BetterTouchTool gestures!

[Kobayagi]

Hey there,

Heres a post where I'd like to share my user experience with BetterTouchTool.

This app lets you configure your Magic Mouse, keyboard, trackpad and more to your liking. I'm sure many of you know it, but for those who don't:

From their Site:

''BetterTouchTool is a great, feature packed FREE app that allows you to configure many gestures for your Magic Mouse, Macbook Trackpad and Magic Trackpad. It also allows you to configure actions for keyboard shortcuts, normal mice and the Apple Remote. In addition to this it has an iOS companion App (BTT Remote) which can also be configured to control your Mac the way you want.

BetterTouchTool includes many goodies, like window snapping or an integrated window switcher.''

Over the time, I have added more and more gestures which help me use my Mac in a unique way and fun way. I have become so accustomed to these gestures, using them has become very easy.

I want to share my used shortcuts I've set within BetterTouchTool to show what the program can do and maybe help others simplify the usage of their Mac and configure it to their liking. And if other users wish, they can share their configurations.


Apple Magic Mouse

First off, I want to show you my configurations for the Apple Magic Mouse.

All these gestures are used in Safari (or any other browser) and can now also be used in Finder because Mavericks supports tabs in Finder.

The gestures:

Gesture #1

Magic Mouse gesture: Single Finger Middle Click
Action: Middle click

Explanation: Because the Magic Mouse doesn't have a scroll wheel, which is used as a middle click button when pressed, I added this action. Pressing on the middle of the Magic Mouse once, acts as if I've pressed the scroll wheel. This action usually opens a link in Safari in another tab. But what is the middle of the mouse, you may wonder.

BBT lets you configure what surface of the mouse you want to act as the ''middle''. See picture above. The orange area is the middle of the mouse, you can adjust the width of it how you like. The outer areas are then the left and right mouse buttons. The white circles are my fingers pressing on the mouse when I took the screenshot. BTT can detect the amount on pressure you apply on the mouse. This helps if you set it up to only respond to a high pressure when doing a swipe or something else, so you dont use the gestures by accident.

Gesture #2 & 3

Magic Mouse gesture: Two finger swipe left and right
Action: ⌘ ↑[ or ⌘ ↑]

Explanation:

These commands let you switch tabs in Safari or Finder. It’s a quick way to easily switch tabs left and right without having to click on them or using the keyboard shortcut.

Since Apple added tabs in Mavericks, it also works there if you have a few open.

I actually assigned a two finger tap to open new tabs in Finder (rather then pressing cmd T), but I haven’t been using it since I usually just press cmd N to open up a new Finder window (so I deleted that gesture). It’s just easier having two Finder windows open when dragging stuff from folders. But yea, this works in Finder as well.

Gesture #4

Magic Mouse gesture: Two finger swipe down
Action: cmd W

Explanation:

Staying with the two finger combinations to avoid confusion, I use this to quickly close tabs or apps (not quit them, thats cmd Q). It's very easy when browsing and it doesn't make you go find that small x to close the tab or use the keyboard shortcut.


Gestures for Finder

Weirdly enough, Apple didn’t make it possible to switch back and forth between previous and next folders by swiping in Finder. Like when using Safari for previous and next pages you visited. They did implement this in the App Store.

So I added these commands to quickly go back and forth between folders in Finder. Simply, swiping left or right with one finger will do it. Just like in Safari.


Other gestures

Making some stuff easier and quicker to acces, I added these extra actions to my wired Apple keyboard:

From top to bottom:

- I use the diagonal arrows to go to a start or beginning of a sentence. Weirdly enough these commands are not standard on the keyboard. Pressing these buttons without any assigned actions, they just scroll down the page, just like the weird looking page-up keys next to them: ⇞

- The ''Show BTT Preferences’’ action was built in, I actually don’t use, but I left it there.

- I happen to use the calculator a lot so I also made it very easy to acces by just pressing the F14 key

- Last action: F5 opens op Activity monitor, always handy whenever my MacBook starts acting weird or slow, just to see whats up. (damn kernel_task )
So if there is a app you use a lot and want really quick acces to it, just assign it to one of the F keys that are not in use.


So that’s it for now, I haven’t implemented too many gestures, but the ones I have are making using my Mac a real joy.
You can try this app with a different mouse as well, but I haven't tested this since I only use the Apple one. If you do use a Magic Mouse, there is a lot more to discover when using BBT and I hope I showed you the potential of this nice app.

You may think all these commands are just making it confusing to use when you can just simply click on tabs or the x to close stuff, but when you use it for a while, you'll get so used to it, you'll be doing the commands without thinking about it. Then, you will not want go to back to the old method.

I hope others who also use BTT share their custom gestures so more people can benefit.

Oh and I almost forgot!

BBT also comes with 'Window Snapping’, it’s a features we have first seen in Windows Vista, where you can drag a window to a side and it’ll resize the window, taking up only half of the screen. This makes it easier to put two windows next to each other.

Anyway, thanks for reading!

 

[Cassady]

Thanks for this. I have had it installed since I first bought my MBP in 2012 - and whereas I always meant to - I never quite got round to allocating specific commands.

You've given me some good ideas - have subscribed to this thread!

 

[Kobayagi]

Thanks for this. I have had it installed since I first bought my MBP in 2012 - and whereas I always meant to - I never quite got round to allocating specific commands.

You've given me some good ideas - have subscribed to this thread!

No problem, it's a great app. If you have any questions or suggestion of the gestures you made, do share.

 

[onekerato]

I use the "Three Finger Click" gesture on the trackpad for toggling on/off the microphone in Dragon Dictate which makes it about as convenient as Apple's fn fn shortcut for inbuilt dictation on Mac OS X.

BetterTouchTool's gestures are great for triggering global shortcuts (e.g. take note in Evernote Menu Bar Helper or record audio or clip a region of the screen to Evernote). Similarly, many menu bar helper apps (eg Voila, ScreenFlow, Evernote) and data capture apps (eg DevonThink, Together) allow configuring global shortcuts which can be triggered using BTT's easier to remember gestures.

 

[coops]

Been using Better Touch Tool since a couple of days after getting my first Macbook Pro several years ago... was shocked to find a touchpad that really did scrolling perfectly, and right clicks so found out about BTT and can't imagine not having it - never mind those who don't even enable the Apple tap to click and the scroll options, that boggles my mind

I've gestures setup for Safari, and my usual Opera browser so i can

• switch Tab to the left or right

• open a new tab

• close a tab (that's a universal Apple Command-W command so works on all app windows)

• open a link in a new tab with a 3 finger click

• back and forward

• 4 finger click to open Operas sidebar to access the built-in email client

BTT is great.

safari as below

 

[Kobayagi]

Been using Better Touch Tool since a couple of days after getting my first Macbook Pro several years ago... was shocked to find a touchpad that really did scrolling perfectly, and right clicks so found out about BTT and can't imagine not having it - never mind those who don't even enable the Apple tap to click and the scroll options, that boggles my mind

I've gestures setup for Safari, and my usual Opera browser so i can

• switch Tab to the left or right

• open a new tab

• close a tab (that's a universal Apple Command-W command so works on all app windows)

• open a link in a new tab with a 3 finger click

• back and forward

• 4 finger click to open Operas sidebar to access the built-in email client

BTT is great.

safari as below

Image

Very nice, and yeah tapping makes it much easier. I think, most people aren't bothered with it. At college I asked a few people why they didn't enable it or if they preferred it so, they didn't even know you could change it...
Sadly, I think most people buy Macs just to show off they have one... not using 10% of it's capabilities.

 

[anonymous4a]

Hi, I made a gesture to minimize a window in Finder to the dock , 4 finger swipe down , but is there a way to maximize that window back open ? I can't find a keyboard shortcut for it so don't know how I would do it .

 

[Kobayagi]

Hi, I made a gesture to minimize a window in Finder to the dock , 4 finger swipe down , but is there a way to maximize that window back open ? I can't find a keyboard shortcut for it so don't know how I would do it .

I dont think there is a gesture to get a minimized window back up unfortunately. I find this very strange, I've tried to find this command my self but there doesn't seem to be one. Though this does work on windows.

If you have a few apps open, you can switch between them with cmd + tab, just like on Windows (with control instead of cmd off course).
But if you've minimized a app, switching to it with cmd Tab will work, (the top bar will appear, it'll for example change from Safari to Finder) but you won't be able to bring the window up, you'll just see the top bar.

 

[augustya]

how can and what gesture can I set up to directly show my desktop, bring to my desktop screen ? I am more interested in the Gestures and not hot keys.

 

[Brian33]

how can and what gesture can I set up to directly show my desktop, bring to my desktop screen ? I am more interested in the Gestures and not hot keys.

If you like, you can show (just) your desktop when you move the mouse pointer to a specific corner of the screen. You can do this without Better Touch Tool.

In Mountain Lion (probably the same in Mavericks), go to System Prefs-->Mission Control-->Hot Corners, pick a corner and select from the drop-down to show "Desktop". The Desktop & Screen Saver preference pane also shows the Hot Corners button.

I use this all the time to get to icons on my desktop. It works with both a trackpad and a mouse.

 

[augustya]

If you like, you can show (just) your desktop when you move the mouse pointer to a specific corner of the screen. You can do this without Better Touch Tool.

In Mountain Lion (probably the same in Mavericks), go to System Prefs-->Mission Control-->Hot Corners, pick a corner and select from the drop-down to show "Desktop". The Desktop & Screen Saver preference pane also shows the Hot Corners button.

I use this all the time to get to icons on my desktop. It works with both a trackpad and a mouse.

Thanks a Lot !!

 

[ianj1972]

I tried BTT but found that occasionally that three finger dragging would fail to be recognised and I'd have to revert to single press drag which is a pain. This was with no gestures setup causing conflict. Quitting BTT would resolve the issue immediately so I stopped using it although some of the ideas mentioned above would be welcomed.
Is there a way to configure BTT, or a bug to prevent the three finger glitch? Has anyone else seen it or is it specific to my setup?

 

[augustya]

I tried BTT but found that occasionally that three finger dragging would fail to be recognised and I'd have to revert to single press drag which is a pain. This was with no gestures setup causing conflict. Quitting BTT would resolve the issue immediately so I stopped using it although some of the ideas mentioned above would be welcomed.
Is there a way to configure BTT, or a bug to prevent the three finger glitch? Has anyone else seen it or is it specific to my setup?

Yes even I have noticed that a lot of times, it fails to recognise Gestures. Happened a lot with me as well.

 

[Kobayagi]

I tried BTT but found that occasionally that three finger dragging would fail to be recognised and I'd have to revert to single press drag which is a pain. This was with no gestures setup causing conflict. Quitting BTT would resolve the issue immediately so I stopped using it although some of the ideas mentioned above would be welcomed.
Is there a way to configure BTT, or a bug to prevent the three finger glitch? Has anyone else seen it or is it specific to my setup?

Maybe you could set it up to be more sensitive to gestures?

You can do this by going to advanced (top left) -> Mouse (top right) -> then the swipes menu.

That might work, but I never tried 3 finger gestures since I find using 3 fingers on the mouse a bit too much. I can't move my ring finder too much to the side

 

[augustya]

If you like, you can show (just) your desktop when you move the mouse pointer to a specific corner of the screen. You can do this without Better Touch Tool.

In Mountain Lion (probably the same in Mavericks), go to System Prefs-->Mission Control-->Hot Corners, pick a corner and select from the drop-down to show "Desktop". The Desktop & Screen Saver preference pane also shows the Hot Corners button.

I use this all the time to get to icons on my desktop. It works with both a trackpad and a mouse.

These Gestures on the Magic Trackpad work only when the windows is not full screen ? It doesn't work when it is Full Screen !!

 

[Brian33]

These Gestures on the Magic Trackpad work only when the windows is not full screen ? It doesn't work when it is Full Screen !!

You seem to be right; I hadn't noticed that. The "Display Sleep" set for the bottom right corner, worked for me in full screen, but "Desktop" didn't when I set it for the same corner. Wonder whether this was intended or a bug on Apple's part. (10.8.5).

 

[calbearz24]

Thanks for the post Kobayagi! I wanted to add the forward/back function for two finger swipe left/right gestures in Finder and you saved me from having to search for the keyboard shortcuts. Also added a three finger click for the BTT predefined action "Hide All Windows" for a "Show desktop"-like function from Windows.

 

[Kobayagi]

Thanks for the post Kobayagi! I wanted to add the forward/back function for two finger swipe left/right gestures in Finder and you saved me from having to search for the keyboard shortcuts. Also added a three finger click for the BTT predefined action "Hide All Windows" for a "Show desktop"-like function from Windows.

No problem, glad I could help.

 

[username:]

Love BTT. Great thread. I thought your swiping between folders in Finder was genius and added it immediately.

I'm using a Magic Trackpad here and I'll just give a couple tips of how I use BTT.
Three finger taps I don't use anymore because I like the built in three finger tap for a definition of a word.
To open new tabs (finder, safari) I use "three finger tip-tap". Which is hard to explain but basically when resting three finger on the track pad I just have to tap my right most finger once. This feels really intuitive for me, don't know why, probably my favourite gesture.
I use "two finger tip-tap" which is the same as above except with only two finger resting on the trackpad, and I can cycle through tabs in both directions. I like this better than swiping because .. Well basically I'm lazy and taps are easier than swipes!
That's about the best I have out of it so far. Again thanks for sharing, I found your tips useful!

Oh yeah and I used to have a gesture for closing tabs but then I kept closing them accidentally and I found using the x was more user friendly for clumsy me.

And I have had no issues with any glitches with BTT, it's always worked perfect, apart from one or two crashes, which I only noticed when the gestures stopped working!

 

[augustya]

Three finger taps I don't use anymore because I like the built in three finger tap for a definition of a word.

Do you mean this feature is already there with the Macbook as a default feature ? Didnt Notice it ? How do you use it ? Enable it ?

 

[Kobayagi]

Love BTT. Great thread. I thought your swiping between folders in Finder was genius and added it immediately.

I'm using a Magic Trackpad here and I'll just give a couple tips of how I use BTT.
Three finger taps I don't use anymore because I like the built in three finger tap for a definition of a word.
To open new tabs (finder, safari) I use "three finger tip-tap". Which is hard to explain but basically when resting three finger on the track pad I just have to tap my right most finger once. This feels really intuitive for me, don't know why, probably my favourite gesture.
I use "two finger tip-tap" which is the same as above except with only two finger resting on the trackpad, and I can cycle through tabs in both directions. I like this better than swiping because .. Well basically I'm lazy and taps are easier than swipes!
That's about the best I have out of it so far. Again thanks for sharing, I found your tips useful!

Oh yeah and I used to have a gesture for closing tabs but then I kept closing them accidentally and I found using the x was more user friendly for clumsy me.

And I have had no issues with any glitches with BTT, it's always worked perfect, apart from one or two crashes, which I only noticed when the gestures stopped working!

Glad I could help and your tips sound great too. Currently, I'm only using my laptop without my Magic Mouse and now I have to use control and tab to switch tabs or just click on them. Those tap features seem nice. I've tried them before but didn't really get how they worked. I'll give them one more go.


Edit: I just tried the two finger tip tap on the track pad and WOW it really works nice. Thanks for showing this one.

- I've added TipTap Right to change tab to the right
- TipTap left to go left
- Two (3) Finger TipTap left for a middle click (open page in new tab)
- And two finder TipTap middle for command W, to close tabs.

So yeah, thanks for the ideas.

Do you mean this feature is already there with the Macbook as a default feature ? Didnt Notice it ? How do you use it ? Enable it ?

When on your trackpad, stand on a word and tap it with 3 fingers. The word should get colored in yellow and shortly after a small explanation should pop up. Sometimes this word is explained but mostly, I get no results. I'm not sure if the laptop is then using the onboard dictionary or if it's giving like a wikipedia explenation.

 

[username:]

Do you mean this feature is already there with the Macbook as a default feature ? Didnt Notice it ? How do you use it ? Enable it ?

You need to go into trackpad settings in system preferences and enable 'look up' which has 'tap with three fingers' underneath. It only works if you have a trackpad.

It works just like kobayagi says. It gives dictionary definition, thesaurus, and some other information if you click more info. Always works for me, but I'm always connected to the internet so it might rely on an internet connection. I think it might use the built in dictionary and if you do have an internet connection it gives additional info.

----------

I just tried the two finger tip tap on the track pad and WOW it really works nice. Thanks for showing this one.

No problem, I really like it too.

 

[Kobayagi]

No problem, I really like it too.

What did you set for the TipTap sensitivity settings? Seems you need to set it quite low if you want to just press it with a ''normal'' pressure.

 

[augustya]

is anyone using the Moshi Trackpad Cover for the rMBP and then tried using this APP ? Has it reduced the sensitivity or responsiveness ?

 

[username:]

What did you set for the TipTap sensitivity settings? Seems you need to set it quite low if you want to just press it with a ''normal'' pressure.

You mean this stuff? I never changed any of that.