Shortcuts Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

"Ducking iPhone" Revisited: two ways to improve iOS auto-correct feature

by TJ Luoma (Mar 21st, 2013)

Back in December 2008, I came up with an "interesting" solution to iOS's annoying habit of "correcting" the word that I wanted with the word that it thought I wanted. The problem was colloquially known as the "Ducking iPhone" for reasons you are probably smart enough to figure out on your own. ...

Use Eve to learn Mac OS X shortcuts

by Mike Schramm (Aug 2nd, 2012)

Eve is a brilliant little program that I just installed on my MacBook -- it's got one function only, and that is simply to pop up on the screen whenever you do something with your mouse, and remind you that there's a way to do it with your keyboard. I am a huge fan of keyboard shortcuts, but ...

Launch Center demo by creator David Barnard

by Victor Agreda, Jr. (Jan 26th, 2012)

Last night David Barnard of App Cubby swung by our makeshift studio in San Francisco to show off Launch Center, which had only been live on the App Store for a few hours. If you're wondering what Launch Center does, this video will explain it. Basically it's a shortcut app which allows you to save ...

iPhone 101: Set up keyboard shortcuts for easier typing

by Chris Rawson (Nov 14th, 2011)

Typing on the iPhone or iPad becomes easier as you get used to it, but some things remain cumbersome to write even after years of use. The keyboard acrobatics required to type something like "Wi-Fi + 3G" or a long email address on a touchscreen keyboard can be somewhat maddening if you have to ...

iTunes 101: Display exact duplicate songs using the Option key

by David Quilty (Dec 22nd, 2010)

This is a really useful iTunes 101 lesson for beginners and expert users alike. While iTunes makes it easy to remove duplicates in your song library, sometimes just because a few titles have the same name doesn't mean that they are the exact same song. Because of this, it could take you a really ...

Mac 101: Keyboard tricks for Finder navigation

by Brett Terpstra (Oct 14th, 2010)

You may know that you can expand and collapse Finder folders in a tree view using the left and right arrow keys. But did you know that you can expand or collapse all of the root-level folders at once? It's a cool trick that can save you a lot of time when navigating your Mac's files. With the Finder ...

Mac 101: Use the tab key in more dialog boxes

by TJ Luoma (Mar 8th, 2010)

TUAW reader Cody Rogers wrote in to say: "I'm fairly new to my iMac and Macbook Pro running Snow Leopard. One of my biggest annoyances from switching over from PC to Mac is when a dialogue box comes up and says 'cancel' or 'okay' I can't find the keyboard shortcut to go from cancel to okay. In ...

Mac 101: Going Commando with Command-key shortcuts in Mac OS X

by Sang Tang (Mar 6th, 2010)

One of the adjustments those new to the Mac need to make is to familiarize themselves with the Command key. Although I switch hit and use Windows at work and a Mac when I'm not working, I've always preferred it over Control. Its proximity next to the space bar allows me to use my thumb, as opposed ...

Five customized Automator services to help save you time

by Sang Tang (Feb 2nd, 2010)

One gem in Mac OS X that sometimes gets glanced over is the Services menu. Lots of readers may not know yet that Snow Leopard brought with it the ability to create your own customized service in Automator -- in other words, you can get additional selections on a contextual menu when right-clicking ...

Mac 101: AllThingsD delivers a video guide for Mac novices

by Joachim Bean (Dec 24th, 2009)

If one of your loved ones has just switched to the Mac, or just got a Mac for the holidays, they might want some tips on how to get around and do the things they're used to doing in Windows. Katherine Boehret from AllThingsD has just posted a video and some tips showing many useful tips for ...

First Look: Keymote for iPhone / iPod touch takes control of your Mac

by John Burke (Aug 16th, 2009)

There are some applications out there that never cease to amaze me. We're always looking for shortcuts and ways to make our lives (and our computer use) much easier. Iced Cocoa's new Keymote [iTunes Link] for iPhone and iPod touch is sure to do just that! With Keymote, you'll never again have to ...

Mac 101: Folder shortcuts in the Finder

by Robert Palmer (Jul 31st, 2008)

Another quick tip in our Mac 101 series for beginners: Some special folders on your computer have keyboard shortcuts that you can press to instantly navigate to that folder when using the Finder. For example, to open your Applications folder, click on your desktop and use the shift (?) and command ...

Shortcuts brings contextual menu items to your keyboard

by Brett Terpstra (Feb 22nd, 2008)

Mice can be great, but sometimes my hands are too cozy on the keyboard to make the trip over to the aptly named pointing device. And contextual menus can be great, too, but I've got a few CM plugins creating a little maze of hierarchical menus. Some of them are used much more frequently than others ...

Mac 101: Using the Up Arrow in Finder

by Erica Sadun (Oct 1st, 2007)

It's no surprise to most Mac users that you can use arrow keys to navigate through Finder windows. Arrow-key presses work in all three window styles: icon view, list view and column view. What many new Mac users don't realize though is that there are Command versions of these arrow keys. When ...

TUAW Tip: endo's keyboard shortcuts rock

by David Chartier (Aug 29th, 2007)

Hi, my name is David Chartier, and I'm an RSS-aholic. [your collective response: Hi David] The last time I refreshed my newsreader was... well, probably a minute or two ago, and then 30 minutes before that. You see, I'm obsessed with news, and I've been using some sort of a newsreader for around ...