what are typical newbie-to-mac issues?

[GGJstudios]

A couple of screen grab shortcuts that don't seem to be documented anywhere are:

Actually, they're documented within the 2nd post in this thread, by simsaladimbamba:

Maybe this can help:

Helpful Information for Any Mac User by GGJstudios​

That link contains near the top: Apple Keyboard Shortcuts:

Shift-Command-3 ------------ Capture the screen to a file
Shift-Control-Command-3 --- Capture the screen to the Clipboard
Shift-Command-4 ------------ Capture a selection to a file
Shift-Control-Command-4 --- Capture a selection to the Clipboard

One other thing is that OSX hides a lot of folders and files from you that you are used to seeing in Windows. Apple reckon you'll just blunder around and delete files and folders you need because you don't recognise them and believe me there are loads of them. It can be frustrating when you know you have some files but can't find them because they have been hidden from you. A search of help or support forums will tell you how you can unhide them permanently or temporarily.

Most users never need to see hidden files, and they clutter your Desktop and other folders unnecessarily when they're visible. For those who are curious:

To show hidden files in Finder, enter the following two commands into a Terminal window (press enter after each line):

defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE
killall Finder​

To hide hidden files in Finder, enter the following two commands into a Terminal window (press enter after each line):

defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles FALSE
killall Finder​

 

[ET iPhone Home]

I'm new to Mac - 2 months. The first 2-3 weeks was very frustrating. Joining MacRumors was a must. After 3 weeks of use, I'm very comfortable, however, I'll share with you a few issues I'm still having:

1. Download/Preview: When I click on a PDF or say, song (mp3) to sample the music, instead of viewing the PDF or listening to the song sample, Safari will download the PDF to your download folder and the song sample to iTunes. With Windows, it will preview the PDF first and then ask you where you want the PDF to be saved too.

2. I also just figured out how to view two separate usb flash drive content side by side. Once you click on Finder, you can access one USB port. To access the other USB port, you have to two finger click on Finder again, to open a New Finder Window. In windows, you can go directly to the port drive i.e. D:/, E:/, H:/

3. In Safari, it allows you to auto-save documents to a particular, in my case, SD Card. The only problem and I have checked the compatibility of this SD Card is that, when I download PDF's, and view them, it says the PDF's are corrupted and won't view. But if you view them directly on the MBA (in my case), no issues.

4. VLC is almost a must to view a variety of video formats, as some content for Windows Media Player, may not be compatible on a Mac.

5. As far as my personal experience, I still struggle with some cut and paste to email content. Sometimes it works, and other times it doesn't. What's 100% full proof is Shift + Command + 4, to jpeg the document.
You can't just go to EDIT > CUT > then PASTE like on Windows, even though OSX gives you that option.

6. Someone suggested GRAB in Spotlight (as a copy and paste alternative). I'm still trying to figure how to use it.

7. There is no PRT SCRN either. So as someone suggested above the following:

Shift-Command-3 ------------ Capture the screen to a file
Shift-Control-Command-3 --- Capture the screen to the Clipboard
Shift-Command-4 ------------ Capture a selection to a file
Shift-Control-Command-4 --- Capture a selection to the Clipboard

I still have a lot to learn. With that said, I don't think I'll go back to Windows - it's too buggy and too many pop-ups.

They say, it's best to learn a PC first, because it would be twice as difficult to go from MAC to PC.

 

[ET iPhone Home]

What is a terminal window?

 

[simsaladimbamba]

What is a terminal window?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminal_(Mac_OS_X)

2. I also just figured out how to view two separate usb flash drive content side by side. Once you click on Finder, you can access one USB port. To access the other USB port, you have to two finger click on Finder again, to open a New Finder Window. In windows, you can go directly to the port drive i.e. D:/, E:/, H:/

You can do the same via Mac OS X' Sidebar: Customizing the Finder sidebar in OS X

 

[theSeb]

What is a terminal window?

cmd + space
type Terminal
hit enter

 

[bill-p]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A405 Safari/7534.48.3)

If command c is copy and cut, how do you specify to cut? Or is there just no cut option for macs?

Think of it this way:
Command + C to mark a file for cut/copy
Command + V if you want to make a copy of the marked file to the current folder.
Command + Option + V if you want to move the marked file to the current folder.

Generally, most people drag files if they want to "cut" them, so Command + Option + V is not used too often. It's useful for external hard drives though. Beats having to Shift + Delete after dragging.

-------

For those who are still attached to Windows, in Bootcamp, the Delete key can serve as a regular Delete key if you hold down Fn. So Fn + Delete acts as regular Delete in Bootcamp. However, Control + Option/Alt + Delete doesn't require Fn. It's just like you would do Ctrl + Alt + Del normally.

Also taking a screenshot under Bootcamp is Shift + Fn + F11, or Shift + Option/Alt + Fn + F11.

Couple of useful typing tips under OSX:
Command + Left moves to begin of line
Command + Right moves to end of line
Command + Up moves to top of document
Command + Down moves to bottom of document
Fn + Up moves up a page (Page Up in Windows)
Fn + Down moves down a page (Page Down in Windows)
Fn + Left acts almost like Command + Up in most situations.
Fn + Right acts almost like Command + Down in most situations.
Option + Left moves back one word (or to the previous space)
Option + Right moves forward one word (or to the next space)

Not to be confused:
Control + Left/Right when not in a text field switches between desktops/fullscreen apps.
Control + Up when not in a text field activates Mission Control
Control + Down in Mission Control will dismiss it and bring you back to the last desktop/app

Also useful:

Command + Space activates the spotlight, which is like Google for your computer. Which means you can type calculations in there (try sin(30)), and it'll give you results. You can also search for email/document/websites/bookmarks and many other random things.

 

[DouchGod]

Looking for the windows key, trying to force quit programs with Ctrl, Alt, Z and the best one, looking for the print screen key.

 

[bill-p]

Looking for the windows key, trying to force quit programs with Ctrl, Alt, Z and the best one, looking for the print screen key.

Windows key under Bootcamp is Command...
Mac OSX doesn't necessarily have the equivalence of a Windows key.

Force Quit programs is Command + Option/Alt + Esc.

Print screen under Mac OSX has been posted. I just posted Print screen for Bootcamp (Shift + Fn + F11).

 

[DouchGod]

I know what they are, i was just highlighting my issues after using windows for 20 years.

 

[pjo]

1. expecting OS X to work the same as Windows - besides UI changes things like (un)installing software, setting up web dev environments, administration (like starting/stopping services)
2. some third party applications (Photoshop and Office for example) are very different as regards to keyboard shortcuts etc on mac/windows. power users of win versions find it hard to switch.
3. Application parity. For some cases you may not find an application that does the same as a windows application or if it does it may not read the same file formats.

As you can see most show-stoppers affect inflexible people/situations. In most cases if you search the forums here you'll find solutions to most of the things that make OS X different from Windows.

 

[bill-p]

I know what they are, i was just highlighting my issues after using windows for 20 years.

I see. My bad. But shouldn't Alt + F4 be force quit in Windows? Ctrl + Alt + Z behaves differently depending on the app... or in fact, I think it might be undo in most apps...

 

[DouchGod]

I see. My bad. But shouldn't Alt + F4 be force quit in Windows? Ctrl + Alt + Z behaves differently depending on the app... or in fact, I think it might be undo in most apps...

Yup my bad to much beer makes me get stuff wrong

 

[theSeb]

I see. My bad. But shouldn't Alt + F4 be force quit in Windows? Ctrl + Alt + Z behaves differently depending on the app... or in fact, I think it might be undo in most apps...

Alt + F4 is quit in Windows. Command + Q does the same in OSX.

Ctrl + F4 closes a window in a multi window application like if you have two word docs open in Windows. Cmd + W does the same in OSX.


Force quit is done via the task manager in Windows (Ctrl + Shift + Esc) and via Force Quit in the Apple menu (Cmd + Alt + Esc) in OSX.

Here are some short cuts in Lion that I like:
Ctrl + Up arrow = mission control
Now you can ctrl and left arrow or right arrow to cycle through your desktops and once you're on the one you want, ctrl + down arrow to go into that desktop

Ctrl + left arrow or right arrow = next or previous desktop in mission control

Ctrl + down arrow = app expose
Now use the arrows to highlight the windows and hit enter to bring the desired window into the foreground

Go into mission control, then hold Alt and click on the different desktops - this shows you what's in the desktop without going out of mission control - effectively this is the same thing as Ctrl + up arrow then ctrl + left or right

cmd + ` allows you to cycle through the application's open windows

I like doing as much as possible without taking my hands off the keyboard - it's much faster.

Ctrl + F4 cycles through ALL open windows, much like alt + tab does in Windows XP. This gets stuck on certain system windows though like system preferences.

When you're doing a Cmd + Tab to cycle through applications - while holding Cmd and you've tabbed to the desired application, keeping holding cmd and then hit the down arrow. This will go into the Application Expose and show all of the application's open windows. You can now select the window you are after using the keyboard left and right arrows or the trackpad/mouse.

 

[jsgreen]

"fn + Delete" on the MBA deletes the character to the right of the cursor

hitting space while a file is selected (such as in finder or an attachment to an email) gives you a quick preview of the material

Preview has some nifty annotating capabilities, including the ability to manage signatures (captured by holding up a signed paper to the iSight camera), which you can digitally stick onto pdf documents.

 

[Chipg]

Pay the $4.99 in the mac app store and get Tutor for Lion, being a PC guy for 30 years it got me up to speed super fast.

 

[jojoba]

Thanks, everyone, super useful - and those lists of short cuts in the mac rumors links are awesome.

I haven't had as much time to explore stuff on the air as I've wanted to yet (busy with stuff I need to do on my work computer), but I've downloaded that tutor program now and going to start it this afternoon.

 

[JonLa]

OS X's search is incredible - cmd+space and then type anything you need - will search programs, files, emails, calendar, etc. I often use it in preference to launchpad or finder

 

[jojoba]

OS X's search is incredible - cmd+space and then type anything you need - will search programs, files, emails, calendar, etc. I often use it in preference to launchpad or finder

Yes, I love that feature, it´s great

 

[doktordoris]

A couple of screen grab shortcuts that don't seem to be documented anywhere are:

1) To screengrab an area of screen, hit SHIFT+CMD+4. Then drag a rectangle with your mouse. When you release the mouse key, the screenshot will appear on your desktop.

2) To screengrab a window, hit SHIFT+CMD+4. Then hit SPACEBAR. Then click on the window you want to image. A file will appear on the desktop.

or to screen grab the desktop use shift+cmd+3