Forwarded from: https://launchpad.net/distros/ubuntu/+source/gnome-terminal/+bug/31344

Some terminal applications such as mutt, mc, and multiview have very helpful screens that appear at the press of F1. Newbies and power users alike have the need to refer to these screens from time to time. Sometimes you cannot remember a command and the only way to proceed with your work is to look it up.

This key is widely known to produce a context-sensitive help screen on many platforms. While it is accurate to have a Gnome Terminal help screen appear for F1, Gnome Terminal is already quite a self-explanatory application, and IMHO the user is more likely to want help on the application inside the terminal rather than the terminal emulator itself.

Altering the keybindings allows a user to send an F1 to the running program, but this is too many clicks for the long term solution, and encourages two states (default Help=F1 keybinding; or Help redefined) which is annoying when you cannot remember which state you left the application in.

Altering the help keybindings in all your terminal-based programs is also an option but far too much work for such a simple issue.

Suggestions for improvement:

1. Leave keybindings as-is, but add "Send F1 to terminal" option on the right-click menu.

2. If you want to be fancier, run through all the set keybindings and add "Send xxx to terminal" for keys that are likely to conflict (at least F1...F12).

3. If you want to cover all the special keys at once but don't want it dynamic, just add a submenu to the right-click menu that says "Send Special Character" and lets you choose F1...F12, Home, End, etc. which are all preselected and static.

4. Leave keybindings as-is, but add "Send raw key to terminal" option on the right-click menu, which when selected, disables keybindings for the next key pressed only.

5. Change default F1 keybinding so that it brings up a choice: Send F1 to Application or View Gnome Terminal Help. This adds an extra, unusal step, but has the advantage of being completely self-explanatory.

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And another comment wrt to bug 329827 ("Edit->Shortcuts->Disable menu shortcut key."):

I guess I'm trying to convince you that having to reconfigure one's primary terminal application just to get a help screen from a terminal-based program is overkill and a disservice to users. For example, if a user trying to learn mutt needs help, under Ubuntu's default configuration you can't access the help screen. (Without first doing as you say.)