Legend has it that the mouse was always meant as a ‘learning’ tool and eventually we were meant to graduate to key commands. Well that didn’t work out so well did it!
The mouse is vital, I think we all agree, but there are a number of very useful key commands that can be used in combination with the mouse to help speed things up.
Here then, are some useful key commands that can be used to speed up your day.
Lets start with the Finder, that smiling Face icon in your Dock that controls how the Mac actually administers files, menus and windows. (that’s windows with a small ‘w’ not Windows – that OTHER operating system) then I will move to other applications.
Finder
Shift-Command -Q will log you out but you’ll be asked to confirm this is what you want to do.
This is instead of: Clicking on the Apple menu and choosing Logout
Option-Shift-Command -Q will log you out without asking.
Command-Tab will let you cycle through all your applications. Keep pressing the Tab key until the application you want is highlighted then release and the application will come to the foreground.
This is instead of: Moving down to the dock and clicking on the application you want.
Command-spacebar will bring up Spotlight search.
This is instead of: Clicking on the Spotlight menu icon in the upper menu.
Pressing the Esc key or command-spacebar again will make it disappear.
Command-N will bring up a new Finder window.
This is instead of: Clicking on the File menu and choosing New Finder Window
Command-Shift-N will create a new folder on the desktop or open window.
This is instead of: Clicking on the Finder menu and choosing New Folder.
Shift-Command-O will open the Documents folder.
This is instead of: locating the Documents folder in the sidebar or drilling down though your disk to find it.
Shift-Command-A will open the Applications folder.
This is instead of: locating the Applications folder in the sidebar or drilling down though your disk to find it.
Command-N will open a new mail.
This is instead of: Click on the File menu and choosing New Message.
Fun Fact… you can press the TAB key to move to Subject and then TAB again to the message field and start typing. Then…
Command-Shift-D will send the email.
This is instead of: Clicking on the Send Mail icon.
Command-Q will exit the application. (This is true for all applications )
This is instead of: Clicking on the File menu and choosing Quit.
Any Application
Command-Q will exit the application.
This is instead of: This is instead of: Clicking on the File menu and choosing Quit.
Command-P will print the open document.
This is instead of: This is instead of: Clicking on the File menu and choosing print.
Command-S will save the document.
This is instead of: This is instead of: Clicking on the File menu and choosing Save.
These are just a couple of my favourite and most often used key commands. There a heap more and a good list can be found here on the Apple website.
