Mac n00b tips!

Larree · 11-03-2008 12:40pm

bobtjustice wrote: »

Hey all.

Is there a command to minimize all screens??

Yes just press F11 or Shift and F11 for a slow, flashy version of the minimise animation.

huggs2 · 21-05-2008 3:41pm

1.Hold down shift while adjusting volume to mute those annoying click sounds
or you can switch it off permanently in system prefs>sound>sound efects and untick "play feedback when volume is changed".
2.hold shift+alt. to get finer adjustment of sound (1/4 steps)

Type 17 · 02-06-2008 10:29am

Ctrl + <Eject> brings up the shutdown/restart/sleep dialogue box - no big deal on a laptop, as the power button is right there, but a handy keyboard shortcut on an Mac Mini, iMac or Mac Pro.

Shift + Ctrl + <Eject> puts the display to sleep - handy if you need to leave your Mac running, but want to save power/screen life. Any keystroke wakes it up.

When any dialogue box is open, Esc key = Cancel (not all users realise this, but DOS users will remember it from pre-mouse days!)

In Finder, Cmd + <up key> will open the folder that contains the one that you're looking at. (Makes more sense when you try it)

In Finder, if you have a folder open, but don't know its path on the HD, hold down Cmd key and click on its name in the title bar for a path.

ZENER · 03-06-2008 5:33pm

Type 17 wrote: »

. . . In Finder, if you have a folder open, but don't know its path on the HD, hold down Cmd key and click on its name in the title bar for a path.

Or you can enable the path bar *: Finder > View > Show Path Bar. My preferred setting.

ZEN

* Leopard Only afaik

Elessar · 08-01-2009 7:32pm

Sick of your Mac laptop's sleep light being too bright at night, keeping you awake?

Simply put the computer to sleep with the lid open - the light sensor works with the sleep light aswell and it'll make sure the pulsing white light is dimmed just enough when it's pitch black.

im...LOST · 08-01-2009 8:14pm

ZENER wrote: »

Or you can enable the path bar *: Finder > View > Show Path Bar. My preferred setting.

ZEN

* Leopard Only afaik

Tiger too

besty · 01-02-2009 12:14am

Think I'm gonna make the big move tomorrow and get a MBP. No doubt I'll be revisiting this thread for some of the tricks.

chrislad · 24-03-2009 9:50pm

A useful item I found is a shortcut for Safari.

Press CMD, Shift and left or right arrow to flick between open tabs. It's probably well known, but I only started looking when I kept pressing CMD and tab!

skywards · 25-03-2009 7:12pm

Elessar wrote: »

Sick of your Mac laptop's sleep light being too bright at night, keeping you awake?

Simply put the computer to sleep with the lid open - the light sensor works with the sleep light aswell and it'll make sure the pulsing white light is dimmed just enough when it's pitch black.

NOT if you have cats though. Ever had to dehair a keyboard? :eek:

Type 17 · 25-03-2009 7:21pm

skywards wrote: »

NOT if you have cats though. Ever had to dehair a keyboard? :eek:

You can put it to sleep with the lid up, to get the dimmer LED, and then shut the lid when it has gone to sleep.

PS: Problems with cat-hair and dust on your keyboard? - try this vacuum cleaner attachment

:

huggs2 · 11-04-2009 1:55am

http://machintsandtips.com/
This site has some great tips.Site was revamped this week with all past tips available (9500).Rss feeds available to send you their tips when they become available.Check out the video on site to see how it all works.Enjoy.

conchubhar1 · 10-06-2009 1:02pm

you can make the text bigger with a pdf quicklook document by pressing command and plus

cool feature

rcaz · 28-10-2009 1:14am

Is there any way to do a screengrab of a DVD Player window without having the DVD footage blocked from the screengrab? I guess that would be breaking some copyright rule or something. Sorry if I shouldn't be posting about this.

I'm trying to get a still shot of a guy's guitar in a music video to find out what pickups are in his guitar.

redenemyjoe · 28-10-2009 11:07am

You can take screenshots of movies, etc when you're using VLC, might not be helpful but there you are.

Darksaga87 · 03-09-2011 5:41pm

Im trying to format my 2011 MBP. can anyone tell me the best way to do this?

Thanks.

Liameter · 23-10-2011 9:22am

Do you mean reformat your internal Hard Drive?

Boot from your Installation disc and choose Disc Utility from the menu. Then reinstall OSX and then use Migration Assistant to transfer your files from your backup drive.

digiman · 24-06-2012 8:08pm

I just bought a MacBook Retina a couple of weeks ago. It's my first Mac computer so only ever used windows before. Any tips to enhance my user experience?

Liameter · 24-06-2012 8:37pm

I'm not sure that it's even worth replying. Nobody seems to come back to say thanks or report success.

Anyway, give us a clue. What do you want to do on your computer?

digiman · 24-06-2012 10:39pm

Mainly use it for surfing and checking emails. Also play online poker a bit. I think it would be handy to have W7 on it. Just wondering what programs are worth getting, are there any good free games worth downloading or even good paid ones? I have started to take a lot of photos recently so would like to get more into that also.

I guess I am just looking for some tips and tricks that a new user wouldn't know about.

Liameter · 24-06-2012 11:17pm

The Hard Drive in a Mac is no more reliable than that in any other consumer product so, if your photos matter, the first addition would be an external Hard Drive for backups (and preferably two). New users don't appear to know this fact or choose to ignore it.

iPhoto is quite good for storing photos but it stores them in a "library" that is not user friendly. Consequently, most "power users" launch Image Capture.app and set it to open automatically when a camera is attached. The images can then be downloaded into a series of appropriately named folders and backed up immediately. They can then be dragged into iPhoto and manipulated, enhanced and labelled there, without affecting the originals that are on your backup drive.

Once you've done that, you can export the images into another folder if you wish. Or/and you could export them as a web page gallery for uploading to your web site.

Although PhotoShop is the defacto standard for manipulating images, it's expensive. Consequently, I tend to use Graphic Converter (shareware) and Pixelmator.

There's also some integration that makes it easy to use images stored in iPhoto for screen savers, desktop backgrounds and to export them directly into Apple Mail for emailing to your friends. I think this integration also extends to apps such as "Pages".

Note: I don't recommend emailing anything but the smallest file size. If your friends plan to print posters, transfer the images via Dropbox instead!

Other stuff:
I use the shareware TypeIt4Me. You can program it to correct mistakes and to convert shortcut words into whole paragraphs. Bear in mind that MacOSX is integrated so an application such as this will work in almost ALL applications.

(Sorry, I know nothing about Windows 7 or about games.)

Snowie · 11-07-2012 6:24am

I came across this maybe of help to some people...

Liameter · 11-07-2012 10:39am

Liameter wrote: »

Nobody seems to come back to say thanks or report success.

^^^ See what I mean? :rolleyes:

digiman · 12-07-2012 7:55pm

Liameter wrote: »

^^^ See what I mean? :rolleyes:

I've not had much of a chance to do much with it as I was back in Ireland for the last 3 weeks. I've installed VMware fusion but I am having difficulty getting my macbook pro to connect to the windows 7 laptop to take the files of it. I will try and give some sort of an update later!

cinderelli · 07-03-2015 5:32pm

I'm thinking of getting a 15-inch macbook pro with retina display. I'm sure you can't get a student discount on a refurbished mac, but failing that, which deal is better? The student discount is 10-12% off, and a lot of the refurbs are 15% off, but obviously it's not brand new. Thoughts?

Zcott · 07-03-2015 8:13pm

You won't have any trouble with a refurb. Bought one last year, and although it doesn't come in the original box, you can't tell its not a brand new machine.

jimbooth · 28-07-2016 10:07am

Hi, I somehow managed to enlarge the home screen on the desktop view and don't know how to get it back to normal, any help ?

Type 17 · 28-07-2016 11:03am

jimbooth wrote: »

Hi, I somehow managed to enlarge the home screen on the desktop view and don't know how to get it back to normal, any help ?

Edit: apologies, I read that wrong and my original reply meant nothing.
Do you mean that you've made the icons on the desktop bigger, or the whole screen resolution bigger?

jimbooth · 01-08-2016 5:28pm

The whole screen, when I move mouse to bottom of screen the taskbar on top moves up out if view. It happened before but I can't remember how I sorted it.:D

Zcott · 02-08-2016 11:08am

jimbooth wrote: »

The whole screen, when I move mouse to bottom of screen the taskbar on top moves up out if view. It happened before but I can't remember how I sorted it.:D

System preferences > accessibility > turn off zoom

jimbooth · 03-08-2016 1:07pm

Zcott wrote: »

System preferences > accessibility > turn off zoom

Thanks, knew it was simple

it was actually in universal access on mine but found it anyway. , quick keys were alt, cmd and 8

Mac n00b tips!

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