Is it possible to some how setup IntelliJ IDEA so that I can column select with the cursor keys similarly to how I might in Notepad++, Visual Studio, or FlashDevelop.
For instance when I'm typing code I almost always do my navigation solely through use of the keyboard. In the IDEs mentioned previously I can quickly select blocks of code by holding Shift + Alt then tapping ↑ to extend my cursor across the lines above. I can then hold Shift + Alt + Ctrl and tap ← or → to quickly jump across words and select the chunk of text I want.
In IntelliJ IDEA I have to constantly enable and disable Column Selection Mode using the Shift + Alt + Insert and even then it doesn't quite function as it does in the other IDEs or Text Editors.
Any ideas?
You can do column editing using the Edit | Column Selection Mode.
The shortcut to turn it on/off is Alt+Shift+Insert. You navigate with Shift + arrow keys to select blocks of text.