jons-macos-tips.md

Jon’s tips for MacOS

My general tips for using MacOS - the apps/shortcuts that I can’t live without

Dock

Fiddle with the settings for it.

• Autohide it
• Don’t have every single app pinned in it, use spotlight/raycast to find/launch

Chris goes one step further and adjust the dock so there’s no delay to it popping up

$ defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-time-modifier -float 0.5; killall Dock # Half a second delay

defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-delay -float 0; killall Dock # No delay

There’s loads of other MacOS customisations here

Desktop

• ⌘ , to open preferences - I like to show the HD
• ⌘ J for view settings - I have sort by kind set so things snap to grid and order nicely

Finder

• Also set sort by kind for most intuitive sorting of files
• I like column view best

Trackpad

• Turn on tap to click
• Use gestures, my faves are:
  • 5 finger spread to show desktop
  • 4 fingers up to show all windows

Common shortcuts

• ⌘ Q to quit
• ⌘ W to close the window
• ⌘ TAB to cycle between open apps
• ⌘ ~ to cycle between windows of focussed app
• ⌘ , will open preferences of focussed app
• ⌘ ⇧ 3 screenshot whole screen(s)
• ⌘ ⇧ 4 gives you cross hair to screenshot any portion of screen - press space bar to make it switch mode so you can choose a whole window to grab (and it gives a nice drop shadow)
• ⌘ ⇧ 5 brings up screenshot toolbar (useful for recording videos)

Terminal tips

I really like oh-my-zsh. It becomes even better with plugins

I use:

plugins=(asdf git zsh-syntax-highlighting zsh-autosuggestions)

zsh-syntax-highlighting and zsh-autosuggestions are the two plugins I can’t live without

The git shortcuts are really useful.

I mostly use:

• gst git status
• gsta git stash
• gstp git stash pop
• gc git commit (opens vim)
• gcmsg "your commit message" git commit with inline message
• gco branch-name switch branch
• gcm switch to master
• gco -b new-branch-name switch to new branch
• glog git log
• glgga fancy git log
• ggl git pull
• ggp git push
• ggfl git push --force-with-lease (for when you’ve rebased)

Lastly I use split screen terminals a lot:

• ⌘ D for vertical split
• ⌘ ⇧ D for horizontal split

Raycast

I replace MacOS spotlight (⌘ spacebar) with Raycast.

Clipboard history

The killer for me is clipboard history I can’t live without it — it’s built in but you have to enable it I think. Open Raycast and press ⌘ , to open the preferences then in extensions look for “Clipboard history”.

I assign it the hotkey ⌘ ⌥ V which launches a little window which shows you all the last things you’ve copied, use the arrows to choose on and hit Enter to paste it where your cursor is.

Window management

Raycast has another great built in extension to manage your windows. If you launch Raycast and type “Almost” you’ll “Almost Maximise” I use that one sometimes.

But for the ones I use the most I have hotkeys setup:

• ⌘ ⌥ Q to pin a window to the left half
• ⌘ ⌥ W to pin a window to the right half

But if you keep pressing ⌘ ⌥ Q on a window it will cycle between half, two-thirds and one-third which I find really useful.

Raycast has loads of other built in stuff that I don’t really use (like a GitHub integration). I do use it to do currency conversions - just type “100USD” and it shows it in GBP for instance.

1Password

The 1Password app works really nicely with the browser extensions, but there are sometimes when you need a password and you’re entering it into dialogs that aren’t in a browser where it won’t autofill for you.

For these instances: it used to be really slow because I did it all with the 1Password app and my mouse. But then I learnt all the shortcuts and its so much better (especially considering how often MS Teams make you reauthenticate).

So when I get the MS login popup

• I press ⌘ ⇧ spacebar to launch the mini 1Password window
• I type “Microsoft”, to choose that login
• ⌘ C to copy the username (then I paste it where I need it)
• ⌘ ⇧ C to copy the password
• ⌘ ⌥ C to copy the OTP

This speeds up the process SO much

Slack

• I use ⌘ K a lot to switch between channels/DMS
• ⌥ UP/DOWN moves between channels/DMs in the sidebar
• ⌥ ⇧ UP/DOWN moves between unread channels/DMs (but not the unread thread thing at the top - which is v annoying!)