Two Uses For The Option Key [Expose] [Finder]

This past week, I've discovered two new tricks that holding the option key will do. The first involves Exposé and the second involves Finder.

While I hardly ever use Exposé I'm sure that for some people, it's their favorite feature. Well, one of the problems with Expose is that if you're looking for a specific window, then you have to mouse over every window then read it's name. This can be particularly slow if you are using the keyboard to activate Exposé instead of the mouse. Well, James over at Mac Tips and Tricks points out that if you hold the option key after you activate Exposé, all the window titles will be overlaid the windows.


One of the problems with using Column view in Finder is that sometimes the name of a file is too long for the width of the column. Well, instead of holding your mouse over the file for a couple of seconds waiting for the tooltip with the full file name to appear, you can simply hold the option key. This will make the tooltip instantly appear.

The Top 10 Keyboard Shortcuts [Finder] [System]

I've been writing for the second half of this week about keyboard shortcuts that you should know. I've already covered Safari and Mail. Today I'll finish off the week with Finder and system wide keyboard shortcuts.


Finder

Move to Trash: Cmd-Delete

While it might be cute to see the trash icon change from empty to full when you drag an item into it, it's a very inefficient way of deleting files. Just use Cmd-Delete.
While on the topic of trash, you can empty your trash with Cmd-Shift-Delete or Cmd-Option-Shift-Delete if you don't want to see the warning dialog.


Eject Disk: Cmd-E

In the same way that it's inefficient to drag trash to the dock, it's also inefficient to eject a disk by dragging it to the dock. Use Cmd-E instead. (To help you remember: E as in Eject.)


Slideshow: Cmd-Option-Y

Slideshow (a.k.a. Fullscreen QuickLook) is very helpful if you're wanting to show your pictures in fullscreen. If you don't want to do quicklook in full screen, use Cmd-Y (Or the spacebar if you want to.)


Show Inspector: Cmd-Option-I

This one is really handy to know. Select a file and hit Cmd-Option-I to open up the inspector. This is the same as an Info window (Cmd-I) except if you change your selection, the inspector will change to reflect your new selection.
The advantage of the Inspector is that you can select two or more files and it will do a combined inspect instead of opening a different info window for each item.



System

Desktop: Cmd-Shift-D

This works in both Finder and system wide. If you're in an Open/Save dialog box, then you can hit Cmd-Shift-D to instantly jump to the desktop. The same applies to Finder. If you're in a Finder window, you can hit Cmd-Shift-D to jump to the Desktop from anywhere.


Screen Shots: Cmd-Shift-3/4

If you need help with anything, or you want to show off something funny, then you can use these keyboard shortcuts to take a picture of your screen:

Cmd-Shift-3: Full Screen
Cmd-Shift-4: Drag selection screenshot.
Cmd-Shift-4, then space: Take a screenshot of a window.

If you add Ctrl to any of these, then your screenshot will be saved to the clipboard instead of the Desktop.


Force Quit Application: Cmd-Option-Escape

We Mac users don't like to admit it, but sometimes a program has a problem and you need to force quit it. (Although, this is usually Microsoft applications, right? Right.) Well, if you need to force quit an application, use Cmd-Option-Escape. You can modify this with the Shift key to force quit the front application. However, you'll have to hold down Cmd-Option-Shift-Escape for a short time before anything will happen. (This prevents you from hitting it accidently.)


The Application Switcher: Cmd-Tab

This is a great one that you should use unless you've lost your keyboard. Type Cmd-Tab and a little window will pop up showing you all your open applications. You can then keep holding the Command key and then switch from one application to the next. Once the application you want is selected, you can then let go of the Command key to jump to that application.

Also, instead of just using tab to switch, you can use Shift-Tab to go backwards in the list. In addition, if you keep holding the command key, you can then hit Q to quit or H to hide the selected application. Finally, if you hold Option when you let go of the Command key, all the windows for that application will un-minimize.


Help: Cmd-Shift-/ (Cmd-?)

I wouldn't have included this one in Tiger. But in Leopard's help menus, you can now search menu contents. So, if you want to superscript some selected text in TextEdit, you can hit Cmd-Shift-/ and then type in "Superscript" to find the menu that it's in.


Well, these are my top ten picks for keyboard shortcuts. Obviously you have your favorite keyboard shortcuts, so post away in the comments.

Search System Files [Finder]

Something that has bugged me for a long time is that you can't for search system files in Spotlight. Well, as James over at Mac Tips and Tricks points out, you can. It just takes a couple of steps:

Step 1: Open up Finder.app and hit Cmd-F to start a new search.

Step 2: Now, click on the "Kind" drop down menu and select "Other..."



Step 3: In the window that opened up, you'll need search for the "System Files" option.

Step 4: Now click "OK". (If you want to be able to search system files later, I would suggest that you check the box for "In Menu".)



Step 5: Finally, change the option for "System Files" to "Include". Now you're all set!




With this little trick you can easily find files that are normally hidden from you. (i.e. Any file in your "Library" folder.) Unfortunately, you still can't search for system files from the Spotlight menu, but it does give you at least one way of searching for them.

[via]

Make A File Template [Finder]

A long time ago, I wrote about how you can use the Stationery Pad feature in Finder to make a duplicate of that file and then open the duplicate. The problem with this is that you'll end up with lots of the same kind of file. This week I discovered a much better solution: locking the file. To do this, select the file in Finder and hit Cmd-I to open the info window. (Or click on the "File" menu and select "Get Info".) Then, check the box next to "Locked" under the "General" section on the info window. Now that the file is locked, whenever you open it a new window will be created in the file's default editor. It will be just like if the file were a stationery pad, but a duplicate file will not be created. For those of you celebrating it, happy Fourth of July.

Default Folder View in Finder [FInder]

For those wonderful people who have subscribed to the RSS Feed, there is a video for this tip.

Travis Reynolds ran a tip earlier this week about changing your default folder views in Finder. This problem has vexed me for a while so I figured I would post about it here.

If you prefer column view, but want to have the Icon view be the default in your Pictures folder (this way you can see the picture icons better) then there is a built in way to make the icon view. To do this, simply navigate to your pictures folder, and change to the view you desire. Now, hit Cmd-J to open the View Options window and check the box at the top of the window which is labeled something like, "Always open in icon view". If you're setting it to column, then instead of "icon" it will read "column".

What vexed me about this is that if you have your Home folder set to column view and your Pictures folder set to icon view, then when you navigate to your Pictures folder from your Home folder, your view will not automatically switch to icon view. However, there is a way around this. When you select your pictures folder, hit Cmd-O to open it up in the same window with it's default view. Double clicking on the folder's icon will have the same effect.

If you would rather watch a really cool movie with great background music and a handsome narrator, then click this link.

Folder, File, and Application Menu Bar Item (Sorta)

I have some folders, files, and applications that I don't access all that often. I might use them once in a while, but not a lot. Because of this, I have to go digging into Finder, or use spotlight, to access them.

Well, I finally found a solution to this. The solution is the scripts menu bar item.



What a lot of people probably don't know is that you're not limited to scripts inside the script menu. You can put files or folders also. When you put in folders, you can browse the folder's contents from the script menu.



Also, when you click on a folder in the menu, it will open the folder in Finder.


Here's how you can set this up.

Step 1: Go to the Applescript Utility found at Applications>Applescript>AppleScript Utility.app

Step 2: At the bottom of the window is an option to show the script menu in the the menu bar. Check that option.



Step 3: Uncheck the option for "Show Computer Scripts".

Step 4: Now you need to add items to the menu. To do this, go to ~/Library/Scripts/ or click on the menu option "Open User Scripts Folder" under the "Open Scripts Folder" menu.



Step 5: Once there, add files, folders, or applications to that folder. I would advise adding them as aliases. (Cmd-Option drag when adding items to the folder to make them be aliases.)


Now you should be able to click on the menu and see the items in the menu that you see in your scripts folder. Don't forget that you can type in the first few letters of the item name to select it in the menu. Then, press the spacebar to open it.

When I first did this, the menu would freeze up. If it's not working for you, the first thing you need to do is make sure that you don't have to many folders, and sub-folders, in there. For example, if you put in an alias to your HD, it'll probably freeze the AppleScript Menu. If the menu freezes, open up activity monitor and quit the System UI Server process.

Use Cmd-R To Reveal in Finder

RSS Subscribers: There is a video for this post. Watch it here.

Turns out, Cmd-R is pretty much your "Reveal in Finder" shortcut. Here's the roundup:


The Original of an Alias

Select an alias in Finder, then, hit Cmd-R to reveal the original of that alias in a new Finder window.


The Open Dialog Box

This one is new in Leopard. When you hit Cmd-O to open a file, you can select a file and hit Cmd-R to reveal it in the Finder. This, unfortunately, does not work in the Save dialog.


iTunes

In iTunes, rather than right-clicking on a song and selecting the "Reveal in Finder" option, simply hit Cmd-R.


Photo Booth

Select a picture you've taken in Photo Booth, and Cmd-R will show it to you in the Finder.



Well, those are all the instances of Cmd-R revealing in the Finder. If you know of another place that I didn't mention, then please leave a comment! (And if you liked this post, please digg it.)

Keyboard Shortcuts For Contextual Menu Items

Another new place you can make keyboard shortcuts at in Leopard is the contextual menu. While I don't know of very many menus where there is a special item in the contextual menu, one that I do know of is "Show Package Contents" in Finder. With this update in Leopard, I can now make a keyboard shortcut where Cmd-Option-Down_arrow opens the package contents of an application.

Interact With Background Applications

A short time back, I suggested an application called Afloat 2 to float Quicktime movies above your other windows. Well, how many clicks/keybourd presses would it take to pause a floating movie? If you answered 2, then you're wrong. As it turns out, you can pause a quicktime movie with one mouse click. To do this, just hold the Command key and click on the pause button.

This post is not about pausing quicktime movies though. Rather, it is about interacting with applications that are in the background. The gist of it is that if you hold the Cmd key, you can click on background windows. However, there are a few catches.


1: Cocoa only.

Regrettably, this only works with Cocoa applications.

Cocoa applications include:
Mail
Safari
Quicktime

Carbon applications include:

Firefox
Finder
iTunes

So, if you're working in Finder (carbon) and want to minimize a Safari (cocoa) window, you can hold Command and click on the yellow minimize button of the Safari window. However, if you're working in Safari, you cannot Cmd-Click on the Finder window to minimize the Finder window.


2: No major interaction

As an example, you can't make a new message window in the background. If you did Cmd-Click on the new message button in mail, it will move mail to the front and open the window. However, you can switch mail messages, check for new mail or even move mail messages around. (But you can't delete a message.)


3: No flash interaction

This is only relevant for Safari, but you can't interact with flash (for example, pause a youtube video). So, if you're watching a youtube video while writing in TextEdit, you have to switch to Safari before pausing the video.


Now that you know how to interact with your applications on a whole new level, what do you find this is most useful for? Leave a comment!

How to Quickly Navigate Column View

For those reading this from the RSS Feed, there is a video for this post.

I really like the Column view in Finder. (Cmd-3) However, navigating through it can be a pain sometimes. Well, not anymore. Using the Tab key you can easily navigate the columns while typing. Here's how it works.

When in column view, there are arrows next to folders.

When you click on a folder, that folder is selected and the arrow is now White. When the arrow is white, whatever you type into the finder window will be selected in the second column.

However, if you scroll to a folder instead of clicking on it, the folder arrow will be outlined in white. When it's like this, your "cursor" is still in the first column.

When you hit Tab, the "cursor" will move from the first column to the second column and the arrow will become white. You can now type in the name of the folder/file you want to select in column two. Repeat as necessary.

It's a very simple thing to do and once you start doing it, your folder diving should greatly speed up.

If you found this helpful, please

Leopard Only: The New Open/Save Dialogs

There are a lot of new things that are in the Open and Save dialogs in Leopard. Here's a list of them:


• Icon View

I thought I had mentioned this already, but, you'll notice in the upper left hand corner of the open/save dialog that you can now have icon view. Cmd-1 changes to icon view, Cmd-2, changes to list view, and Cmd-3 changes to column view.


• The Media Section

I don't know if this is strictly for people with iLife '08, but, the new info windows have a "Media" section. It's much like the media browser in Pages, Keynote and other applications, just in an Open/Save dialog.


• Column Resizing Options

While you can still use the Option key to resize the column view, Apple has built in some resizing options. Right click on the drag section of the column splitter and you'll be presented with a menu of three options:

Right Size This Column
Right Size All Columns Individually
Right Size All Columns Equally

Right sizing a column will make it right size so that you can read the largest title in the path or current folder.


• View Options for The Icon View

Unlike the Column view, Apple built in the Icon view and the view options for the Icon view in one step. To customize the view options of the Icon view, click and hold on the Icon view button. A menu will appear with the option to change the icon sizes and the label positions.


• Finder Interaction (Only works in open dialogs)

Regrettably, you can't use quicklook in open/save dialogs. However, you can somewhat interact with Finder. There are two ways to interact with Finder. The first, is that you can hit Cmd-R when you've selected a file or folder and have it be revealed in Finder. The second is that you can hit Cmd-I and have Finder open up an info window for the file. Sadly, it doesn't open up in the current application, but switches to Finder first.


Well, that's it for now. Head on over to MacOSXhints.co.uk to see where I got this from.

Get An Organized Desktop

If keeping your desktop organized is a problem for you, then this might help you. While this tip is not exclusively for Mac, having an organized desktop will keep your computer speedy.

What I do, is I have a six circles that are different colors. I also have one circle in the center which I use for stuff like pictures or text. For an example, look at my current desktop:



As you can see, I have the center circle filled with this rather grotesque comic from See Mike Draw (I have edited the center circle more than I normally would to get it to look right.) Also, I have two pernament files on my desktop. An alias to my Hard Drive (Upper right) and an alias to this applescript (Lower Left). I'll tell you why they are aliases later.

I made the core background picture using Keynote. Then, if I want to add something, I simply go to my root keynote file and edit the center circle. So, if I need to remember something, I'll stick the text in my center circle. If I find a funny picture, I'll stick it there.

To get the picture onto my desktop, I do a slideshow in keynote, and, while still in the presentation, will take a picture of the current slide. This way, I have a full-screen version. After that, I stick it in my rotating background images folder and wait for it to show up.


Now I'll tell you how to edit it. First of all, you can download my keynote file here. Sorry, but, it's in 800x600 format. So, you might have to change that if you're on a widescreen computer. You also might want to rearrange/add some circles/squares/triangles/whatever shape you want. Once you have your shapes arranged, you want to add the center circle. Make it a color you want and then set the fill to either nothing or an image. If you do an image, it might turn out perfectly, it might not. YMMV. If you do nothing, then you can do text.

To do an image, select the circle and hit Cmd-Optio-I to open the inspector. Click on the 4th tab from the right and change "Fill" to "Image Fill".

To do text, make a new text box and type in the text you want. Then, place it in the center circle.



Why would you want this kind of background? Well, for two reasons:

1: You'll eventually have a more organized desktop.
2: You can put text in the center and have it memorized in a short period of time.


Finally, the aliases. I mentioned earlier that I have two aliases on my desktop. The reason that they are aliases is simple: because aliases do not display the "item info" under the icon. This is a strange behavior, but, it makes my desktop look a bit cleaner, so, I use it.


Well, that's all for this week. If you deployed my ideas listed above, or, are bored, email me a pic of your desktop!

Hold Option to Close the Window

You know how after you open a file from the Finder, you then need to close the window you just opened it from? Well, you don't need to anymore. Simply hold down the Option/Alt key and the window is closed when you open a file. This works with Cmd-O, Cmd-Down_Arrow, and, double clicking a file.


As a bonus for those of you using Safari 3, you can hold down the shift key and drag out a tab from the tab bar for a pretty cool effect. Kinda pointless though.

Stop the Extension Change Warning in Finder

If you are changing file extensions often, perhaps to put a file in the left-hand side of the dock, then you'll understand why it's really annoying when you have to confirm that you really want to change the file extension. To turn off this safety "feature" you just need to uncheck a box in the finder Preferences. Go to Finder>Preferences (Cmd-,) and click on the Advanced tab. Then, uncheck the box next to, "Show warning before changing an extension".

The Hidden Favorites Folder

While you can add items to the favorites folder in Finder with Cmd-Shift-T, there's no easy way to get to it, or, any indication of where it is. To start off, the favorites folder is at (Your_Home_Folder)/Library/Favorites/. Now, you can add aliases to that folder by simply selecting a file/folder and hitting Cmd-Shift-T.
With this in mind, you could add the favorites folder to the dock, or, to the sidebar.

Putting Documents or Folders on the Left Hand Side of the Dock

Here's a simple method for putting documents in the left-hand side of the dock.

Step 1: Rename the file so that it's file extension is ".app".

Step 2: Drag your fake .app file to the left hand side of the dock.

Step 3: Go back to the file in the finder and remove the .app extension.

Step 4: Open Terminal (Applications>Utilities>Terminal.app) and type:

killall Dock

(This will reset the dock.)



Note that this works on both files and folders. However, the folder merely opens the folder in Finder rather than being a stack/heiarchialy folder.

Resetting the "Created Time" of a File

If you want something to appear at the top of a stack, you either have to name it something with a space at the beginning, or, have it be created several weeks ago. Regrettably, you can't create something several weeks ago, today. However, you can backdate a file so that it LOOKS like it was created several weeks ago. Here's how.

Step 1: Find the file and leave it open in the Finder.

Step 2: Go to System Preferences>Date & Time

Step 3: Set the year to 2000

Step 4: Make sure that the year was set back by clicking on the time in the menu bar. It should say something like "Thursday, January 10, 2000".

Step 5: Open the terminal. (Applications>Utilities>Terminal.app)

Step 6: Type "touch " (Without the quotes.)

Step 7: Drag the file from Finder into the Terminal Window. It should read something like: "touch /Users/John\ Doe/Documents/Late\ Project.doc"

Step 8: Change your year back to the current one.

Step 9: Go back to your file in Finder. It should now say that it was created in 2000 instead of yesterday!

Getting Rid Of File Info

If you have turned on the "Show Item Info" option on the Desktop or icon views, then you probably have some items you would not want to show the item info for. Something I discovered recently is an easy way to get rid of item info for specific items. In this example, I'll use the Hard Drive icon on your desktop as an example.

Basically, we need to create an alias of the item. Then, put the alias on the desktop.

Step 1: Click on the HD icon and hit Cmd-L. This will create an alias.

Step 2: Go to finder>Preferences (Cmd-,).

Step 3: Under the "General" tab, uncheck the box next to "Hard Disks".

Step 4: Move the alias to where you want it.

Now, you can have easy access to your Hard Drive without having to have the clutter of the item info. If you want to find out how much room there is remaining, you can open the HD in a new Finder window and look at the bottom to see remaining capacity.

Leopard Only: Switching Views

A while back, I mentioned that in Tiger you can use Cmd-1, Cmd-2, or Cmd-3 to switch between the finder views. (Read more here.) Well, in Leopard, you can do the same thing. Another feature in Leopard is the ability to have icon view in an open/save dialog. Here, you can also use Cmd-1, 2, or, 3, to switch between views.

Leopard Only: Sort The Columns in Leopard's Finder

There's a new addition to Leopard's Finder that has entirely escaped my attention. In the Finder in Leopard, you can sort the column view a specific way in a Finder window by using the Options (Cmd-J) window. What this means is that if you have a window in Finder that is in column view, rather than sorting by name (the default in Tiger), you can hit Cmd-J to open the view Options window. Then, you can use the "Arrange by:" drop-down menu to sort the files a different way.