Top 20 MacBook Tips for Productivity!
About this video
Jeff Su walks through 8 MacBook settings changes and 12 tips. Opening trick: with a file selected, press Command-I, choose a default app under ‘Open with,’ and press ‘Change All’ so files open correctly. Finder settings: show the path bar and status bar; uncheck ‘open folders in tabs instead of new windows’; open new windows to Documents instead of Recents; trim unused tags and sidebar items; and under Advanced, set search to ’the current folder’ instead of the whole Mac for more relevant results. He also shows a dragging trick — moving the cursor to the info columns lets you drop a file into the top-level folder — and enables ‘show percentage’ for the battery in Dock & Menu Bar settings. Dock tips: hold Shift and drag the divider to reposition the dock, right-click the divider for Dock settings, and disable ‘show recent applications.’ Option-key tricks dominate the middle: Option-Command-drag the Downloads folder to create an alias you can pin to the Dock; hold Option when right-clicking a file to get ‘Always Open With’; Option-drag to copy a file; Option-click a folder to expand all child folders at once; hold Option in menus and under Go to reveal the hidden Library folder (where the Fonts folder lives), then add Library to the sidebar; Option-click the red X to close all windows of an app. Media tips: connect an iPhone by cable and use QuickTime Player’s New Movie Recording to record or present the iPhone screen on the Mac; Command-Shift-5 opens the screen recorder with options for save location, timer, microphone, and showing mouse clicks; in Preview use Markup/Edit Size to shrink an image below a size limit (his example gets a file to 486 kilobytes), combine multiple images into a PDF via right-click Quick Actions, and export a PDF’s pages as PNG images. Troubleshooting: force-quit an unresponsive app via Activity Monitor, Command-Option-Escape, or Option-right-clicking its Dock icon. Finally, verify a used Mac’s warranty by copying the serial number from About This Mac to checkcoverage.apple.com, use Function-Delete for forward delete, long-press keys for accented characters, and Command-Control-Space for the emoji picker.
Key takeaways
- Set default apps permanently with Command-I > Open with > Change All, and configure Finder to show the path/status bars and search only the current folder
- The Option key unlocks hidden power: ‘Always Open With,’ Option-drag to copy files, Option-click to expand all subfolders, and access to the hidden Library folder
- Create a Downloads alias (Option-Command-drag) to pin a normal folder view in the Dock instead of the default stack view
- Use built-in tools for media work: QuickTime to record an iPhone screen, Command-Shift-5 for screen recording, and Preview to resize images or convert between PDF and PNG
- Force-quit stuck apps three ways (Activity Monitor, Command-Option-Escape, or Option-right-click in the Dock) and check a used Mac’s coverage at checkcoverage.apple.com
Episode details: published February 22, 2022 · 8:57 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. Business results and any income figures mentioned are Jeff Su’s own claims, shared for education — they are not typical or guaranteed.
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