Dell XPS Studio Break/Pause keyboard mapping
I have a Dell Studio XPS 16 laptop which I enjoy very much. This laptop is used primary for development and debugging and therefore Visual Studio is being used heavily.
When I first got the laptop it took me some time to get used to the keyboard layout and combination keys needed as some of the key on a standard 106/102 keyboard layout are not in their original place or mapped to some type of key-chord combination.
The only key I wasn’t able to find until recently was the all-important (Debug Break and Build Break on Visual Studio) Pause / Break key.
I could have re-map my keyboard layout in Visual Studio but I switch during the day from computer to computer and didn’t want to create the re-map on every computer.
So after another annoying session of debug without the break key I set down and started typing different combinations of the ‘fn’ key and FINALLY I have found it.
Here's the key combination to trigger Pause/Break: Ctrl + Fn + F12.
If you use Windows, here's another little twist: Windows + Pause/Break brings up the System Properties on a standard keyboard, but Windows+Ctrl+Fn+F12 doesn't work. Instead, you have to use Windows + Fn + F12.
Also, here's the history of the Pause/Break key. Fascinating...!