Stan,

If you set the "mouseOverForKeyboardFocus" preference to true, then 
when the mouse leaves a text pane, keyboard focus will be 
relinquished by the text pane, thus allowing the "desktop command 
keys" such as alt-r to be honored.

Alternatively, hit shift-esc ("escape to the world menu") followed by 
alt-r at any time, wherever the cursor is, to force a repaint.

HTH,

   -- Scott

At 12:39 PM -0400 7/12/02, Stan Heckman wrote:
>I did try alt-r, and it didn't appear to do anything at all. This
>surprised me, since the presumably equivalent "restore display" menu
>selection at least repainted the screen.
>
>--
>Stan