All of your friends are playing a new game on their laptops. You go to download it on your Mac so you can play with them but it’s Windows only. You’re starting to feel some regret from buying your computer but you do use it more for work than gaming.Seven of the best Mac Hacks that you need to know if you are looking to take full advantage of your device.Look at this details of Mac Hacks.
It still upsets you when you can’t do everything that your Windows friends can do. Look at it this way, there are some things a Mac can do that Windows can’t.
Who knows, once you get the hang of these Mac hacks your friends who use Windows might start to feel envious of you. Keep reading to learn more.
7 Mac Hacks You Need to Know
- Bring Up the Emoji Keyboard
You know that it’s not that professional thing to do, but you tend to use emojis in your emails. You’re scared if you don’t, you may come across a little too aggressive. The good news is that here’s a fast way to bring up the emoji keyboard when you’re sending emails on Mac.
Place your cursor over the area where you want to place the emoji. Press Command + Control + Space. The emoji keyboard should pop up.
Scroll through the available options, click the one you want to use, and it should appear. Keep in mind that this trick doesn’t work in all text fields but you should be fine to use it in messages and emails. If it doesn’t work you’ll see a small blank box where the emoji should be.
- Using Spotlight as a Calculator
If you don’t have your calculator pinned to your dashboard you’ll have to get to it through your launchpad. While this doesn’t take long, you can get the answer to your calculations faster by using Spotlight.
Press Command + Space to bring up the Spotlight. Type in the equation that you’re trying to solve and the answer should appear. It’s that simple.
- Taking Screenshots with the Snipping Tool
Someone needs you to take a picture of something on your computer screen and send it to them in an email. There’s a simple way to do this by using the snipping tool.
If you want to take a picture of a certain area press Command + Shift + 4. This will bring up a crosshair that you can drag across the area you want to capture.
If you want to take a picture of your entire window press the same series of buttons and let them go. Push the space bar and then click on the window that you want to take a picture of.
If you want to show someone your cool new desktop background you can take a picture of it by pressing command + shift + 3.
- Signing PDFs in the Mail App
A client sends you a PDF for you to sign. As technology grows, this is a more common scenario than not. Lucky for you, the Mac makes signing electronic documents pretty easy.
Open up the Preview app on your computer. Click on the Show Markup Toolbar button and click sign. You’ve got a couple of ways to create and save your signature. First, there’s the trackpad option.
Click trackpad, select the text when you’re prompted to, use your finger to create your signature, and if you’re satisfied with your signature click done. If you aren’t satisfied with the signature, click clear and try again.
The easiest and cleanest way to add your signature is to use your camera. Grab a white piece of paper and a pen and sign it like normal. Click ‘camera’ and hold the paper up to the camera.
Make sure that when you do this, your signature lines up with the blue line. When your signature appears, click done to finalize it.
Lastly, you can add your signature to the PDF by choosing the signature you want to use and dragging it into the right spot. It might be a little large but you can adjust it using the corners of the box.
- Rename All Your Files at Once
You’ve taken a ton of screenshots and want to rename them all so you can organize them. This can be pretty time consuming if you don’t know how to rename them all at once.
Select all the files that you want to rename and right-click on them. Under the list of options you have, you’ll see ‘rename [insert number here] items’.
Click on that and you’ll get the option to rename and format your files. When you’re finished click rename.
- Watch Netflix Offline
Wouldn’t it be great to watch Netflix offline? You can if you have a Mac. First things first, you’re going to need an active Netflix subscription, a movie and or TV show that has a downloadable option, the Netflix app, and AirPlay.
Once you have Netflix downloaded to your device open AirPlay. You’ll see a list of devices.
Choose your Mac from this list. After that, all you’ve got to do is open Netflix and click on the video you want to play.
- Definitions
If you see a word that you want to know the meaning of you can type it into Spotlight to look it up but this process isn’t as fast as the one we’re about to show you.
Hover over the word that you want to look up and tap your trackpad with three fingers. If you click it the right way the definition of the word should pop up.
Mac Hacks That Will Change Your Life
Instead of being frustrated by the things that your Mac can’t do, explore the things that it can do. You may find that it can do some pretty cool stuff. Try out some of the Mac hacks on this list and start rethinking the way you use your computer.
The Netflix trick is perfect when you’re traveling somewhere without Wifi. It’s not the only thing you can do to set your Mac up for travel though. Check out my blog daily for more tips like the ones you read here.
