MacTricksAndTips.com

Hey

We are moving on today and I am going to introduce Exposé, the fantastic system tool which I use regularly to navigate between windows and apps on my Mac. This is by far the best tool that you can use to speed up and increase your productivity during the day. I personally use it instead of Command + Tab or minimising or maximising windows as it is far quicker and a lot simpler to use.

Set Up

Setting up Exposè is very simple. Head over to System Preferences > Exposé & Spaces. In the bottom half of the window you can set up which keys will activate Exposé and its various different functions. This will usually be automatically set up when you first start your Mac, however you can fine tune the settings. If I mention “F9″ for a function this will usually vary depending on what keyboard you have, you may have to read around the lines.

While I am here, its a good idea to set up some hot corners. These are a quick way to access various different settings. I’ve got reveal desktop on the right hand corner, i’ve used this function so much and got used to it, that I try and do it on other computers I come across, usually to no avail.

All Windows

Expose is brilliant for showing you all of your windows. Due to the way the Mac system works, you don’t have a task bar as found on Windows. As a result it can be hard to navigate between applications and there various windows. By pressing F9 (or your specific key), every single windows will be shown. This gives you the ability to see everything going on, on your Mac. With this function clicking on any windows will bring it to the front and make is active.

I find this function the best way to navigate windows on your Mac. As you get used to how it works, you can move between windows quicker than you realise. I highly suggest you use it.

Application Windows

Similar to showing all the windows you can show windows from a specific app. This is really useful if you have an app that likes to spawn a wide variety of windows. By pressing the required key (F10 in my case), it will do a similar effect as the one shown below, but it will only show windows in your currently selected app.

Desktop

The final option is to show you desktop. By pressing F11, every window will shoot off to the sides, allowing you to see your desktop. In this mode you can open new Finder windows or files. You can also drag files off your desktop onto a window. Simply select your desktop file and then press F9 or F10 to bring your required app forward. This is very useful if you want to manage files effectively.

Tricks

There are lots of little tips and trick for Exposé, most which you find by accident. One of the best tricks is the ability to surf through your windows. Once you have pressed F9 or F10, you can then use the Tab key to bring an application window forward. The windows is still in “Exposè” mode so you can quickly navigate through. You do have to click on the window to make it active.

One less cool trick, but quite useful, is the ability to view the titles of windows. Simply press the option key to view them. You can use this to find out the exact name of which window you are about to click on. You can achieve the same effect by hovering your mouse over the window.

If you want to change the colour of the highlight, go to the Appearance settings in System Preferences, under Highlight Color is a drop down menu which you can use to change the colour of the highlight.

Hopefully you have learnt a couple of different things. I recommend you use Exposé, it is brilliant and you will save a lot of time when you need to navigate between apps.