Posts

Make More Space for Documents by Putting Your Dock on the Side of Your Mac’s Screen

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By default, Apple locates the Dock at the bottom of the Mac’s screen. If that location interferes with you seeing as much of your document windows as you’d like, you can set it to appear only when you move the pointer to the bottom edge of the screen. But there’s a better way: put the Dock on the side of the screen where there’s plenty of horizontal room and it won’t get in the way of most document windows. Open System Preferences > Dock, and select Right or Left from the Position on Screen radio buttons.

 

The Secret Keyboard Shortcut for Comparing Before/After Edits in Photos on the Mac

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Photos on the Mac provides so many editing tools that it’s easy to lose track of how an edited image compares to the original. You can always use the Revert to Original command and then undo it, but that’s fussy. Instead, Photos provides a Show Original  button in the upper-left corner, between the window controls and the Revert to Original button. Click and hold it to see your original image; let up to see the edited version again. Even easier, press the M key on your keyboard. The only thing either of those techniques won’t do is show the effect of cropping; to see the uncropped original, press Control-M. And if you just want to see how a particular set of adjustment controls affected the image, click its blue checkmark  to turn it off and back on.

The post The Secret Keyboard Shortcut for Comparing Before/After Edits in Photos on the Mac appeared first on TidBITS Content Network.

A Simple Technique for Decluttering Your Reminders List

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Productivity experts recommend offloading things you have to remember to a task-management app like Apple’s Reminders, which syncs your to-dos among your Mac, iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. That’s particularly helpful for tasks you want to be reminded of in a few months or next year, but then those far-in-the-future tasks—especially repeating ones!—clutter your main Reminders list. The solution? Create a Far Future Reminders list, and move reminders to it that aren’t relevant within the next month or so. Just make sure everything in Far Future Reminders is set to alert you on the appropriate day.

The post A Simple Technique for Decluttering Your Reminders List appeared first on TidBITS Content Network.

Did You Know This Hidden Trick for Opening System Preferences Panes Directly?

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The System Preferences app on the Mac contains about 30 icons, each leading to additional settings panes. Rather than opening System Preferences, scanning the collection of icons, and clicking the one you want, you can jump directly to the desired pane. Just click and hold on the System Preferences icon in the Dock, and choose a pane from the pop-up menu.

The post Did You Know This Hidden Trick for Opening System Preferences Panes Directly? appeared first on TidBITS Content Network.

Tired of Skewed Lines in Your Photos? Use the Camera App’s Hidden Level.

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If you’ve ever photographed a sheet of paper or some other rectangular object, the image may have come out skewed because you inadvertently tilted the camera. The iOS 11 Camera app has a level feature to help you avoid this problem, but it’s so subtle that you may not have noticed it. To use it, first go to Settings > Camera and turn on the Grid switch so thin white lines divide the viewfinder image into a grid of nine rectangles. Then, to access the level, hold the iPhone or iPad flat, so the camera points straight down toward the floor (or straight up toward the sky, if you’re photographing a ceiling). Notice that two crosshairs appear in the middle of the viewfinder, a yellow one that marks the position where the camera will be level and a white one that shows the camera’s current angle. Tilt the camera until the crosshairs merge into a single yellow image, and tap the Shutter button.

Did You Know You Can Customize the Columns in a Finder Window’s List View?

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When a Mac folder contains a lot of files, the Finder’s List view often works best, since it lets you focus on a single folder and easily sort the contents by clicking the different columns: Name, Date Modified, Size, and Kind. But did you know that you can resize columns, rearrange them, and even add and remove columns? To resize a column, drag the vertical separator line to the right of its name. To move a column, click and hold on its name, and then drag it to the desired position. And to add or remove a column, Control- or right-click any column header and select or deselect the desired column. Choose from Date Modified, Date Created, Date Last Opened, Date Added, Size, Version, Kind, Comments, and Tags.

Remember That You Can Search for Nearly Anything in Your Photos Library

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Apple’s Photos app on the Mac can identify thousands of different objects in your photos, so it’s easy to find photos based on their content. You can find objects (cars and trains), scenery (beaches and forests), and even some events (weddings and parades). This is both big fun and useful for those times when you can’t remember when you took a photo, but do remember what’s in it, like a cat, camera, or carousel. To carry out a search like this, type the search term into the Search field on the right side of the Photos toolbar. From the list that appears, choose the Category result. In macOS 10.13 High Sierra’s version of Photos, you can filter your results from the Showing menu at the upper right of the window. The feature isn’t perfect, so you may see some odd results or miss some photos, but it’s way faster than browsing manually!

Use Copy as Pathname to Help Someone Find a File on the Mac

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Have you ever needed to write directions for where to find a file on the Mac? That’s easy if it’s in a well-traveled location, like the Music or Pictures folder, but more difficult if it’s in an obscure hidey-hole. Rather than write out instructions like “Look in the Chrome folder inside Google’s Application Support folder in your user Library folder,” select the item in question, hold down the Option key, and choose Edit > Copy “ItemName” as Pathname. (A pathname, or path, is the sequence of nested folders that holds a file or folder, such as /Users/adrian/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome.) Then paste the path into an email message or word processing document (or wherever you like). You’ll now have the entire thing exactly where you need it, and you don’t have to worry that you’ve accidentally left out a navigational step.

Did You Know Your EarPods Work as a Remote Shutter Button for Photos?

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Have you ever composed the perfect photo in the iPhone’s Camera app and then been unable to tap the shutter button without jiggling the iPhone and blurring the image? That can be especially difficult with macro shots that require physical contortions to position the iPhone properly. Sometimes, pressing one of the physical volume buttons on the iPhone to trigger the shutter is the solution. But, even better, connect your iPhone’s wired EarPods and then press one of their volume buttons to take a photo. Bonus tip—the EarPods’ buttons also work to start and stop video recording!

Look Up All Sorts of Information with a Quick Click or Tap on the Mac

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Apple makes it easy to look up information about any word you can see on your Mac, in nearly any app. To access this information, Control- or right-click the word and choose Look Up “word”, use the trackpad to tap the word with three fingers, or hover the pointer over it and press Command-Control-D. macOS displays a popover with a dictionary definition. And in 10.12 Sierra and later, you can also swipe right with two fingers on the trackpad (or click the buttons at the bottom) to see much more in the popover, including Wikipedia entries, apps, news, sports info, movies, TV shows, music, maps, Twitter accounts, and more. Give it a try a few times, and it might become a habit!