Handy Tips

I’ve picked up two very useful tips in the last few days…

Todd Dominey at What Do I Know shows how you can invoke OS X’s built-in dictionary in native OS X (Cocoa) apps, such as Safari, TextEdit, Mail etc. Type the first few letters of your word, then hit F5 (or option-escape) to reveal a list of possible words. Select the desired word and hit return to insert it in your document (escape will hide the menu).

Tommy at Cloven Hoof shares a quick method to hide or quit open applications. Using command-tab to switch between applications, if you release tab (keep command pressed) and hit either H or Q, the highlighted application will hide or quit.

Great tips which will shave precious time off your workflow.

Posted 3 years, 11 months ago on 13th October 2004.


Comments

Those are two very cool little tips! I defo consider myself a power-user (to say the least) having used Macs for over 12 years now, but I didn’t know either of those!

Thanks!

Jamie Kirkpatrick · 3 years, 11 months ago


Thanks for the first tip, Phil. I’ve used it before in Colloquy but wasn’t aware that it was a system-wide feature. :)

On the subject of tips, I found another one the other day. You can access hidden files and folders from any app’s open and save dialogue boxes by pressing Command-Shift-G then typing in the path.

Tommy · www · 3 years, 11 months ago


well well, F5 on my mac is linked with voice increase command, which is quite handy too and none of the key combinations I could imagine worked for me to make this tip work... hmm?

Alex M. · 3 years, 11 months ago


Alex .. check under system prefs / keyboard & mouse / keyboard.

Check the ‘use F1-F12 keys for custom actions’ box. This makes you use the function key w/ F5 to adjust the volume.

C Lacy · www · 3 years, 9 months ago


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