You know, it’s pretty rare that I post up here about netTunes, mostly because… well… it just works, and there’s not much to say other than “Whoa! Cool!"… which gets a bit boring.
But, every so often I’ll get a question about how it’s possible to access commands that aren’t available in the main window—for example, Store > Check for Purchases...
So, from the department of obscure features, let’s get this done!
Normally, you’d access things like this with an onscreen control or keyboard shortcut. For example, to access iTunes’ Preferences, you can press Cmd+y (an alternate for Cmd+,) and it’ll come right up. And you can add a playlist with the + button in the main window. But Check for Purchases doesn’t have a keyboard shortcut or button, and so it’s not available in netTunes.
But there’s hope! In Tiger, you can add your own keyboard shortcuts using the Keyboard & Mouse preference pane. Open that up, switch to the Keyboard Shortcuts tab and click the + button. Set the Application pop-up to iTunes, then enter the full, properly capitalized text of the menu item (in this case, Check for Purchases..., including the ...). Choose a shortcut key (like Cmd+Opt+C).
Save, then quit and restart iTunes and poof! You can now Check for Purchases in netTunes on the client!
