Selfish Heathen
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
|
The recent thread by johnny5 got me thinking about the default settings in Mac OS X and Apple's apps and just how much I really dislike them. I usually spend a good ten or fifteen minutes going through everything and changing them. Thank goodness for preferences!
So, I was wondering what were the things that you all change immediately upon setting up a new Mac or a new account on an existing Mac. Off the top of my head, here are the first things that I change to make my Mac work efficiently:
Is it just me? Or does Apple really just have a bad set of default preferences? The quality of this board depends on the quality of the posts. The only way to guarantee thoughtful, informative discussion is to write thoughtful, informative posts. AppleNova is not a real-time chat forum. You have time to compose messages and edit them before and after posting. |
quote |
Senior Member
Join Date: Aug 2004
|
I agree with a majority of those, but not all. For example, why do you want to always show the tab bar in Safari? If you only have one page open, it's just a waste of space to me.
|
quote |
Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
Location: San Francisco, CA
|
Whoa, I never knew about the transparent-icon-when-hidden thing before. It's pretty interesting, if not all that useful.
I would think that most people on this forum would be outliers, though. I do most of the stuff that you do, if not all. I could never stand the flashing time separators, though. I'd likely put in the seconds, but I'm on a 12" screen. |
quote |
Selfish Heathen
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
|
Quote:
If it didn't do that, I agree, I'd have this turned off. Quote:
The quality of this board depends on the quality of the posts. The only way to guarantee thoughtful, informative discussion is to write thoughtful, informative posts. AppleNova is not a real-time chat forum. You have time to compose messages and edit them before and after posting. |
||
quote |
Rocket Surgeon
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: The Canadark
|
I can never fathom why you even have to go into Preferences to turn on Tabbed Browsing in Safari. One of the best features, and it's off by default? I just don't get it.
|
quote |
Fro Productions(tm)
Join Date: May 2004
Location: London Town
|
Quote:
You can't make hidden apps in the Dock transparent (out of the box), can you? Is that TransparentDock or something? |
|
quote |
‽
|
Quote:
Quote:
As for hidden apps: not a solution for me, since the same level of transparency is used for dragging. I wish the Dock had a smarter indicator for this. Quote:
Quote:
Dashboard gets filled with Calculator, Calendar, Converter, two Weather widgets (Montral and Bremen), a SlothCam webcam image of a friend and finally Package Tracker. Quote:
For icon view in windows, which I hardly use, I set 48x48 like on the Desktop and "keep arranged by name" just like you. Both Desktop and windows' icon view have item info and icon preview on. For column view -- my typical mode -- I occasionally turn the preview off, as it tends to fuck up with certain porn err media files (damn you, archaic QuickTime implementation and lack of codecs). At that point, I cringe over the stupid brushed metal and try and think of a proper solution. Failing that, I either install Unifier (shudder, APE) or UNO (shudder, a theme). Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
As in, the thing is too damn slow and buggy for me to be of any use. Shockingly enough, I have resorted (for this year) to just screw it and use GMail instead. Ugh. Yuck. Darn. I want to switch back to a desktop application, but there just isn't anything decent. The solution? Avoid e-mail altogether as much as possible. It sucks so badly anyway. Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
|
|||||||||||||||||
quote |
Member
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Verde Amarela
|
First thing I always change: increase the trackpad and/or mouse tracking to its highest setting.
I even do this when I visit an Apple store. |
quote |
reticulating your mom
|
I do zillions of things, first and foremost installing iScroll 2.
|
quote |
Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
Location: San Francisco, CA
|
Quote:
Code:
defaults write com.apple.dock showhidden -bool true
killall Dock |
|
quote |
The Hoarding Packrat
Join Date: Oct 2005
|
I dont even remember how I got the tabs in Safari. Did I do it through Safari or Prefs? I like the transparent Dock thing. BUT! what about making apps completely disappear from the Dock when hidden???
|
quote |
‽
|
Quote:
|
|
quote |
Selfish Heathen
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
|
Quote:
|
|
quote |
‽
|
Quote:
|
|
quote |
The Hoarding Packrat
Join Date: Oct 2005
|
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
While they're still open. EDIT: Really, where did Brad get File from??? |
quote |
Member
Join Date: Oct 2005
|
hey- regarding the safari tab bar:
if your keep your safari window at little bit shorter than full screen height, than the addition of the tab bar will enlarge the window to exactly compensate for the height of the new tab bar- so that there is no resizing of your content. it only shifts the window downwards. |
quote |
Senior Member
Join Date: May 2004
|
I dig the transparent hidden apps. I think. I always have iTunes and Mail open but hidden, so I'll have to see how I like having them usually transparent.
|
quote |
Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Promise Land of Trustafarians
|
Well, its been a while, so I don't remember all of them.
- Dock ---- Add OmniOutliner, GraphicConverter, Transmit, SubEthaEdit, Audium, Art Directors Toolkit, TextEdit and Photoshop Elements ---- Hide the dock ---- Turn off icon bouncing and magnification - Safari ---- Turn on tabbed browsing ---- Install PithHelmet and my rules list ---- Install custom hosts file (not really Safari) ---- I used to install that one shareware that let you use the Google search box with different sites, but it would bring Safari to an absolute crawl, so I'm going to wait a version or two before I try again. Can someone tell me the name of that program? - iTunes ---- Enable Airport Express speakers ---- Log into iTMS account - Menu Bar ---- Put Batter Indicator, Airport, and Audium ---- Set Clock to Day Hr:Mn *M - Dashboard/Expose ---- Turn off Dashboard ---- Set Expose to mouse buttons - Finder ---- Create folder in the Desktop called Desktop, so I don't have to look at anything. It's all tucked away in a folder with unlimited space. Sure, its unorganized, but with Spotlight it doesn't matter That's all I can remember right now. (edit: vBulletin stripped out the spaces I used to make the list organized) |
quote |
Not a tame lion...
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Narnia
|
I was thinking about something similar to this the other day.
It seems to me that over time, my computer has become more and more customized, so much so that I have no idea how long it would take to switch to a new box and have everything just the way I like it. Symlinks, scripts, preferred Applications, the way the desktop icons are laid out etc. It seems great to me, that our (*nix users) computers get better with age but Windows computers seem to get worse, and require more and more maintenance over time. I think this is a given for most people, but I was reflecting on the notion that my computer didn't just avoid the problems Windows has, it has slowly transformed into a personal tool and in fact become better with age. |
quote |
Member
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: 成都
|
Something pretty stupid that i've noticed: Cmd-space is the default shortcut for spotlight, yes? Well, i'm pretty sure the default for switching input methods is also Cmd-space (I don't think I changed it from the default anyway). I remember a while ago, when I went to change languages it'd bring up spotlight as well. Of course, the little warning in keyboard shortcuts in system prefs was there for a conflict. But no matter how many times i'd disable the spotlight binding, it'd just come back every time I logged out. Arrghgh!
Eventually it went away, and spotlight got the message in the end. God knows how I did it. ...and all the wolves were found upside-down in a box! |
quote |
Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
|
Quote:
With a couple of exceptions, my settings are scarily similar to Brad's. Most important differences are "Tracking Speed" (set to half-way: I rarely use an external mouse and value pointer precision; all other rates are at maximum) and "Snap to grid" on the Desktop (the space wasted between columns of icons is huge, so I like being able to drop icons into the space between columns on my little 12-inch screen). Single best change? Setting "Active Screen Corners" for Expos. This revolutionises window-management in a way that clumsily clawing for Function keys never could. I have an iBook (like you chucker) and the trackpad works perfectly for throwing the cursor rapidly into a corner (and like I mentioned, my "Tracking Speed" is only half-way). I didn't really "get" what was so great about Expos until I did this. |
|
quote |
Yarp
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Road Warrior
|
I set overall look and feel to 'graphite' then a week later realize that it's dreary and turn 'aqua' back on.
|
quote |
‽
|
Quote:
|
|
quote |
Sucker for shiny objects
|
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
|
||||||
quote |
Senior Member
Join Date: May 2004
|
|
quote |
Yarp
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Road Warrior
|
Quote:
|
|
quote |
Mac Mini Maniac
Join Date: Sep 2005
|
Quote:
I cannot handle active screen corners. When going to a corner it's because I want the apple menu, Finder, the Trash or spotlight. Keep arranged by name moves my icons around so I can't find them anymore... Spellchecking may be a good thing, but it won't catch you writing which instead of witch... Also, it focuses my mind on the spelling error instead of the process of writing out my thoughts, thereby derailing my train of thoughts. So I disable it. If I enable the seconds on the clock I end up just sitting and staring at them... bad... |
|
quote |
Now in lower-case™!
Join Date: Feb 2006
|
I am having a really hard time figuring out how to do this but this question might be dumb...do I have to turn on system wide spell check?
|
quote |
Selfish Heathen
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
|
You turn it on in a per-app or per-field basis.
Use one of two methods: 1. Edit -> Spelling -> Check Spelling As You Type. 2. Right/control-click in a text field, choose Spelling -> Check Spelling As You Type. Note that, sadly, still not all apps support it. For example, the Mozilla-based apps (Firefox, Camino, Thunderbird, etc.) and Microsoft apps (Word, Entourage, etc.) do not support the system-wide spell checker. Nearly all Cocoa apps support it, though. Do you have to? No, but it's a pretty good idea. The quality of this board depends on the quality of the posts. The only way to guarantee thoughtful, informative discussion is to write thoughtful, informative posts. AppleNova is not a real-time chat forum. You have time to compose messages and edit them before and after posting. |
quote |
Right Honourable Member
|
Quote:
|
|
quote |
Posting Rules | Navigation |
|
Thread Tools | |
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
Mac mini accessory mania | Robo | Third-Party Products | 9 | 2005-11-16 19:37 |
Does the Intel Processor make the mac better? | HTee | Speculation and Rumors | 62 | 2005-11-15 20:51 |
Stupid Mac graphics card options | Luca | Third-Party Products | 33 | 2005-07-01 01:34 |
Games specifically for Mac | Banana | General Discussion | 24 | 2005-03-28 14:03 |
Apple releases updated Power Mac G5s | staph | Apple Products | 43 | 2004-06-09 13:20 |