For a user who strongly prefers to avoid the mouse, I want to set up key equivalents to trigger several procedures, and I have several databases involved. I would like to use the same key combination, which do analogous things, in more than one databases Is there a limitation on using the same key equivalent in more than one database, which are both open at the same time? (I am having trouble getting the key equivalents to trigger the procedure in database 2, which was opened after database 1, which has the same key equivalent combination set up.
When you define a hotkey you can set the scope to global, database or window. If it is set to database it will only be used for that database and you can have the hotkey key combination used on another database that does something completely different. If the scope is set to global then one hotkey will function exactly the same on any open database. I’m not sure what would happen if you had two hotkeys with the same key combination with one set to database and the other set to global.
I just tried setting a hotkey combination to both global and database and the database setting seems to take precedence.
I guess I misread this and thought it was about hotkeys. Oh, well, maybe hotkeys might actually be a better way to go. 
Yes, it looks like hot keys might be a better way. I am going to try that.
It looks like the F-keys don’t work in hot key combinations. Is that right? Too bad, since there are so many and they are mostly available.
Yep, looks like the fn key is not recognized for use with HotKeys.
Not sure if my question was clear. I am referring to the F1 F2 … F18 (on the extended keyboard) keys. So command-F1 does not work. I was not referring to the fn key as a modifier.
I did some more experimenting and it seems the F1 thru F15 keys (on my keyboard the F16 thru F19 keys do not work for this) can be used as long as the fn key is included as in function-function6. The fn key can also be used with other normal keys together with the other modifier keys. My earlier statement about the fn key not working with HotKeys is plain wrong. You can definitely have a HotKey set to something like function-R or any of the other normal keys. Unfortunately the fn key is not as handy on the keyboard as the other modifiers and may not be available on all keyboards.
To answer this original question, no, there should be no problem here. The key equivalents come from whatever the current menus are, which can switch from database to database or even from window to window. It doesn’t matter what key equivalents are in some background database or window, it only matters what the current menus are. On the other hand, this means that you cannot trigger a key equivalent for a menu that is not currently active. So if you have a key equivalent of Command-Option-7 for a database that is not currently active, pressing Command-Option-7 won’t do anything.
That should not be a problem. When database 2 is active, you’ll get the key equivalents for that database, when database 1 is active, you’ll get it’s key equivalents. Anything that is not currently active is completely ignored as far as key equivalents go.