Mac Tips: 10 Keyboard Shortcuts You Probably didn't know Existed.

The Famous 'Command' Key
Source: http://drbl.in/fOQj

Hello and Merry Christmas! I hope everyone had a good holiday because here is my present to all of you: 10 shortcuts that most of you didn't know existed. Every shortcut here is one that I use almost everyday because it is so helpful, and when I show my friends, they ask me why I haven't shown them it before. So read on if you want to know how to cut your time on a mac by a lot (I'm not that good at math to figure out the percentage). Please note that these commands were tested on Mountain Lion, and are not guaranteed to work on anything lower than OS X 10.8 but according to Apple's page (the link to it will be at the end of the article), these should work on all macs down to Mac OS X 10.5 (Which is really old!).

What do those Menu Symbols Mean?

If you have used the menu items on the top bar of the Mac before, you might have noticed symbols and letters on the right hand side of commonly used commands. Take a look at the file menu of Finder for example:

The File Menu of Finder.
Note the Symbols on the Right Hand Side.

While a little excessive if you ask me, this is a perfect example of those symbols. Those symbols actually tell you the key shortcut you need to press to perform the same command. For the command key, you can tell which ones use it by looking for the same symbol that is on the actual command key (which is actually called a Bowen Knot), however for the rest of them, the symbols are not on the keys and you need to know what they transcribe to. Lucky for you, Apple made a chart of all the modifier keys which I have put here:

 (Command key) - On some Apple keyboards, this key also has an Apple () logo
 (Control key)
 (Option key) - "Alt" may also appear on this key
 (Shift key)
 (Caps Lock) - Toggles Caps Lock on or off
Fn (Function key)  - You will need to use this key if you use the function keys (F1, F2, etc.) as their images (such as brightness and volume).

Finder Shortcuts

If you don't already know what it is, finder is the core application that Macs run on. Finder is also the smily face at either the top or the left side of the dock -- depending on where the dock is located -- that pulls up all of your files. So now that you know what Finder is, here are some shortcuts for the finder window.

1.  Command-A: Select all items in the current finder window. This can be helpful if you want to move all, or most of your items in that window to another window, such as moving the items to a new folder. To deselect an item after you selected all of them, use Command-click, to deselect all items, use Command-Option-A.

2.  Command-Delete: Moves Selected Item to the trash. This one can go with number 1 if you wanted to do a mass cleaning of, for example, your Downloads folder.

3.  Command-Shift-Delete: Empty the Trash. This one also goes with both numbers 1 & 2. To delete items from the Trash without the annoying conformation prompt, use Command-Shift-Option-Delete

Web Browser Shortcuts

Please note that these may not work on all web browsers. Tested on Safari, Chrome and Firefox.

4.  Command-D: Bookmark the current page. You can also bookmark all tabs by using Command-Shift-D.

5.  Command-Shift-H: Opens the Home Page.
6.  Command-R: Reloads the current page.

7.  Command-N: Opens a New Window. You can also use Command-T for a new Tab.

     7a. To open a private window, the commands are a bit different for each web browser.

• Chrome: Command-Shift-N
• Firefox: Command-Shift-P
• Safari: Sorry guys, you don't get a shortcut, instead go to Safari -> Private Browsing... on the navigation bar.

Miscellaneous Shortcuts

These shortcuts can be used anywhere

8. Command-Shift-3: Take a snapshot of the whole screen and save it to the desktop. Also hides the mouse in the snapshot.

9. Command-Shift-4: Take a snapshot of a selected part of the screen and save it to the desktop. As a bonus, while the crosshairs are visible, it shows you the current pixel location you are on.

10. Command-Option-esc: Opens the force quit window to let you choose which application to force quit. To force quit the top-most application hold Command-Shift-Option-Esc for three seconds. Note: use only when an application is not responding!

Conclusion

These are ten of the most commonly used shortcuts that I use and that I have shown my friends that afterwards start to use themselves. To find out more commands that can be used, Apple created this page with a list of commands. To find out which commands can be used in any application on your mac and have at lease OS X 10.7, there is a great free app on the Mac App Store called CheatSheet that will pull up all the commands that can be used in that application - which is great for someone like me that likes to use keyboard shortcuts as much as possible.