Please share your hidden Mac OS X features or tips and tricks

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Do you know any hidden or little-known nice feature of Mac OS X? It doesn't matter what it is—maybe just a short terminal command or a keyboard shortcut. Share your experiences on hidden Mac OS X features with us.. Please post one tip per answer. Please also check to see if your answer has already been posted - duplicate answers will be deleted. To search answers for this question use inquestion:400 (or inquestion:this, directly from the question page) in addition to your search terms in the search box in the upper right hand corner of this page. Also provide details on how to achieve that feature, and if possible, include a relevant image too! osx tips-and-tricks hidden-features linkimprove this question edited Jan 26 at 16:49 community wiki 25 revs, 10 users 53% Am1rr3zA

15   mac.finerthingsin.com is a great source of hidden gems on the Mac. – Philip Regan Aug 24 '10 at 23:35 show 5 more comments feedback

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up vote 135 down vote

In any Finder window or Open/Save dialog, you can hit ⌘+⇧+G (just '/' also works in Open/Save) to get a location bar from which you can directly type in the directory to go to. It even supports ~ for home and tab completion. The Open/Save dialog has several other useful shortcuts: ⌘ + R - Reveals the selected item in a new Finder window. ⌘ + I - Info window shows for the selected item. ⌘ + D - selects the Desktop folder as a destination ⌘ + F - cursor jumps to the Find text field ⌘ + . - Cancels and closes the dialog window ⌘ + ⇧ + > - Shows/Hides hidden files in the dialog linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 18:57 community wiki 8 revs, 7 users 44% bmike

1   nice one! this has been bugging me for awhile now... – Robert S Ciaccio Sep 13 '10 at 10:53 38   Typing / or ~ in an open/save dialog will also trigger the file path text field to appear. – John Siracusa Sep 14 '10 at 18:09 3   This basically works like the command line cd command. Type /... to go to absolute paths, ~/... for paths relative to the user directory and ... for directories relative to the current directory. Great for opening hidden directories. – deceze Sep 27 '10 at 3:21 show 2 more comments feedback

up vote 105 down vote

Proxy icons In a document-based application (like Finder, TextEdit, Preview, Pages…), after a document has been saved, a proxy icon for the document appears in the title bar. It represent the file itself, and can be likewise manipulated: click it for a few seconds and drag to another application to open it, or to the desktop/Finder if you want to copy/move it, etc… ⌘-click (or control-click, or right-click) it to view the path menu, useful to open the folder or any subfolders of the file in the Finder. ⌘-click on the titlebar in Safari can help you easily move up the directory structure of a web site, too! linkimprove this answer edited Jul 28 '11 at 9:53 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 70% Carmine Paolino

6   You can also drag it into Terminal. – Daryl Spitzer Sep 16 '10 at 0:08 7   The link you gave (to Apple Human Interface Guidelines) is useful. Lots of interesting details to be learned from there (this was new to me: a dot in the (red) close button means there are unsaved changes). – Jonik Sep 17 '10 at 23:14 3   Proxy icons are like the best thing ever. +1! – Mark Szymanski Mar 22 '11 at 19:31 show 1 more comment feedback

up vote 104 down vote

In the terminal, you can pipe the output of any command to pbcopy to copy it to the system clipboard. You can also paste from the system clipboard using pbpaste, and pipe that to another command or write the value directly to a file: Copy a string: echo "ohai im in ur clipboardz" | pbcopy Copy the HTML of StackOverflow.com: curl "http://stackoverflow.com/" | pbcopy Open a new buffer in VIM, initialized to the content of the clipboard: pbpaste | vi - Save the contents of the clipboard directly to a file: pbpaste > newfile.txt linkimprove this answer edited Sep 15 '10 at 13:44 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 47% Ryan Tenney

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up vote 96 down vote

I love the fact that OS X will scroll the window that the mouse is hovering over, even if another application has focus. That way I can scroll an example that I am coding in TextMate without having to lose keyboard control on TM linkimprove this answer answered Aug 24 '10 at 23:36 community wiki Dan Seaver

7   This is a great feature. Using Command + Click you can even open Firefox links in new tabs without giving it focus. – David Barry Sep 4 '10 at 17:03 8   Katmouse will do this for you on Windows. I installed it a few years back and have been using it ever since. – Robert S Ciaccio Sep 13 '10 at 10:51 3   This is not limited to OS X - this is a feature in many window managers on Linux / Unix - including the one I'm using right now :P – George Edison Apr 6 '11 at 0:51 show 11 more comments feedback

up vote 90 down vote

I always find the ⌘+⇧+4+space (you must press space at the end otherwise it doesn't work) command is really useful, and one that a lot of people don't know you can do. Upon pressing space, you get a large camera icon for your cursor, and it allows you to take a screenshot just of the highlighted window. The nice thing is that OS X preserves the window drop shadow, with full alpha transparency. So when you paste the images into other documents, they look fab. More screenshot magic from 3rdparty. Screenshot Secrets via: http://digitalmedia.oreilly.com/2006/01/01/mac-os-x-screenshot-secrets.html: ⌘+⇧+3 Capture entire screen and save as a file ⌘+ctrl+⇧+3 Capture entire screen and copy to the clipboard ⌘+⇧+4 Capture dragged area and save as a file ⌘+ctrl+⇧+4 Capture dragged area and copy to the clipboard ⌘+⇧+4 then space Capture a window, menu, desktop icon, or the menu bar and save as a file ⌘+ctrl+⇧+4 then space Capture a window, menu, desktop icon, or the menu bar and copy to the clipboard Another useful trick is to hold space while drawing a capture area to reposition it. Hit esc while capturing an area or window to exit capture mode. Note: I added this because I find it to be useful. I don't mean any offense to anyone's answer in doing so. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 18:59 community wiki 6 revs, 5 users 54% notJim

26   I'd rather describe it as "Having pressed cmd+shift+4, you can toggle between a crosshair snap and a full-window snap using spacebar". – deceze Aug 26 '10 at 2:25 1   I didn't know about the "space" aspect -- very nice! – khedron Sep 8 '10 at 6:28 2   Tried to add a few more but wouldn't fit as a comment - OP feel free to edit your answer: apple.stackexchange.com/questions/400/… – Josh Newman Sep 14 '10 at 17:22 1   If you hold CTRL while taking the shot, it is placed in your clipboard. – klaaspieter Apr 13 '11 at 8:30 show 5 more comments feedback

up vote 83 down vote

You can increase or decrease your volume by quarter increments by Pressing: ⌥ + ⇧ + Volume Up/Down Note, however, that this only works in versions of Mac OS X prior to Lion (10.7). For workarounds on how to accomplish this on 10.7+, see this question. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:00 community wiki 4 revs, 4 users 40% Reed Olsen

35   Related to this tip, option+any volume key will open the sound system preference pane, and shift+vol up/down will change volume silently (without the little plink sound.) – ghoppe Sep 9 '10 at 20:38 7   Following up on ghoppe, if you've turned off the preference for the little plink sound using Shift + Volume Up/Down will change the volume with the sound effects. – Matthew Shanley Sep 14 '10 at 17:58 2   If you want the tiniest little bit of sound, you can turn the sound all the way down with "Volume Down" and then hit the "Mute" key to turn it up just a little bit. – Ted Naleid Apr 9 '11 at 19:17 show 4 more comments feedback

up vote 79 down vote	While Cmd tabbing between applications, without releasing CMD, you can hit 'Q' to quit or 'H' to hide the selected application. Works great with the mouse to get rid of a whole bunch of applications quickly. The bevel won't go away and you can repeat this for as many applications as you like as long as you're holding CMD. linkimprove this answer answered Sep 14 '10 at 18:13 community wiki
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up vote 62 down vote	Want tab to go to every field on a form not just input fields? I got sick of the state/country drop down fields of web forms being skipped when tabbing. Go to System Preferences => Keyboard and set Full Keyboard Access to All Controls linkimprove this answer edited Oct 9 '10 at 17:40 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 62% Shaun W.
	2   I cannot live without this...absolutely essential! – Lizzan Oct 9 '10 at 13:01 7   I don't understand rationale behind "Text boxes and lists only" setting being default. – Peter Štibraný Nov 2 '10 at 5:40 1   Ah THAT's where it is! I set it in OS 10.4 and haven't been able to find it since! thanks :) – Mark Pim Apr 5 '11 at 7:50 show 4 more comments feedback

up vote 58 down vote

Most applications on OS X respect emacs' style shortcuts for maneuvering about in text fields. ctrl+A: beginning of line. ctrl+E: end of line. ctrl+U: delete from cursor to beginning of line. ctrl+K: delete from cursor to end of line. ctrl+W: erase word to the left. ctrl+T: transpose characters around cursor. There are others that are slipping my mind currently I'm sure. I miss this so much on Linux. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:00 community wiki 7 revs, 5 users 61% anon

17   these are emacs shortcuts more than they are bash i believe – dstarh Feb 9 '11 at 21:31 3   Those are indeed Emacs bindings; bash uses libreadline, which defaults to Emacs style. There are plenty of other bindings: CTRL+f / CTRL+b to move back and forward by character, and OPT+f / OPT+b to move by word (super useful!). Similarly, CTRL+d deletes the character to the right, and OPT+Delete deletes the word to the left. – ieure Apr 8 '11 at 19:28 4   @Will Hardy set -o vi – Bluu Apr 9 '11 at 3:46 show 3 more comments feedback

up vote 57 down vote

In Terminal (Applications/Utilities/Terminal), open can be pretty handy. It can: launch programs by exact path to the executable launch any program in the PATH directories by executable name In Terminal, type open -a Application to launch an application that lives in the /Applications folder, or open <exact path to applcation> to launch an application that is anywhere on your computer. open files in default applications Just us open <file>. open song.mp3 will open song.mp3 in the default audio player (in my case iTunes) open files with other applications Open a file with Mail.app (i.e. mail the file) open -a Mail homework.txt open a Finder window into a local directory open a Finder window into a network share open /Path/to/dir/ will launch the folder in Finder, whereas open . will open the current folder in Finder. open any URL with its default handler (e.g. a browser) open http://google.com will launch the default browser and open the url. It also works for FTP (but i have not tested anything else) For more, just run man open in Terminal or see this page. From Super User linkimprove this answer edited Apr 12 '11 at 19:49 community wiki 5 revs, 5 users 42% joshhunt

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up vote 51 down vote

When I first switched to Mac a couple of years back, I was using it full time for nearly six months before someone showed me ⌘+space to bring up the Spotlight Search. Single best shortcut I've learned. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:01 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 50% Tim Sullivan

31   Addendum to this: the Spotlight search field can handle simple mathematical expressions. No need for Calculator.app for a quick bit of division! – LessPop_MoreFizz Aug 24 '10 at 14:53 4   @LessPop: It's community wiki, remove your comment and add it to the answer via the edit link. – Josh K Aug 24 '10 at 17:33 1   I use this shortcut all the time for quick lookup of English word definitions (from the built-in New Oxford American Dictionary) – Jonik Sep 14 '10 at 21:14 show 1 more comment feedback

up vote 48 down vote	It took me a while before I figured out that hitting the space bar while in Finder launches Quick Look on whatever is selected. VERY handy. Also note that holding ⌥ while doing this throws you straight into the full-screen view. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:01 community wiki 5 revs, 4 users 25% Trieu
	1   Alt: no such button. – WTP Apr 2 '11 at 15:54 9   My button says alt on it. I know it's option, but it doesn't say that on it anymore. – Rich Bradshaw Apr 12 '11 at 19:21 show 4 more comments feedback

up vote 48 down vote

Holding ⌥ while clicking menu bar icons will give you additional menu items or alternate menus. The alternate volume control menu will let you choose input and output audio devices. Bonus: On older versions of OS X, this gave you the alert volume instead of devices. You can still get the alert volume using ⇧ clicking. For the airport menu, you'll get WiFi connection information. The BlueTooth menu will include debugging information and tools. Time Machine will replace the normal operations with "Verify Backups" and "Browse Other Time Machine Disks". Unlike the other menus, the Time Machine menu will show the alternates if you hold Option after opening the menu, and will hide them if you release it. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:01 community wiki 5 revs, 4 users 45% outis

2   And it won't. This is Snow Leopard only. For Leopard I suggest checking out SoundSource: rogueamoeba.com/freebies – Jason Salaz Mar 12 '11 at 1:49 2   This is awesome. – pt2ph8 Mar 22 '11 at 21:23 5   I once read 'Option-click everything' – John Ferguson Apr 8 '11 at 22:56 1   This also works for the network control (in snow). I'm not on my mac right now, can't add cap. – Trufa Apr 12 '11 at 14:38 1   I've been using soundsource this whole time! Thank you so much for letting me clear up some oh-so-valuable space in my 15" macbook menu bar! – Matt Williamson Apr 12 '11 at 15:40 show 4 more comments feedback

up vote 44 down vote	In most Mac apps (TextEdit, for example), you can ⌥-drag* to select a rectangular area of non-contiguous text. You can also hold ⌘ while dragging to select multiple disjoint areas in a single selection. *Hold ⌥ while dragging your mouse over an area linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:01 community wiki 4 revs, 4 users 36% Fishtoaster
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up vote 42 down vote

I needed this today, when I had to shut down several Macs. ctrl + ⌥ + ⌘ + ⏏ Shuts the computer down ⌥ + ⌘ + ⏏ sends computer to sleep ⇧ + ctrl + ⏏ send display only to sleep (great for locking your computer instantly) ctrl + ⌘ + ⏏ restarts the Mac ⌥ + ⌘ + esc lets you kill not responding programs (including the Finder) and one of my favorites ⌘ + , gets you to preferences of almost every program linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:03 community wiki 6 revs, 6 users 62% Stegel

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up vote 39 down vote	In any Open/Save dialog window, hitting ⌘+D opens the desktop folder. linkimprove this answer edited Sep 11 '10 at 19:16 community wiki 3 revs, 2 users 50% Davide Gualano
	8   @Radek: There is also Cmd+H for your home directory. – Harald Hanche-Olsen Apr 2 '11 at 16:35 1   In the Finder it's Cmd-Shift-D to go to the Desktop. – michaelmichael Apr 12 '11 at 15:46 2   In Finder: CMD-Shift-D: Desktop CMD-Shift-A: Applications CMD-SHift-H: Home directory – klaaspieter Apr 13 '11 at 8:32 show 2 more comments feedback

up vote 37 down vote	⌘ + click on a dock icon takes you to the respective app in /applications via @Mactip linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:03 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 83% Josh Newman
	8   To my delight I just noticed that cmd + click (or cmd + enter) in Spotlight search results (and some other places) follows the same logic (= show in Finder instead of opening) – Jonik Sep 26 '10 at 12:19 feedback

up vote 34 down vote	Running pmset noidle in Terminal will prevent your Mac from sleeping. Press Ctrl+C to stop. linkimprove this answer edited Sep 13 '10 at 18:37 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 80% Peter Štibraný
	12   Great tip! Also, Caffeine does the same thing but in a button in the menu bar, and can also prevent sleeping for a certain amount of time (and it's free). – Ricket Nov 20 '10 at 0:22 show 1 more comment feedback

up vote 34 down vote

The speech synthesizer, which is available from the command line, with the command say, knows how to correctly pronounce the operating system name: say Mac OS X It won't say "MacOSex", but "Mac OhEs Ten". That's attention to detail. It works even if you specify macosx as the argument. linkimprove this answer answered Sep 14 '10 at 21:13 community wiki Victor Jalencas

15   I use "say" a fair amount -- scripts tell me when they're done, for example. Handy. – khedron Sep 22 '10 at 0:31 3   Here’s an example of the details that the speech engine gets correct daringfireball.net/linked/2007/10/28/alex – Josh Lee Oct 5 '10 at 18:14 6   say -vz Droid is deliciously ironic. XD – Redbeard 0x0A Jan 31 '11 at 21:08 1   ls | say to say a list of files – WTP Apr 2 '11 at 15:59 2   the say command is a wrapper over the API to use it from Cocoa (see developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/Cocoa/Reference/…) so I don't see see why it couldn't be used in a service. Also, the accessibility services (VoiceOver) use it as well – Victor Jalencas Apr 4 '11 at 15:54 show 4 more comments feedback

up vote 33 down vote

While typing - Just press F5 to get the quickest suggestion of what you typing ( almost equivalent to spell check-suggestions ) like as follows. linkimprove this answer answered Dec 30 '10 at 11:13 community wiki Spark

4   OH MY GOD THIS IS AMAZING. I had no idea this existed! – joshhunt Dec 30 '10 at 12:10 4   Or for MacBooks where to press F5 you have to press the Fn key as well, you could just use the Esc button. (This is cool though, thanks for bringing it to my attention :)) – Jonathan. Jan 9 '11 at 18:19 1   Esc works too, but it more unsafe due to Esc usually having another function. But it works :). – Jason Salaz Mar 12 '11 at 1:46 1   I love this one!! – daviesgeek Sep 6 '11 at 2:07 feedback

up vote 33 down vote	Hold ctrl and move the scroll wheel(or use 2 fingers on trackpad). It will zoom in the entire screen. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:03 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 50% Michael
	2   I use it occasionally. I wished it was possible to disable antialiasing... To count pixels ;) – Vincent Apr 8 '11 at 23:10 show 3 more comments feedback

up vote 29 down vote

When you drag and drop any file (or folder) from Finder onto a Terminal window, it gets converted into the full (absolute) path to that file. I find this a small but occasionally useful trick when dealing with files in both Finder and Terminal. linkimprove this answer answered Sep 14 '10 at 21:26 community wiki Jonik

11   You can also drag & drop files into File Open dialogs, and it will navigate to the appropriate dialog and highlight the file. – khedron Sep 22 '10 at 0:30 1   You can also use Copy/Paste instead of Drag & Drop. And since Terminal knows you copied a folder/file, it knows to automatically escape special characters for pasting into the shell. – Chris Page Sep 4 '11 at 9:35 1   As of Mac OS X Lion 10.7, if you drag a folder or pathname onto a tab (rather than into the terminal view) it will automatically execute a complete "cd" command. – Chris Page Sep 4 '11 at 9:37 show 3 more comments feedback

up vote 27 down vote	Drag and drop files and folders to "Open" dialogs/sheets: very useful to open package contents with other software. Just locate the file with the Finder and drag and drop it to the Open dialog Bonus: you can do the same thing with 'Upload file' web forms. (Only with WebKit-based browser) ➔ linkimprove this answer answered Aug 28 '10 at 9:32 community wiki Carmine Paolino
	1   Also useful in general for open/save dialogs. – khedron Sep 8 '10 at 6:31 8   +1 for web forms with drag and drop. SUPER handy! – Agos Sep 15 '10 at 0:10 1   I love this behavior and hate that in windows, if you try it, the file is moved to the folder that was showing in the dialog. Stupid! – adambox Sep 16 '10 at 20:12 show 1 more comment feedback

up vote 22 down vote

Show the full directory path in the Finder window. In the Terminal, run this: defaults write com.apple.finder _FXShowPosixPathInTitle -bool YES Then, run this. killall Finder There are all sorts of hidden defaults that can be mucked around with but this is my absolute favorite because now no matter which window I am looking at, I know exactly where I am. linkimprove this answer answered Aug 26 '10 at 0:57 community wiki Philip Regan

1   I just test this, WOW I really love this one. – Am1rr3zA Jan 31 '11 at 17:23 show 3 more comments feedback

up vote 21 down vote	Secrets is a preference pane with a huge amount of hidden preferences for both the system and some common applications. linkimprove this answer answered Aug 24 '10 at 19:19 community wiki kolizz
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up vote 21 down vote

Image Wells All good mac programs contain image wells for opening files, such as the Desktop and Screen Saver pane in System Preferences: or in Filemerge: This nifty litte things allow you to drag-and-drop files into them (and in some cases, out of) to load them into the program. Here, I am changing the wallpaper by dragging the file out of Finder and into the image well: linkimprove this answer answered Sep 15 '10 at 14:04 community wiki joshhunt

2   This is also how you can change the icons for apps & other files in Finder. Highlight a file, press Cmd-I, and drag a new icon onto the well. – Joe Shaw Apr 12 '11 at 15:43 show 5 more comments feedback

up vote 21 down vote	Holding down ⇧ while using the mouse scroll wheel will scroll the window horizontally. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:03 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% Matthew Shanley
	4   If you have a multitouch trackpad, you can also scroll horizontally by swiping two fingers left and right. – Matthew Apr 13 '11 at 5:56 show 1 more comment feedback

up vote 19 down vote	This is a pretty common one, but to show all hidden files you can type the command defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles 1 and then killall Finder in Terminal. To reverse, repeat using a 0 instead of 1. linkimprove this answer answered Aug 24 '10 at 23:45 community wiki swilliams
	4   The only annoying bit is that you see the .DS_Store files EVERYWHERE, like on your desktop. – mhud Apr 12 '11 at 17:51 show 3 more comments feedback

up vote 18 down vote

Most animations in OSX can be played in slow motion, when you hold ⇧. Works for example to slowly minimize windows if you click the minimize button while holding the ⇧ key. Other examples are: toggle exposé toggle dashboard add/remove dashboard items all kinds of animations in Twitter for Mac From: http://www.eeggs.com/items/29318.html In MacOS X, while in the finder, open any window & click the minimizie button (yellow) at the top of the window while holding command+shift. This will minimize the window in slow motion using the new "genie effect" minimize function of Mac OS X. The CEO of Apple has shown this egg publicly several times. However, this egg is undocumented & has no system menu equivalent to use this feature. Anyone who has NOT followed the development of Mac OSX & watched the demos at the MacWorld trade shows would not realize this somewhat useless feature exists in Mac OSX. linkimprove this answer edited Apr 12 '11 at 20:13 community wiki 5 revs, 4 users 45% anon

4   Even better: If you type killall Dock in Terminal, without hitting enter, do this, then go back to Terminal and hit enter, the Dock is quit while the window is minimizing, leaving it in its animated state until next time you minimize it. – ughoavgfhw Mar 22 '11 at 19:49 show 4 more comments feedback

up vote 18 down vote

I really find the inbuilt dictionary useful on Cocoa apps like Safari and Mail etc. With your cursor over a word, press ctrl+⌘+D to get a definition. You can also drag a word straight onto the Safari icon in the Dock to perform a Google search for the word. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:04 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 80% Nev Stokes

show 3 more comments Was this post useful to you?              Please share your hidden Mac OS X features or tips and tricks up vote 171 down vote favorite 309 share [g+] share [fb] share [tw] Do you know any hidden or little-known nice feature of Mac OS X? It doesn't matter what it is—maybe just a short terminal command or a keyboard shortcut. Share your experiences on hidden Mac OS X features with us.. Please post one tip per answer. Please also check to see if your answer has already been posted - duplicate answers will be deleted. To search answers for this question use inquestion:400 (or inquestion:this, directly from the question page) in addition to your search terms in the search box in the upper right hand corner of this page. Also provide details on how to achieve that feature, and if possible, include a relevant image too! osx tips-and-tricks hidden-features linkimprove this question edited Jan 26 at 16:49 community wiki 25 revs, 10 users 53% Am1rr3zA 15   mac.finerthingsin.com is a great source of hidden gems on the Mac. – Philip Regan Aug 24 '10 at 23:35 show 5 more comments feedback protected by Community♦ May 10 '11 at 20:15 This question is protected to prevent "thanks!", "me too!", or spam answers by new users. To answer it, you must have earned at least 10 reputation on this site. 117 Answers active oldest votes prev 1 2 3 4 next up vote 16 down vote On i.a. en-US keyboards ⌘+` will cycle through multiple open windows in your current application. On some other keyboard layouts the hot key may be e.g. ⌘+<. You can verify—and modify—your "Move focus to next window in application" shortcut under System Preferences → Keyboard → Keyboard Shortcuts → Keyboard & Text Input. linkimprove this answer edited Aug 23 '11 at 14:25 community wiki 2 revs 3rdparty 2   It's stunning how many people don't know about this. Of course, I remember when I was complaining about "how bad OSX's Alt Tab is, because it doesn't show all windows". Then I learned how to do it better. – Jason Salaz Mar 12 '11 at 1:47 1   cmd + ` (not tilde, which requires shift) can also be used when the task switcher (cmd + tab) is active (continue to hold cmd), selecting the previous application rather than the next. – eyelidlessness Apr 14 '11 at 5:33 show 2 more comments feedback up vote 16 down vote In file open and file save dialogs: Hit ⌘+⇧+. to show all hidden files and folders. Note that this appears to be true for any keyboard, no matter what ⇧+. on its own produces on that keyboard. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:04 community wiki 5 revs, 3 users 56% Debilski 1   Shift . doesn't correspond to : in the US keyboard, maybe another distribution? – Petruza Apr 4 '11 at 15:38 1   Heh. I forgot about the community wiki feature. I edited it myself. – Harald Hanche-Olsen Apr 5 '11 at 16:02 4   I so wish this feature existed in the Finder itself, and not just the Open/Save dialog. I would LOVE to be able to enable hidden files temporarily, on-the-fly, as it were. – Jason Salaz Apr 15 '11 at 1:16 show 7 more comments feedback up vote 14 down vote Pressing ⌥+fn will bring up the System Preference panel for that key. Here's a list: ⌥+Brightness: Displays ⌥+Exposé/Dashboard: Exposé and Spaces ⌥+Mute/Volume: Sound linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:04 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 55% Mark Szymanski feedback up vote 14 down vote When typing text in any document or text field ⌥+Backspace will delete the entire word, the same with ⌥+Del which will delete the whole next word. Using an accented language? Press ctrl+⇧+Backspace after an accented letter to delete just the accent, not the letter. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:11 community wiki 4 revs, 4 users 57% gregseth show 2 more comments feedback up vote 13 down vote My favorite trick is using expose with drag and drop. Once you've started dragging something you can use the expose keyboard shortcut, switch to the app you want to drag it to, and drop it wherever it's needed. It's great for doing things like adding images to a presentation. linkimprove this answer answered Sep 14 '10 at 20:01 community wiki jblocksom 1   You can also drag it to the app's Dock icon and Exposé will pop up with only that app's windows. – WTP Apr 2 '11 at 16:02 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 10 down vote When you're ⌘+⇥ between running applications, if you press ⌥ before releasing command, it will raise minimized windows from the dock. Otherwise, you may be in an application, but without a raised window. Also, while ⌘+⇥ goes to the right through the application list, ⌘+⇧+⇥goes left. ⌘+ backtick (`) also goes left. ctrl+⌥+⌘-8 inverts the screen. Sometimes useful for whacky lighting situations, especially with glossy screens. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:06 community wiki 4 revs, 4 users 53% Elliott Bennett 1   Option to raise minimize -- this only works for me if the application has no non-minimized windows. I wonder if this is intentional behavior or a side-effect of something else? – khedron Sep 22 '10 at 0:35 show 3 more comments feedback up vote 9 down vote Use widget in Desktop: This allows you to drag widgets out of Dashboard onto the desktop. Requires the dock to be relaunched to take effect, so type "killall Dock" and press enter. Now, if you click and hold onto a widget in the dashboard and press F4 to return to the desktop, the widget won't disappear with the rest. If you want get it back to dashboard click it and press f4 (show dashboard) and release widget defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode YES linkimprove this answer edited Apr 8 '11 at 5:58 community wiki 6 revs, 2 users 88% Am1rr3zA 2   no click it and press f4 (show dashboard) and release widget. – Am1rr3zA Aug 28 '10 at 0:16 show 5 more comments feedback up vote 9 down vote Disable Caps-Lock The ability to disable the Caps-Lock key is wonderful (simply in the keyboard preferences, special keys). It is not really hidden, but I never need the key, but especially on my macbook I sometimes hit it by fault. Some people also use this panel to replace Caps-Lock with Control. Especially useful when you're using Ctrl+A, Ctrl+E shortcuts a lot. linkimprove this answer edited Apr 12 '11 at 9:15 community wiki 3 revs, 2 users 75% Arne Burmeister 2   If you are a command line hacker, having caps lock as control is pretty essential in my book. – claytron Apr 20 '11 at 19:54 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 9 down vote Have a laptop? ⌥+Click BatterySymbol in menu bar to view your battery's condition via @Mactip linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:06 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 91% Josh Newman 5   The same on the WiFi logo: displays more information about the hotspot you're connected to. – gregseth Sep 15 '10 at 20:12 1   Same goes for the audio symbol and the bluetooth symbol. – johnwards Sep 27 '10 at 9:31 feedback up vote 9 down vote In iTunes pressing ⌘ + L brings you to the song playing right now. Helpful if you lost yourself in your collection or are in iTunes Store and want to change something real quick. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:08 community wiki 5 revs, 4 users 69% Stegel feedback up vote 8 down vote This isn't really a "feature", just a way to customize OS X, but I still think it's useful: You can edit the icons used by OS X at /System/Library/CoreServices/CoreTypes.bundle/Contents/Resources You can also change the login screen to your liking here /System/Library/CoreServices/SecurityAgentPlugins/loginwindow.bundle/Contents/Resources There are so many ways to customize OS X... the dock, for example (/System/Library/CoreServices/Dock.app/Contents/Resources) And you don't really need to "resource hack" anything: just backup and change a couple png or tif files! linkimprove this answer answered Aug 24 '10 at 23:29 community wiki Nano8Blazex feedback up vote 8 down vote It's always worth pressing Alt when a menu is posted, as some menu items will change to offer previously-hidden options. For example: In Safari, File>Close Window and File>Close Tab become Close All Windows and Close all Tabs. In iTunes, File>Find Duplicates becomes File>Find Exact Duplicates, and Advanced>Create MP3 Version becomes Advanced>Convert to MP3... In Mail.app, Edit->Add Link... becomes Edit->Remove Link. In Finder right-click menu, Get Info becomes Show Inspector, and Keep Arranged By becomes Arrange By. On the Window menu in any application, Minimize, Zoom, and Bring All to Front become Minimize All, Zoom All, and Arrange in Front. linkimprove this answer answered Jan 31 '11 at 18:04 community wiki scottishwildcat show 1 more comment feedback up vote 8 down vote Photo Booth: Hold ⌥ to skip countdown and take immediate photo. Hold ⇧ to disable the screen flash. via @Mactip linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:06 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 90% Josh Newman show 1 more comment feedback up vote 7 down vote On any open file or save file dialog instead of searching for the file, you can grab any from the finder... And drop it in the window to select it! This little trick has saved me hours in looking for files to be opened. You can also drop files directy on the file fiedls of any webpage. Specially useful tricks when you have files on your desktop or a finder window! Hope it helps! linkimprove this answer edited Apr 15 '11 at 14:26 community wiki 2 revs kevin9794 1   Drag and drop on OS X is just amazing. Pretty much works everwhere. – joshhunt May 6 '11 at 3:51 1   I would vote this up 10 times if I could. – Ian C. May 20 '11 at 16:28 show 2 more comments feedback up vote 7 down vote ⌘ + click on the title bar at the top of a Safari window to get a menu of URLs, each the same as the previous but with the last path component removed. Like this: linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:06 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 91% Simon Whitaker show 2 more comments feedback up vote 7 down vote hold down ctrl and ⇧ while mousing over the dock to toggle magnification on-demand. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:09 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% jburns20 feedback up vote 6 down vote When clicking from one application's window to another's, holding down ⌥ while clicking will automatically hide the former app's windows. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:07 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% Mjayasek feedback up vote 6 down vote Hold down ⌥ and click TimeMachine Icon in the menubar. Now you can search/restore from other backups via @MacTip linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:09 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 91% Josh Newman feedback up vote 6 down vote I still think ⌘ + ⌥ + ⇧ + v (paste without style) is very handy. That is, when something is on the clipboard and has unwanted styles along for the ride, this keyboard shortcuts lets you paste just the plain text without any formatting. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:09 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 80% Jeff Atwood 1   I wish all programs implemented this key combination consistently. Evernote decided they needed to be "special" and use Cmd + Shift + V for paste-without-style. Grrrr. – Ian C. May 20 '11 at 16:26 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 6 down vote You can change screen brightness in quarter intervals using this combination: ⌥ + ⇧ + Brightness Up / Down linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:11 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 89% marked feedback up vote 5 down vote Hold down the ⌘ key to drag a background window by it's title bar without focussing it and bringing it to front ⌥-click in a scrollbar's empty space to scroll to the clicked place (instead of scrolling up or down one page). You can switch this behavior in the Appearance panel of System Preferences. ⌘-click on the name of a page in Safari's title bar to show the URL path as a menu. Select to browse (this is the same as ⌘-clicking the title in document windows). linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:07 community wiki 3 revs, 2 users 75% Peter Frings feedback up vote 5 down vote ⌘ + ⇧ + . will show hidden files in any file-open dialog box. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:12 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 95% z4mba feedback up vote 4 down vote If you hold down option while resizing the Dock, it will resize in multiples of 16 pixels. linkimprove this answer answered Sep 14 '10 at 18:37 community wiki feedback up vote 4 down vote In Safari, on a page that wants you to select a file for upload, instead of clicking "browse", you can usually just drag a file directly to the "browse" button. It will set the filename without even opening up the file dialog. Slightly recursive example below :) linkimprove this answer answered Jun 20 '11 at 12:57 community wiki Matt Gibson feedback up vote 4 down vote I really like the way of MacOS modifies the letter spacing of the fonts when resizing a pane. As long as the spacing can be decreased, the title won't be truncated. Example: linkimprove this answer edited Aug 23 '11 at 9:11 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 89% KARASZI István show 2 more comments feedback up vote 4 down vote Have a menu command/keyboard shortcut that you know exists, but you can't find it (or just don't want to touch your mouse)? Press ⌘-⇧-/ to get to the help menu. It'll pop up the help menu that you can type into. Type the word you want to search the menus for, then ↓ to the menu item you want. OSX will helpfully show you where that item exists in the menu with a big blue arrow and you'll also see any associated shortcuts. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:07 community wiki 3 revs, 2 users 94% Ted Naleid show 2 more comments feedback up vote 4 down vote When you use ⌘ + ⇥ to switch tabs, you can continue to hold ⌘ down and drag a file into any icon in the bezel. Combined with the trick of dragging from the proxy icon in the menubar, this is a powerful way to open a file in another application, especially if you rarely use your dock. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:12 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 80% user5580 feedback up vote 4 down vote ⇧+⌥+← or ⇧+⌥+→ can be used to select the previous or next word. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:13 community wiki 6 revs, 6 users 29% Joe Howard show 2 more comments feedback up vote 4 down vote Often a simple spotlight query isn't enough. The shortcut ⌥+⌘+space brings up the powerful finder search window no matter what app is running. Not only can you use the normal search types like kind:app or kind:mail but you can force spotlight to show you files that are normally hidden. This is particularly useful to search for and inside hidden system files such as .ipsw packages, detailed logs and CoreServices utilities. You may want to add System files to your default search menu for quicker access. first click the circle plus to the far right of the Save button to show the optional search filters then choose other under the Kind dropdown lastly search for System and check the include toggle. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:13 community wiki 3 revs, 2 users 98% bmike feedback up vote 3 down vote Select a bunch of text and drag to the desktop and it will make a text clipping. Drag it back to a text window and it will dump the text there. Double-click and you can view the selectively copy for pasting elsewhere. Install the quicklook extension and you can view text and pict clippings in quicklook. linkimprove this answer           Please share your hidden Mac OS X features or tips and tricks up vote 171 down vote favorite 309 share [g+] share [fb] share [tw] Do you know any hidden or little-known nice feature of Mac OS X? It doesn't matter what it is—maybe just a short terminal command or a keyboard shortcut. Share your experiences on hidden Mac OS X features with us.. Please post one tip per answer. Please also check to see if your answer has already been posted - duplicate answers will be deleted. To search answers for this question use inquestion:400 (or inquestion:this, directly from the question page) in addition to your search terms in the search box in the upper right hand corner of this page. Also provide details on how to achieve that feature, and if possible, include a relevant image too! osx tips-and-tricks hidden-features linkimprove this question edited Jan 26 at 16:49 community wiki 25 revs, 10 users 53% Am1rr3zA 15   mac.finerthingsin.com is a great source of hidden gems on the Mac. – Philip Regan Aug 24 '10 at 23:35 show 5 more comments feedback protected by Community♦ May 10 '11 at 20:15 This question is protected to prevent "thanks!", "me too!", or spam answers by new users. To answer it, you must have earned at least 10 reputation on this site. 117 Answers active oldest votes prev 1 2 3 4 next up vote 3 down vote In finder "columns" view, double click the block below the scroll bar arrows to auto fit column width via @Mactip linkimprove this answer answered Sep 15 '10 at 16:08 community wiki Josh Newman show 1 more comment feedback up vote 3 down vote If you are a recent convert to osx and miss the mouse/cursor acceleration of a windows mouse? OSX mouse doesnt feel quite as good as the windows mouse? Give SteerMouse a try! linkimprove this answer answered Oct 8 '10 at 12:33 community wiki Shaun W. show 3 more comments feedback up vote 3 down vote The 'Open Terminal Here' applescript that can be added to the finder toolbar(?), is a great way of getting a shell prompt to the folder your are viewing. The 'original' is at the pages of its author Marc Liyanage: http://www.entropy.ch/software/applescript/ He kindly links to a number of other versions so you can take your pick. The other side of the coin (though not worth it's own answer) is the command open . to open a finder window for the current shell folder. linkimprove this answer answered Oct 20 '10 at 15:36 community wiki Stephen 1   As of Mac OS X Lion 10.7, Terminal provides Services to do this. Enable New Terminal at Folder in System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard Shortcuts > Services. The quickest way to get there is to choose [Application Menu] > Services > Services Preferences…. There's also New Terminal Tab at Folder. These operate on folders in Finder, as well as pathnames selected in text in any application. You can also drag folders (and pathnames) onto the Terminal application icon in the Dock, or onto the tab bar of a terminal window to add a new tab. – Chris Page Sep 4 '11 at 9:30 show 6 more comments feedback up vote 3 down vote An often-neglected feature of OS X is the ability to drag files and proxy icons into other applications or windows. Try this in Adobe apps. Why use the File > Place… command? Just drag a file directly from the Finder directly into the document you’re working on. Drag files onto Dock icons to open that JPG in Photoshop rather than iPhoto. Drag an image from your browser into Photoshop’s Dock icon. linkimprove this answer answered Jan 31 '11 at 17:17 community wiki user3156 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 3 down vote In Terminal, if you hold option, your cursor turns into a small "+". While holding option, you can use this to highlight and copy any square/rectangular area of text instead of whole lines at a time. linkimprove this answer edited Apr 8 '11 at 5:27 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 50% Greg show 1 more comment feedback up vote 3 down vote Hibernate your MacBook Pro with sudo pmset -a hibernatemode 25 and then put it to sleep which will save the state of your system and then power off. Very handy when flying. If instead you want very fast sleeps, without writing memory to disk, use sudo pmset -a hibernatemode 0 To restore the default behaviour, use sudo pmset -a hibernatemode 3 linkimprove this answer edited Apr 18 '11 at 18:58 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% anon feedback up vote 3 down vote Quickly find your search results in Safari Perform a Google search in the toolbar Click a result Press ⌘+G via @Mactip linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:08 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 95% Josh Newman feedback up vote 3 down vote I love the DigitalColor Meter application (in /Applications/Utilities) for finding the color of something on screen (especially useful for web development). cmd + shift + h to lock/hold the color you're on, ⌘+⇧+c to copy the value as RGB Hex value. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:28 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% geoffeg show 1 more comment feedback up vote 3 down vote By pressing ⌥ + ⇧ + + you can create the  - Symbol on a german keyboard. The tilde-key btw is created by pressing ⌥+N for all those who searched `~´ linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:29 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 57% Stegel 2   It's alt+shift+K on an English (American) keyboard. – Ricket Nov 20 '10 at 0:43 feedback up vote 3 down vote When switching focus between applications, you can hold down ⌥ and click on another application. When you change focus from one application to another, the first application hides. So, let's say you are switching from an open Finder window to an open TextEdit window while holding the ⌥ key. Finder will hide once you click on the TextEdit window. I discovered this by accident and it's pretty cool linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:34 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% daviesgeek feedback up vote 3 down vote I avoid using the mouse, so I like to start applications using Spotlight. You can launch Spotlight by pressing ⌘ + space. Once Spotlight is launched, type in application name and press enter. So to start Safari without using the mouse, type: ⌘ + space -> "Safari" -> ↩ linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:34 community wiki 5 revs, 4 users 62% Chris Reitter 1   "I avoid using the mouse" Really? on the platform that virtually gave birth to the mouse? really? – Petruza Apr 4 '11 at 15:22 show 3 more comments feedback up vote 3 down vote Dialogs usually have two useful actions accessible from the keyboard. ↩ performs the default action (Save, in the image below) and space performs the secondary action (Don't Save, in the image below). linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:34 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 91% edoloughlin 1   Hmmm could it be possible that works only because first button is focused which is not the default OSX option? – Vincent Apr 9 '11 at 0:10 2   For this particular type of sheet, you can also press ⌘D to choose the Don't Save option. Unlike the space bar this works whether or not you have Full Keyboard Access enabled. – PCheese Apr 12 '11 at 8:13 2   This is incorrect; space only performs "Don't Save" because it is highlighted, which will only happen if you have full keyboard access enabled. Pressing the <kbd>tab</kbd> key move focus elsewhere, and space will then perform that action. – eykanal Apr 13 '11 at 3:45 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 3 down vote ⌘ + ctrl + "two finger swipe" = change the opacity of the window under the cursor linkimprove this answer edited Jan 13 at 8:29 community wiki 3 revs, 2 users 50% Javier show 1 more comment feedback up vote 2 down vote Also TinkerTool shows some hidden features linkimprove this answer answered Aug 24 '10 at 19:43 community wiki Jemus42 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 2 down vote Exposé for spaces and 'Show desktop' attached to corners of the screen. I've attached 'Show desktop' to my lower right corner, and Exposé for spaces in the top left. Now, i can go bottom right to the desktop, grab a file, move over to the top left to switch to a space, and drop it there in a Finder window or Application. linkimprove this answer answered Sep 15 '10 at 9:43 community wiki Husky show 1 more comment feedback up vote 2 down vote Remember the double-sided arrows on both the top and bottom of the scroll column in OS 9? Go to the terminal and type: defaults write "Apple Global Domain" AppleScrollBarVariant DoubleBoth When you login/restart, this will work across all other applications. Very handy to have. linkimprove this answer answered Oct 1 '10 at 4:21 community wiki Bluebomber feedback up vote 2 down vote Do a "killall dock" in Terminal while a window is being minimized with the Genie effect (helps to hold down Shift to slow it down) and the window will be 'stuck' in the Genie effect yet still be operational! For example, you can still scroll. linkimprove this answer answered Oct 1 '10 at 22:27 community wiki Fill show 3 more comments feedback up vote 2 down vote If you want to quickly resize your Dock you can click and drag the bar that separates the apps from minified windows, the Trash etc. If your Dock is on the bottom then drag up to increase the size of the dock and down to make them smaller. Drag left/right if your Dock is on the side of the screen. linkimprove this answer answered Oct 9 '10 at 17:02 community wiki Nev Stokes feedback up vote 2 down vote If you drag files while holding the command key, the contents move but don't copy. Great for cutting the copy - then delete original process. linkimprove this answer answered Nov 2 '10 at 2:05 community wiki Mike Varela show 1 more comment feedback up vote 2 down vote You can disable 3D Dock effect ( if you don't like ) when dock is at bottom. Use tinker tool (it's free). Now, switch to Dock tab, do as instructed in image. linkimprove this answer answered Jan 11 '11 at 7:05 community wiki Spark 6   You can achieve the same effect without using TinkerTool by entering this string defaults write com.apple.dock no-glass -boolean YES in the terminal. – Davide Gualano Jan 11 '11 at 12:17 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 2 down vote You can access the file, edit and other application menus with the "move focus to the menu bar" setting in Keyboard Preferences. I changed it from the default to ctrl ` as the default merely adjusted brightness. No-one at Apple seemed to be able to let me know how to do this! linkimprove this answer edited Feb 9 '11 at 16:35 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 53% Tom de Grunwald feedback up vote 2 down vote To quickly lock your computer with a screen-saver style password, regardless of whether a password or time delay is set in the Security preference pane, enable the keychain status menu item and use its Lock Screen command. To enable it, open the Keychain Access utility, choose Preferences… from the Keychain Access menu, and enable "Show Status in Menu Bar" from the General pane. linkimprove this answer answered Apr 12 '11 at 8:29 community wiki PCheese show 2 more comments feedback up vote 2 down vote I am new to Mac so this might be common knowledge but in snow leopard if you hold 3 and 2 during boot you will boot into 32 bit mode and the same goes foe 64 bit when holding the 6 and 4 keys during boot. Macfuse for example did not like running in 64 bit mode linkimprove this answer answered Apr 12 '11 at 22:15 community wiki user5493 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 2 down vote ive found that you can play tetris in terminal... When you are in Terminal type emacs and hit enter. After that press escape button and X button at the same time. Now just type “tetris” and hit enter. ( stolen from here http://secretpctips.com/2011/04/mac-os-secrets-easter-eggs/ ) linkimprove this answer answered Apr 15 '11 at 21:57 community wiki user5698 show 2 more comments feedback up vote 2 down vote 3rd party apps can add unwanted items to your right click menus! To add or remove items from the right click contextual menus: Go to System Preferences -> Keyboard -> Keyboard Shortcuts. Select the "Services" panel and uncheck the services which you don't need. linkimprove this answer answered Aug 2 '11 at 20:34 community wiki Paul Eccles feedback up vote 2 down vote I use "Spacers" to organize my Dock. Some apps can make them, but its also possible with this command for the Terminal: defaults write com.apple.dock persistent-apps -array-add '{tile-data={}; tile-type="spacer-tile";}' Use killall Dock after, to restart your Dock. Now a "Spacer" appeared, just copy and paste this command again to make more. They can be removed and repositioned by dragging just like normal apps. As an example, here's a spacer between Launchpad and Chrome: linkimprove this answer edited Aug 23 '11 at 14:10 community wiki 4 revs, 2 users 75% Dave 2   Can it be removed like any other app? By drag 'n' dropping it off the dock? – Loïc Wolff May 4 '11 at 20:15 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 2 down vote Just came across this one... To enter a newline character in a text field you can use ⌥ + return. Similarly to enter a tab character use ⌥ + ⇥. This is particularly helpful in a find and replace window. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:26 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 91% g . feedback up vote 2 down vote ⌘ + ` (backtick accent) switches between multiple windows of the same app. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:31 community wiki 4 revs, 3 users 40% Zepplock feedback up vote 2 down vote While you are using ⌘ + ⇥ to cycle through open applications, you can press Q before you release ⌘ to close the app. You can close several apps before release ⌘. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:31 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% Mark feedback up vote 2 down vote Switcher + Exposé (10.6+) While ⌘+⇥ing (holding ⌘, tapping ⇥), you can press ↑ or ↓ to switch to the currently selected application's window Exposé view. You can then use the keyboard arrows to highlight a window and ↩ to switch to it. Screenie link (spam protection...grrr): http://d.pr/RFF5         1 down vote If you use random Backgrounds, there is a quick way to make them change when you want. type in the terminal killall Dock This will make your random Desktopbackground change. linkimprove this answer answered Oct 14 '10 at 11:03 community wiki Stegel feedback up vote 1 down vote alt + ⌘ + left click in the dock hides all windows except application currently in focus. Great if you find window clutter distracting. linkimprove this answer answered Nov 20 '10 at 17:45 community wiki faB show 1 more comment feedback up vote 1 down vote There is a fast way to create a hidden folder on Mac OS. Hidden folders a created by typing "." on the beginning (e.g. ".hiddenfolder") The Finder won't let you do this though. So we gonna use the terminal. to create a new folder: mkdir .hiddenfolder first of course you have to navigate to the location, you want the folder to be. For example the Desktop: cd /Users/USERNAME/Desktop/ or drag a folder into the Terminal to get it's address To know where you are right now, type: pwd Another way is, to rename a folder. To do so type: mv ActualFolderName .hiddenfolder To open a hidden folder, make hidden files visible like described earlier, or use terminal (navigate there first, or type open absolute path) open .hiddenfolder or if you are in the hidden folder already, just type open . to show hidden folders/files in terminal type ls -a linkimprove this answer edited Mar 12 '11 at 1:52 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 97% Stegel show 2 more comments feedback up vote 1 down vote If you connect two Mac's directly using a standard ethernet cable, you can quickly transfer files between them. It automatically configures the connection, and is much faster than doing large transfers over wireless. linkimprove this answer answered Apr 2 '11 at 15:36 community wiki bconneen show 2 more comments feedback up vote 1 down vote Not sure if it's posted already but you can drag folders and files from the finder into an application's open / save dialogue. It sets the save or open path to that of the folder or file you're dragging. Excellent when you prefer to use the finder to navigate but don't want to repeat the process in your app or vice versa. Also, on many cases, whilst in the open / save dialogue, you can hit command R to reveal the files in the finder. linkimprove this answer answered Apr 7 '11 at 20:56 community wiki user5130 feedback up vote 1 down vote You can adjust the scale of all windows (sizes of buttons and menus and toolbars) to fit more on a smaller screen. It was really helpful on my TV setup, because I couldn't see the bottom items in the System Preferences. defaults write NSGlobalDomain AppleDisplayScaleFactor .75 to reset simply defaults write NSGlobalDomain AppleDisplayScaleFactor 1 Or you can change it per Application defaults write com.apple.iTunes AppleDisplayScaleFactor .7 linkimprove this answer answered Apr 8 '11 at 20:27 community wiki Nilloc feedback up vote 1 down vote You can force Expose to only show windows that are on the current Space (instead of all windows open on any Space). Type the following into Terminal: defaults write com.apple.dock wvous-show-windows-in-other-spaces -bool FALSE then, to restart Dock: killall Dock linkimprove this answer answered Apr 12 '11 at 16:44 community wiki Doug feedback up vote 1 down vote Target Disk Mode lets you mount a Firewire-enabled Mac as an external disk, without even booting into the OS. Useful for quick transfers, large transfers (it's quite fast), recovery, etc. linkimprove this answer edited Apr 21 '11 at 19:10 community wiki Kevin L. show 1 more comment feedback up vote 1 down vote Click and hold Show All in System Preferences, and you'll get a list of all Preferences panes At the bottom of this list there is a Customize... option which enables a check mark in the lower right corner of each Preferences panes item un-checking a check mark, will disable/remove the item(s) from the view, but not delete it. linkimprove this answer answered Jul 28 '11 at 7:38 community wiki Rene Larsen 1   Yeah I believe this is for Lion only. Nice tip though. – Paul Eccles Aug 2 '11 at 20:26 show 1 more comment feedback up vote 1 down vote When closing an unsaved document ⌘+D will invoke Don't Save for you. Use with care though. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:19 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 80% Nilloc feedback up vote 1 down vote ⌥-click menulets to bring up extra information. I use this all the time! Battery Menulet: Airport Menulet: Bluetooth Menulet: Sound Menulet: linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:20 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 97% daviesgeek feedback up vote 1 down vote Want to move back and forth through Safari pages or Finder windows? ⌘+[ to move back. ⌘+] to move forward. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:20 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 60% BSP feedback up vote 1 down vote Hold ⌘ you can drag icons to reorder on Status bar. Drag out of status bar mean delete it from status bar. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:20 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% Guixing Bai feedback up vote 1 down vote Hold ctrl and scroll with the mouse/trackpad in order to zoom the view at any time. Extremely handy in order to discern pixel differences of a UI. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:21 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% user5532 feedback up vote 1 down vote You can ⌘-click and drag many OS provided icons from your menu bar to rearrange or remove them if it's getting too crowded. Doesn't work with all 3rd party ones, but many built-in ones (like volume, battery, sync, bluetooth, etc) can be removed this way. Many of them can be removed from the control panel, but this is the only way some of them can be removed once activated (that I'm aware of). linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:21 community wiki 3 revs, 3 users 50% Ted Naleid feedback up vote 1 down vote When resizing columns in Finder, hold down ⌥ whilst dragging, and you'll resize all columns and reset the default width. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:21 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% Stuart Carnie feedback up vote 1 down vote Ever wanted to stop the iTunes visualizer at that really cool moment and take a picture? In iTunes 10 (and previous versions really) you can control what your visualizer is doing. You need to have a song playing to notice changes. Simply press the ? key to see a help menu of the controls. On most visualizers press f to see the current FPS. (all except the default) To freeze the default iTunes visualizer press F to freeze the mode, then press L to freeze the camera. Now that your visualizer is completely stopped, press M to change the mode. Turn the fog on and off with N (only works with certain themes). Change the color palette with P before freezing the mode or locking the camera or it has no effect. ⌘ + F for full screen, then ⌘+⇧+3 for full screen grab. Viola, instant custom desktop pattern! linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:24 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 92% user5466 feedback up vote 1 down vote When ⇧+clicking on an open app in the Dock the application hides. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:27 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% deiga 3   I have this behaviour when I hold the Alt key instead. – Rabskatran Apr 6 '11 at 10:42 show 3 more comments feedback up vote 0 down vote Secrets by Blacktree is a preference pane which enables many hidden OS X and specific application preferences (e.g. change Dock to 2D, change iTunes stoplights back to horizontal). Saves you a couple of trips to the Terminal. linkimprove this answer answered Jan 31 '11 at 18:06 community wiki yjsoon feedback up vote 0 down vote Safari also supports a subset of Emacs keybindings linkimprove this answer answered Apr 5 '11 at 20:10 community wiki dreynold show 2 more comments feedback up vote 0 down vote One of the most amazing things I know to do in the terminal is "doctor terminal" I just love it! :D I know it's a silly program that's easy to make but, no other operating system has it. I'm trying to get hold of the command now... linkimprove this answer answered Apr 8 '11 at 12:19 community wiki Alvar show 1 more comment feedback up vote 0 down vote ⌘ + ⇥ = switch between applications. Press ⌥ before releasing ⌘ and it will un-minimize minimized windows from that application. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:19 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 50% Dmitriy Likhten feedback up vote 0 down vote In order to navigate with the keyboard in the menu bar, press ctrl+F2. The Apple icon in the menu bar will light up, and you can navigate through the menus using arrows and the ↩ key. linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:19 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% Thomas Lundström feedback up vote 0 down vote If you want to Open/Close FrontRow just use ⌘ + esc linkimprove this answer edited Dec 21 '11 at 19:19 community wiki 2 revs, 2 users 67% dequin feedback up vote 0 down vote sudo purge I use this all the time for cleaning my Mac's memory. linkimprove this answer answered Jan 17 at 15:47 community wiki Paul Dunahoo feedback up vote -1 down vote A handy tip I discovered by accident. Highlight any file in an Open dialogue window, press the space bar and voila! there is your file in all it's glory. linkimprove this answer answered Apr 15 '11 at 14:30 community wiki BSP show 1 more comment feedback up vote -2 down vote Use this plugin to allow QuickLook to view animated GIFs - Animated GIF QuickLook For Mac 1.0 linkimprove this answer answered Apr 13 '11 at 20:54 community wiki footer show 1 more comment Was this post useful to you?       http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/400/please-share-your-hidden-mac-os-x-features-or-tips-and-tricks?page=1&tab=votes#tab-top