Closing Palettes

From NeoWiki

When a floating window, e. g. Find and Replace window, or a palette such as the Navigator is open, it stands in front of your document window and the keyboard shortcut Cmd-W closes the palette and the document window at the same time.

However, you can use a keyboard shortcut to close those floating windows, if they are the active window: just press the Esc key, and only the floating window will close.

(You can also use that shortcut to close many panels in Mac OS X, like the Font panel, or Find panels in many applications, even though in those cases the current shortcut Cmd-W works perfectly.)

If the floating window or palette is anchored, you can't close it using the keyboard without closing the document at the same time. You have to detach it as described in the Docking and Detaching Palettes article in order to close it without closing the document.