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Mac Tips and Tricks

 

Mac Tips 

If you've recently made the switch from Mac to PC, there are equivalents for Windows keyboard commands. Here are many of the most commonly used.

Find a neat tip? Tell us about it!

A few quick tips...The Command button functions similar to the Control button on Windows. The Command key is sometimes referred to as the Apple key. Apparently, it used to have a picture of an apple on it.

For example...

Copy
Command+C

Cut
Command+X

Paste
Command+V

Save
Command+S

Undo

Oops. Did you do something that you did not intend? Simply hit
Command+Z

Why Does Mac Delete Backwards?

On Windows, the delete key removes text from right to left. It is backwards on the Mac. If you must delete from right to left, simply use

Function+Delete or
Control+D

Right Click

Losing sleep over the loss of your right click button? If you really crave that contextual menu

Control+click

On the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air, you can also use a two finger prompt to right click. Simply choose

System Preferences
Keyboard and Mouse
Choose the Trackpad Tab
Under Two Fingers, check the Secondary Click button

Now a two-finger-click on the trackpad will make the right click menu appear.

Locked Up? There's no Ctrl+Alt+Delete!

Need to end a wayward program? Use Force Quit under the Apple menu or hit

Option-Command-Esc

Computer moving slowly? To check usage and find out which applications are running, go to Finder and choose

Applications > Utilities > Activity Monitor

Zoom Feature

To activate / deactivate this feature

Command+Option+8

Zoom in
Command+Option+

Zoom Out
Command+Option-

Finder

Similar to Windoze Explorer. To delete a finder item

Drag it to the Trash or
Command+Delete

Find Anything

If you run Mac OS 10.4.x, you can use Spotlight.

Command+Spacebar

Or hit the magnifying glass on the very right of the menu bar. This handy feature allows you to search for anything on your hard drive. It will look through emails, word documents, etc., and will even search through documents for specific words. Click it from anywhere.

Is This App Still Running?

A blue dot under the applications means that it is running. There will always be a blue dot under Finder. Closing a window is not the same as closing an application. Clicking the red button at the top left corner will close the window, but the program will remain running.

To quit the program: Choose Quit from the menu bar of that program or
Command+Q

Cycle through running apps
Command+Tab

Hide the current window
Command+H

Press it again to flip back to the previous application.

Minimize vs Maximize

The yellow button will minimize the window to your dock. The green button will maximize only as much as necessary to see the whole document.

Shutdown

Control+Eject

X Ray Effect

Here is an interesting effect (press it a second time to go back to normal)
Control+Option+Command+8

Screen Print

No Print Screen button? No problem.

Choose the screen you want to take a picture of.

Press Command + Shift + 3

You will hear a camera click and your screen capture will be placed on your desktop.

How sweet is that?

Mac Tips

Hopefully these Mac tips have made your switch somewhat easier. Just like anything new, it takes getting used to.

Soon you will wonder how you ever got along without a Mac.


Have You Found Any Helpful Mac Tips?

Share your finding here.

Your Mac Tip

Tips Other Visitors Have Shared

Click below to see contributions from other visitors to this page...

Text Clipping  starstarstarstarstar
How do you save text?

On Windows, you must select the text, right click and choose copy. Navigate to the desktop, right click and select New, Text ...

Putting the Display to Sleep  starstarstar
If you want to put your Mac's display to sleep you can turn the brightness all the way down, or you can do it the easy way and hit Control-Shift-Eject....

Open a Link in a New Tab  Not rated yet
To open a link in a new browser tab, press the Command button and click on the link.

Quick and easy!

Screen print partial  Not rated yet
Choose the area of the screen you want to take a picture of.

Press Command + Shift + 4

The cursor will become a camera shutter "cross". Depress the ...

Safari: "Home" and "End"  Not rated yet
Option-Command-Up Arrow on my MacBook Pro in Safari takes me to the top of a web page. Option-Command-Down Arrow takes me to the end of the web page.

Pressing 'C' at Start Up  Not rated yet
Whenever we want to boot from a device on Mac, we simply press the 'c' key from the keyboard and it starts booting from the device safely.

Enlarging Tables in Pages  Not rated yet
In Mac's Pages program, to add a new row in a table just press alt button + down (or up) arrow; to add a new column, press alt + left (or right) arrow....

Easy to use Calculator  Not rated yet
If you need to add, subtract, multiply or divide some numbers quickly you can enter your problem into spotlight. This works in Leopard and later versions....

Separate Windows  Not rated yet
If you are on a laptop, slide all four fingers down the touch pad. If on a p.c. tap both sides of the mouse on the two side panels.

3 in 1 tips for opening documents  Not rated yet
To open a few of the same documents on your desktop, simply select them by dragging with your mouse (left click) a selection rectangular (tip 1). Drag ...

Keyboard Shortcuts  Not rated yet
Command-A Select all items in the front Finder window (or desktop if no window is open)
Option-Command-A Deselect all items
Shift-Command-A Open ...

Dim Display  Not rated yet
By default, all Macs are configured with energy-saving options enabled. This usually isn't a problem, but if you get tired of your display dimming every ...

Moving from one Application to other  Not rated yet
In Windows you use Control + Tab to switch from one application to another, in Mac use Command + Tab.

Do not lose the Mac OS install discs  Not rated yet
This may sound like common sense, but they are very important. On a windows computer the install discs aren't needed too much after the initial OS install....

Dictionary  Not rated yet
On Mac OS X 10.4 and later, when you are in a native (Cocoa) Mac app, hover your mouse over a word and press Ctrl-Cmd-D. You will get a Dictionary definition ...

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