Some members on this forum are new Mac users - others of you have been fans since the days of Lisa. What are the little, everyday secrets that you use to make life with your Mac easier?

If you have favorite keyboard shortcuts or hidden features that most people don't know about, share them here!

Maybe these are not new, and are commonly known, but for the new on OSX86

Make the Safari Debug Menu appear:
Quit Safari then in Terminal type
defaults write com.apple.Safari IncludeDebugMenu 1

Make any App Icon Transparent in Dock when it is hidden
In Terminal type defaults write com.apple.dock showhidden -bool true
then type killall Dock

My favourite - Command Q when the stupid Apple registration screen comes up right after installing. Like I'm going to send all my details to Apple?

iTunes - set 'don't take me to the music store, take me to my music library'. Then it works as a perfectly good MP3 player without the rest of the garbage. Set kiddy preferences to avoid showing music store.

Most of the below are well known but I'll list them anyway-

Holding down C when booting selects the CD for startup rather than HD.
Command Alt Esc is the OSX equivalent of CTRL-ALT-DEL
Command S when booting brings up single-user console

To put dashboard widgets on the desktop, drag them and hit F12 while still dragging. You can put them back in the dashboard by dragging and opening the dashboard at the same time.

To put an eject icon on the top bar, go to /system/library/coreservices/menuextras and double-click on Eject.menu

Hi everybody,

Well I try to put widget on desktop but that doesn't work.
Is it possible with osx86 version ?

This is really dumb, but

When ALT+tabbing, I discovered that you can use your mouse to manually select the program you want, I find myself using it when I have 8 apps running and dont want to tab 20 times to get somewhere..

I forgot an important bit with the widgets drag tip for OSx86 -

For the drag/F12 trick to work, first you have to open terminal and type:

defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode YES (return)

You might have to do this as root or sudo the command.

Then either logout and login again or reboot and your widgets can now be dragged onto the desktop. Sorry I forgot this vital bit of information.

-S

My personal favorite as just a nice trick (although I haven't confirmed it in OSX86 yet) is to hold the Command Option and Control keys and hit 8. It will invert the colors on the screen.

F9-F11 - Expose

I would kill for that in XP. It's one of my favorite features of OSX86

When ALT-Tabbing. You can still use many commands.
Try for example CMD+Q to kill the selected program. Very handy to kill most programs before planning on restarting or such.
Another favorite is CTRL+F2, which gives focus to the menubar. Very handy =)

Porn mode for Safari:



http://www.tuaw.com/2005/05/02/porn-mode/

There ARE a number of programs on WIndows with more or less similar features - I suggest something called XDESK which has that and a few other things related to managing many windows/applications (QuickView, better Alt+Tab, something like Alt+Tab for mouse) - even if XDESK is actually a virtual desktop manager.

A simple trick that maybe you all know it, [printscr] key in windows = command + 3 in osx, if you hit command + 4 you'll get a partial screen cap, you must to hit the numbers in the common keyboard instead of key pad. Command key = ALT key.

It's alt + shift + 3 for full screen capture and alt + shift + 4 for seleted capture

Sorry, i did write this post yesterday very later in the night, and forget "shift" key. so it's Command + shift + 3 and Command + Shift + 4. By default in osx86 Command key = ALT key, but you can to change it.

Command+shift+tab -- tab backward through application list

does the "hold F12" work in osx86? suppose to eject the CD/DVD out of primary optical drive.. at least on the ppc platform it does :-) also, force eject of all removable media that support eject by holding left mouse button on bootup (cannot be usb mouse via hub as far as i know)..

also, if anyone was successful in hacking "front row" into osx86, command+esc :-)

Holding F12 ejects removable media, just checked

ohhhh sweeet!

yay! =) i use my logitech usb wireless keyboard on osx tiger ppc on the mac mini.. sometimes it does not work (like when osx is trying to read a cd/dvd that is badly scratched).. in that case, i open terminal and type in "disktool -e" and all removable media is ejected. also, dragging the volume folder to trash ejects media.

-p

Google for TopDesk.

it took me a while to get the hang of this one on my french keyboard : apple-tab to cycle through the apps and then shift-A to quit them !

Well, here's something on PowerPC Macs (No OSx86! ) to access the Firmware Command Prompt in Open Firmware.

Once you hear the startup chime, hit Cmd+Opt+O+F (OF for Open firmware, stating the obvious). You will get a white screen with black text.

I don't know any of the commands, maybe someone can help me with that, or I will post them later once I find them.

Oh -- I forgot. BE CAREFUL IN HERE!!! There are commands that are DANGEROUSLY close to internal system functions that computer noobs and Mac noobs shouldn't play with unless you read something in a manual that told you to use this.

--In Shorter Words...--
DON'T USE WITHOUT PRIOR OPERATING KNOWLEDGE!!!!

i do what i please

a nice shortcut-list...



btw: try ctrl-option-command-8 (german keyb. layout)

very handy at night when you'r wardriving 'round the block

Also Alt ~ will allow you to toggle through the current windows open for that application. Just like the alt-tab, but only for that app. I find this very handy for browser popup windows and mail.


-Brian

firefox 1.0-1.1: (shift)+control+tab - move through tabs
firefox 1.5: opt(alt)+cmd(win)+arrows(left/right)

Try calling Expose and widgets up while pressing shift. It should produce a slow-mo effect. Don't ask me how that's useful... Maybe there were a series of customers for whom the suddenly popping up widgets created a migrane, I don't know..

dragging mounted image from finder anywhere else unmounts the image (f.e. desktop)

holddown shift key, and klick any minimize buton, see the slow motion genie effect

Also great for F9-F11
press shift +F10 2 or 3 times for example

Hidden tetris game

1. Open the finder
2. Open Applications
3. Open Utilities
4. Open Terminal
5. type "emacs"; click enter
6. Press ESC + X at the same time
7. Type "tetris"

have a fun

LOTR history

1. In the "applications" folder, open the "utilities" folder.
2. Open the terminal
3. type
cat /usr/share/calendar/calendar.history | grep "LOTR"

enjoy

i share my MP3 collection between iTunes for WIndows and iTunes for Mac by going into both apps' preferences (in OS X it's on the iTunes menu, on Windows it's on the Edit menu) and on the Advanced tab, I uncheck to keep my folder organized and to copy items to my music folder. Then from the File - Add to Library, pick the folder with the MP3. Doesn't matter if it's on an NTFS share; the database for the app is kept in the default location (which in OS X is ~/Music/iTunes). So now I know i'm not wasting any disk space with duplicate copies of my MP3.

Hey everyone. This is my first post on OSx86, although I've been frequenting this site a lot. Anyway, if you like the expose effect, check out the new Novell Xgl videos. This stuff looks a lot like Mac OS X and some features, like 3D desktop switching and transparent windows, are nice too.
Here's the link

enjoy

Thanks for this one Metrogirl - I've been looking for how to do this.
There are a whole bunch of other menu extras in the same folder which you can add. Some are not compatible with x86 (for example 'Classic' will tell you that your system is not set up to run OS9 classic apps...)
Anyway, I was looking around to figure out how to remove or rearrange menu extras. By holding 'command' (or Alt by default on a windows keyboard) you can drag items off the menu or rearrange them. More info at http://guides.macrumors.com/Menu_Extras

Ctrl+F2 when the mouse isn't working. You can use arrow keys to navigate the menu bar and press return when you highlight the item you wanted.

Ctrl+F8 AFTER having pressed Ctrl+F2, it selects the right side of the menu bar. Why you can't get at it otherwise is a bit obtuse for me.

Unless you have discovered what key on a PC keyboard maps to "eject," the following aren't too helpful for you: Cmd+Ctrl+Eject = Reboot; Cmd+Alt+Ctrl+Eject = shutdown.

The "sleep" key on some PC keyboards will bring up a special dialog box on OS X by which you can select to sleep, restart, or shutdown (and cancel).

Cmd+Alt+Esc will force quit an app. If you do not see the force quit dialog, try choosing that from the Apple menu. If this still doesn't work, see if you can activate another application first by clicking a window or clicking an app in the dock that has a black arrow pointing up at it (this is a running/loaded indicator).

All of my hidden stuff on OS X is done via TinkerTool. That one piece of software should be required on every Mac.

Other usefull tricks:
Open a Finder Window
Hold down 'Cmd' and click on a window title
You will see the hierarchical structure untill tnis folder, and can navigate up
Mount a CD or dmg image
Hold down 'Option' (Windows key) and drag the mounted image or disc. You can copy all contents of the mounted volume as a folder to the new desired location
If you are mounted a .dmg image to install something, the mounted volume will be opened as a simple window (without button bar and left pane). Click on a the above right button in a simple window and it becames a normal Finder window (with button bar and left pane). You can drag now the application direct in the 'Applications' folder located in the left pane.
Hope to understand my poor English.
Enjoy!

heres my favorate. i have never heard of anyone mention it before and it is not mentioned on apple website or in help. And it is very usefull.

In quicktime, hold down shift and press up arrow key to increase volume more than normal. this is very useful for low volume videos.

When using Firefox 1.5.0.2 :-

Holding apple when clicking on a link opens it in a new tab.
Pressing space scrolls down one page.
Pressing shft + space dcrolls up one page.
Apple + option + left or right moves between tabs.
Apple + T opens a new tab.
Apple + W closes the current tab.
Apple + [ goes back.
Apple + ] goes forward.

Here is how convert plist binary files to plain text files (or XML files editable on Text editors) and viceversa:

From binary to text (XML):

plutil -convert xml1 some_file.plist

From text or XML to binary:

plutil -convert binary1 some_other_file.plist

Cool tip! Thanks!

Here are some more cool tips:

It was already mentioned that if you press Apple Opt and 3 you capture the whole screen to a file on your desktop, and if you press Apple Opt and 4 you get to select the part to capture, but if you press Apple Opt 4 and then press the spacebar, you get to capture any window just by clicking it, even if it's mostly covered up.

If you turn on Full Keyboard Access in System Preferences, you can tab between buttons and select then with your spacebar. The glowing blue button waits for the Enter key, but the normal button with the blue glow around it tabs and responds to Spacebar.

At startup you can press the T key to turn your computer into a Firewire drive. Hook it up to another computer, not just a Mac either, and you can use your Mac's optical drive and hard drive on the other computer. (Note that Windows will not see a Mac formatted drive by default though.) You, of course, need a firewire cable too.

=)

I'm surprised that nobody put in OS X's hidden Tetris and Text Adventure

To play OS X's hidden tetris, you:

1. Open the finder
2. Open Applications
3. Open Utilities
4. Open Terminal
5. type "emacs"; click enter
6. Press ESC + X at the same time
7. Type "tetris"
8. Play Tetris! Use the arrow keys to move and rotate the blocks, and press the space to make the blocks fall.

To play the Text adventure, you just type Just type "emacs -batch -l dunnet" (without quotes) into the terminal and it will bring up and old school text based game.

I think the OS X developer's were REALLY bored when they made it.

Those are both emacs easter eggs, not OS X. Starting with Mac OS X the developers were no longer allowed to hide easter eggs, since being hidden they are never tested and could cause bugs.

emacs is an included Unix app, Apple did not write it.

=)

Create an Alias of your movie directory on another drive to the Movies directory. Now you dont have to copy your movies to the Movie directory on Front Row/Media Central!

Ok now I've got this on my desktop...



But I don't know how to close it? Dashboard can't do anything with it anymore...

No problem, Pippin. Start to drag the widget and while you are still moving it quickly press F12. The dashboard will open and you can then stop moving the widget - it will now be restored to the dashboard. You must still be dragging it when you hit F12 - if it's not moving it won't be affected.

Haha so simple so simple!! Thank you very much MetroGirl!!

As previously posted holding down F12 ejects
Alt + F12 ejects 2nd drive if you have two.

Hold Ctrl + F12 = shutdown prompt
Hold Ctrl + Windows Key + F12 = reboot

Shift + Scroll Wheel = scrolls left to right

Firefox
Ctrl + Scroll = navigates back/forward
Windows + Scroll = increase/descrease text size

Actually, Mac easter eggs stopped around OS 8 or 9. Before that, the Mac OS was riddled with them. They are in OS X, but they are usually text files, like the Mrs. Fields cookie recipe