altKey() down

[Richmond]

I am currently "retooling" my Devawriter as folks are finding they 
cannot quite get their heads round some aspects of the GUI, and, having 
used the SHIFT key as a modifier inconsistenly across the current 8-odd 
interfaces I am now intending to use it for a consistent task, and start 
using the ALT / OPTION key for another task. I am eschewing the 
commandKey and the ctrlKey as they respond to different keys on the 
keyboard depending on the OS the computer is running.

I would be grateful for some feedback from anybody about how they feel 
about using the ALT / OPTION key as a modifier of this sort:

on mouseUP
    do something
     if the altKey() is down then
       do something extra
     end if
end mouseUp

Richmond.