How to configure Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open System Monitor in Ubuntu 10.04
When I’m working in Windows I tend to use the Ctrl + Shift + Esc shortcut a lot to bring up the task manager. Since I’ve switched my primary OS over to Ubuntu i still find myself trying to open up a task manager (or system monitor) with the aforementioned shortcut, which isn’t configured by default. To overcome this I simply created a custom keyboard shortcut to open the gnome-system-monitor with the Ctrl + Shift + Esc key combination.
This short tutorial will show you how to create a custom keyboard shortcut for the system monitor in Ubuntu 10.04.
- Under System > Preferences open up Keyboard Shortcuts
- Click on Add, to add a new action
- Enter a name for your shortcut, I’ve named my System Monitor.
- Enter the command gnome-system-monitor

- Click Apply
- You should now see your new Action under Custom Shortcuts in the list
- Click on the shortcut column of your new action (which should say Disabled)
- The shortcut text should change to New Shortcut, now press the Ctrl + Shift + Esc key combination.
- The shortcut column will change once again to your new key combination.

- Click Close to exit the Keyboard Shortcuts window
- Now you can use your new shortcut to open up the System Monitor
That’s all there is to it. Enjoy and have fun.


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