    If (keyData = (Keys.Control Or Keys.F)) Then
      MessageBox.Show("Ctrl+F");
      Return True
    End If
    Return MyBase.ProcessCmdKey(msg, keyData)
  End Function
End Class

The method returns True to indicate the key press has been handled, preventing further processing. If the key combination doesn't match Ctrl + F, it calls the base class's ProcessCmdKey method to handle other key presses.