> Spectacle used it's own keyboard shortcut recorder, while Rectangle uses MASShortcut [1], a well maintained open source library for shortcut recording in macOS apps. This cuts down dramatically on the number of bugs that were only in Spectacle because of the custom shortcut recorder.
FWIW, I use the Double Use Shift for parantheses. Tap left Shift for (, tap right Shift for ), and shift works as usual for normal typing and shortcuts. Karabiner is really an essential tool for me, especially this shortcut.
Cmd+shift+/ - brings up help search to search through menu items. Huge feature to me over windows, Linux-based desktop environments.
Not exactly a shortcut, but I once made a gesture-driven shortcut app (https://thimblemac.com) - it’s been on hiatus the past couple years but have been wondering if there’s value in it for programming work contexts.
It's better to use a full size keyboard and use two hands for keyboard combos, e.g. for Ctrl+A use right Ctrl, for Ctrl+N use left Ctrl, for Ctrl+E use right control. Takes a little while to master but it puts much less pressure on your fingers.
On Linux you can get it to do the same thing with a combination of xmodmap, setxkbmap and xcape (but it's fiddly) and on Windows with AutoHotkey (but it's fiddly) — neither are as easy to use as Karabiner Elements, but they do work.
The latest version of Elements has supported this for several months, if not longer (I think they'd made it work for High Sierra at least, but I could be wrong about the exact timing.)
I use it for both Caps Lock -> Escape/Control and Return -> Return/Control and it's indispensible.
Cmd-Space for me is the most powerful one! It makes life so much easier, and unlike the windows key, it's all front and center on your screen and easier to read.
IIRC, these are enabled by default if the text view is a standard NS* text view (don't recall the actual class). It's always a bit of a surprise when I find a window where these don't work, and that's a good indication that someone has implemented their own class for the text view. Little nugget holdover from those Unix-loving NeXT devs.
If you've used Cmd-C to copy something to the clipboard, pbpaste is really useful to pipe the clipboard contents into a pipe or to a file (pbcopy being the inverse)
Shift-Cmd-3 will simultaneously capture a screenshot of ALL monitors connected to your system and put the files on the Desktop.
Shift-Cmd-4 will give you a cursor with which you can draw a rectangle of the area desired; if you then hit Space, however, the cursor changes to a camera icon which then allows you to click on any open window. That window will then be captured.
Shift-Cmd-5 pulls up a full set of screen capture controls with various options.
Wish this was easier to remember. I don’t do many screenshots yet I have ctrl/alt print screen burned in my brain and have to google this one every damn time
(joke ..) It's easy, just remember to add +1 from "Cmd Shift 3" .. the whole-screen screenshots shortcut.
(seriously) Cmd Shift 4 also has AFTERTOUCH - so do the command, draw out the grey capture window, and keep holding the mouse button WHILE trying using different combinations of Ctrl, Option, and Shift. Allows you to resize your capture window.
Without the initial SHIFT dumps the file to the Desktop. With the SHIFT adds the screenshot to your clipboard.
Setting a text replacement (sys-prefs > keyboard > text) for "@@" to your email address. It's something we type multiple times a day, it's important to not have a typo, and @@ is something you rarely type in any context. This works with most apps, though some won't allow the text replacement to apply.
I like ShiftIt (free) for basic window management. I have opt+ctrl+cmd+[arrow] set to move my active window to that part of the screen. Ie, left arrow has that active window take up the left half of my screen. I then cmd+tab to another window and put it on the right side. Super quick for my window management needs.
I remap every single key on my keyboard into custom modifier. So my caps lock is escape on single press and cmd/opt/shift on hold.
My control key is a. My command key is e. I open apps by pressing w + <key>. ie w+l opens VSCode. Press it again and it switches to previous app (under the hood w+l calls a Keyboard Maestro macro).
Not a shortcut exactly, but turn on the "zoom" accessibility feature bound to something like CMD. You can then zoom in anywhere on the screen by holding the shortcut and doing a two finger gesture. Useful for reading small text, checking some CSS rendering close up and to point out a feature on the screen to someone nearby.
The app witch lets you command-tab to switch apps but it lets you choose any open window of any app. So if you have 4 separate terminals and 3 chrome windows and multiple word documents open you can scroll to the exact one that you like
Does anyone know a way to assign a keyboard shortcut to show and hide a specific app? I love this feature in iTerm2 and would like to have it for my browser and text editor as well.
I have it set up in Keyboard Maestro. It's useful, as if you also use Keyboard Maestro's app switcher (Cmd+Tab), you can set that up to never show certain apps in the switcher - apps like Spotify and Tweetbot that I always have open, but clutter the switcher.
The biggest thing I missed going from Ubuntu to Mac was the ability to take your current active window with you when you switched workspaces using only the keyboard. In Mac, you have to use a mouse. Now I only use the other workspace/desktop as a quick way to get a clear screen to access something on the desktop like a recent screen shot.
⌘⌃D -- looks up whatever word the cursor is hovering over or whatever text has been selected. Works system-wide except (irritatingly) in Microsoft Office.
Another recommendation for Magnet. Using an ultrawide with my MBP it makes snapping windows around the screen really smooth and a key part of the workflow.
Late to the comment party, hopefully this still helps someone!
Probably the most important knowledge is to learn the Mac modifier key symbols, since they'll help you learn more
shortcuts from the menu items you use.
⌃ Control
⇧ Shift
⌥ Option
⌘ Command
——— SCREENSHOTS ———
[⌃⇧⌘4] Copy screen selection to clipboard. In this mode:
- Press [space] to capture a single window.
- Hold [⌥] to toggle whether to include window shadow.
[⇧⌘5] Show extra options, including screen record (10.14+)
——— MISSION CONTROL ———
[⌘MissionControl] Show desktop
[⌘Tab] Switch between apps. In this mode:
- Press Tab to go highlight the next app.
- Press [⇧Tab] or [`] to highlight the previous app.
- Press [Q] to quit the highlighted app.
- Press [H] to un/hide the highlighted app.
[⌘`] Switch between windows of the current app
——— TEXT EDITING ———
[⌥Delete] Delete word
[⌥⇠]/[⌥⇢] Move cursor to next word
[⌥⇡]/[⌥⇣] Move cursor to next paragraph
[⌘⇠]/[⌘⇢] Move cursor to start/end of line
[⌘⇡]/[⌘⇣] Move cursor to start/end of text field
——— FINDER ———
[⌘Delete] Move to trash
[Enter] Rename selected file
[⌥⌘V] Move copied file here
- You can see this option if you open the Edit menu and hold down [⌥].
——— DRAGGING ———
- You can drag the "document proxy" icon in any titlebar. Make sure to hold the icon for a bit before dragging. (This delay is probably to prevent people who want to move the window from dragging the icon.)
- If you're dragging a file into a folder, press [Space] to immediately open the "spring-loaded" folder.
- In many apps, hold down [⌥] to duplicate instead of move.
- In Finder, dragging a file across filesystems will duplicate by default. Hold down [⌘] to move instead.
- You can [⌘Tab]/[⌘`] while you're dragging an item.
- To navigate a open/save dialog to a particular place, drag the folder or file into the edges of the dialog. Be careful not to drag it into the middle white area of the dialog, as in some cases it might move/copy the file.
- To open a Finder window at the same location as an open/save dialog, use [⌘R] (R for "reveal").
———
(Note: There are many more shortcuts in each category. These are just the ones that I find the most useful.)
Which is all very well, but Macs have never had an OpenApple or Reset key (the Command key used to have an Apple symbol on it, but now just has the cloverleaf symbol).
Suggests your experience with Apple computers dates back at least to the '80s! :-D
Then command-e, command-g (find next) will search for the selected text without sacrificing the copy/paste clipboard.
Also, the find clipboard is shared between apps, so you can command-e in Safari, then command-g in Xcode.