How-To: Change AdBlock Plus Sidebar Shortcut

For some odd reason AdBlock Plus in Thunderbird choose to use the keyboard CTRL+SHIFT+V to open the sidebar (blockable items). The problem with using this is CTRL+SHIFT+V is the universal keyboard shortcut to Paste as Plain Text of Paste without Formatting. After some searching I found a thread from October 2012 on the Adblock Plus Forums that provided a solution:

  • From within Thunderbird go to Tools > Options > Advanced (OS X: Thunderbird > Preferences… | Linux: Edit > Preferences) and then click the Config Editor… button in the lower right of the Options/Preferences Window.
  • If needed click the I’ll be careful, I promise button on the ‘This might void your warranty warning’.
  • In the search box paste extensions.adblockplus.sidebar_key
  • You should see one result as a string with the default value of Accel Shift V, Accel Shift U (note: Accel is Control on Windows/Linux and Command on OS X).
  • Double-click on the entry to edit. Delete Accel Shift V, so only Accel Shift U is the value
  • Click OK to save then close the about:config and Options/Preferences windows.
  • Changes take effect as soon as you restart Thunderbird

What I don’t understand is why they had two shortcuts for the same function and why they would use one that is a universal keyboard shortcut.