Most people don’t use the menu bar to its full advantage. Some apps use it for extra information, but there are some other really creative things you can do with the information there. Let's look at some cool ways to customize your Mac's Menu Bar. Add Seconds and a Date to the Time Changing the way the time is displayed in the Mac menu bar. MacOS is the operating system that powers every Mac. It lets you do things you simply can’t with other computers. That’s because it’s designed specifically for the hardware it runs on — and vice versa. The Option key on a Mac can do a lot of things for you if you just know how it works. It is not an ordinary key that lets you type characters or helps you use a shortcut. It has its own functionality that makes it stand out in the crowd. 11 Followers, 16 Following, 27 Posts - See Instagram photos and videos from Mac Thing (@macthing). A bit pricey: The Mac version runs $49.99, the app for iPhone and Apple Watch is $9.99, and the iPad app is $19.99. You can sync your tasks across apps via the Things Cloud, but you need to buy.
By: AiroAV - Security Labs
We love our Macs. We spend more time with them than we spend with our children, our wives or even our TVs. However, we all know that every close relationship needs the right maintenance and nurturing. We asked Mac users what annoys them the most when using their Mac.
1. When your Mac (suddenly) Slows Down
There are many causes for a sudden system slow down. The most common would be an unwanted (sometimes malicious) guest you probably didn’t know or didn’t remember inviting in. Or, you just overloaded your system with too many apps, tools, software, and files.
A recent poll we conducted, revealed that two-thirds of all Mac users spend most hours of the day behind their computer. Our precious Mac serves us for almost all our needs. Whether it’s for work, study, communication, media consumption, managing our finances, playing games or shopping for our favorite dress: the list goes on and on. We basically manage our entire lives through this machine by using apps, software, websites and many other tools designed to make our lives easier. We don’t disturb ourselves with protection and security until that point where something bad hits us. Whether a system slow-down or complete inability to suddenly use our Macs.
Most systems nowadays are designed to handle an overload of data and files. But no system is immune to malicious files or programs that are only designed to serves who created them. So, in the first case, it’s an easy fix (see below), and you can easily use Mac tolls or external software to help you optimizes system overload. The latter isn’t always easy and can derive by what sometimes, can come across to you as a simple widget, software or a tool. But is actually a conduit for malicious intent, such as Crypto mining malware, Adware and search hijackers, spyware, that operates only as a background process with no real value, but great access to your data and files.
2. When Apps Crash or Stop Responding
You are in the middle of your game, or just about to finish the edits of that photo you need to submit to your client. When suddenly something interferes with the process of your Mac or the app just quit responding.
It’s the most terrifying moment while working on an important document, or giving a presentation at work. That one little innocent mouse-click that for some reason leads to this endless spinning pinwheel. It usually only takes a few seconds or minutes to disappear and for your Mac to resume its function, but in some unfortunate cases it ends up with an application crash. Which may cause a loss of essential data, and even worse, major embarrassment in case this it happens in front of a bored crowd of people while you’re giving an important presentation.
Our Mac performance depends on the capacity of its processor and of its RAM, this is where (all) the data that we use at any given moment is stored. If there are only a few apps running and your Mac still slows down or gets stuck after almost every small task or action, it is possible that some unwanted and invisible processes are running in the background without your knowledge. Like crypto malware, for example, a script that uses your Mac resources to mine cryptocurrency without your awareness or consent.
3. Ads, Ads and Ads. And also pop-ups.
The veteran Mac users among us probably remember the times when Mac was a synonym for a safe and isolated browsing environment where viruses, malware, and adware were not allowed to enter. Nowadays, if you don’t use any Mac antivirus, you have a good chance to encounter some pretty invasive ads while browsing.
Ads, banners & pop-ups: all of these uninvited guests can be really annoying. My ‘favorite’ type is the kind of ad that pretends to be a system message, falsely claiming that your Mac has been scanned and carrying hundreds of viruses.
The most annoying ads even spice things up with an irritating alarm sound to increase panic symptoms. Any unintentional click (usually an effort to stop this disturbing sound) starts the unwanted downloading of an unnecessary app, or even worse, a malware.
Other pop-ups pretend to be well-known online shopping websites. But if you look carefully in the address bar you will notice a different domain, which means that you were redirected to a fake website. In case you tried to make a purchase through this fake website and handed over your payment data, your sensitive private information might be misused. Many websites and apps collect data about users’ browsing habits, which helps them display targeted commercial ads according to the users’ search and browsing history. These ads are rarely useful and mostly contribute to the overall sense that someone is tracking your activities (So you better think twice next time you search for an “anti-hair loss shampoo.”).
4. When your Browser and Search Engines get Hijacked
That moment when someone else decides that default search engine is not good enough for you.
Imagine waking up in the morning, making yourself a good cup of coffee and launching your Chrome or Safari, all ready for your morning read. You are Googling or Binging your favorite topics, but suddenly you notice that something’s different. Weird, your beloved search engine and default homepage were modified to some other search engine you never remember to ask for. Decent search replacements would have made sure to get your permission first, normally in exchange for free software, service or tool. Less decent ones will just hijack it overnight.
5. Unfamiliar Apps That Appear Out of Nowhere
We try to keep our environment clean and controlled by downloading software only from credible sources. However, it takes just one unreliable installation to get some weird unfamiliar apps springing up all around our Mac like mushrooms.
As Mac users, we always want to control what’s being installed on our device. Nothing drives us, Mac users, crazy like unfamiliar apps that are suddenly found on their computers. Games we never wanted, browser extensions we never asked for and all kinds of unreliable products with unclear functionality are absolutely not welcome. If you’ve found one of these annoying “gifts” on your Mac, chances are you probably have been a bit distracted in the past days or weeks. These apps usually come from auto-download ads (one click anywhere on the page will download the app, as if you were clicking on a download button), software bundles (that’s what happens when you click “next” on installers without really reading the terms you agree on), or apps you installed weeks ago, and maybe even removed, but keep coming back like mushrooms after rain.
6. Software for Mac Are Harder to Find
Just like Apple puts in a lot of effort to ensure that its users only use specific compatible accessories, they made it equally difficult to find apps that are Apple compatible.
It’s hard to admit, but the biggest price Mac users pay for their choice of a computer is the poor variety of software and apps for Mac OS. Many apps don’t offer any Mac version. And even if they do, these versions are sparse and lack many of the features that can be found on the Windows version. In addition, most Mac versions of popular freeware can’t be purchased or downloaded from the App Store. Forcing Mac users to “go out there” and search for it on download websites, increasing the risk of being exposed to malware.
So what’s the bottom line? Today’s Mac users have to take extra steps to secure their device and keep their environment clean and safe from any kind of unwanted process. Even though our Mac is the most important and precious device we have, we often tend to neglect its security, due to a lack of awareness or technical knowledge.
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While macOS may only have just under 10 percent of the world’s operating system market share, you have made a fantastic choice by purchasing a Mac. There are many cool things to do on a Mac that you can’t do on any other machine!
This operating system is designed to be easy to use, but it packs a lot of power under the surface. We’re here to help you make the most of your machine.
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In this list, you’ll find productivity tips, fun easter eggs, and a whole lot more! Are you ready to start making the most of your Mac? Then keep reading and discover awesome things to do on a Mac!
1. Add to Your Reading List in a Snap
Safari no longer supports RSS feeds. While other browsers like Chrome do offer this functionality, you may want to keep using Safari anyway. If you do, there’s a great substitute feature called Reading List.
What Reading List does is add a temporary bookmark to pages that you want to return to, but don’t want to save to your main bookmarks.
This feature isn’t exactly hidden, but it isn’t too well known, either. If you want to add to your reading list in seconds, we’ve got a quick way to do that.
On a web page, hold down shift+cmd+d. It’s that easy. The best part about this is that your reading list stays in sync across all your Apple devices!
2. Play a Game of Chess
Are you a chess fiend? Then we’re willing to bet that you’ll find this to be one of your favorite cool things to do on a Mac! All Mac computers come with Chess preinstalled.
If you want to access chess, you need to go to your applications folder. There, you’ll find the game ready to go!
You can play against the computer or another human player. In preferences, you can even change the look of the chess set! Glass, marble, and metal are all available options.
Within preferences, you can also change the game’s difficulty. On top difficulties, you may as well be playing Deep Blue
3. Take Your Pick of Office Software!
If you’ve only used Windows before, you may be used to Microsoft Office. While MS Office is available on Mac and has been for some time, it isn’t your only choice!
Your Mac will come preinstalled with iWork, Apple’s productivity suite! This is a fantastic set of software that’s capable of saving and opening MS Office formats.
If you want yet more choice, then take a look at LibreOffice! This free productivity suite can be installed easily and does everything you’d want! If you’re interested in learning more about productivity on Mac, Setapp wrote a book about Mac productivity!
4. Set Up Speech Recognition and Improve Productivity
Do you want to make your work even faster? Then you could do with setting up the Mac’s built-in speech recognition system! One of the coolest things to do on a Mac, you can command your computer to do various things using only your voice!
To set it up, you’ll need to go to App, then System Preferences, then Accessibility, and finally Speakable Items.
Here, if you click on the radio button, you’ll be able to program various phrases into your Mac that correspond to different commands. Simply set a keybinding that will allow the Mac to record your speech, and you’re on your way!
Quit out of this menu and you’ll be able to start using voice commands straight away!
5. Annotate PDFs without Additional Software
Editing PDFs can be a chore. On Windows, you need to download specialist software to edit these documents. This is not the case on Mac!
One of the really cool things to do on a Mac is load up Preview, the built-in PDF viewer and editor. In Preview, you can annotate and edit PDFs natively, without downloading any other software.
If you’d like to add your signature to the document, that’s easy to too! Hold up a piece of paper with your signature to the webcam, and it will be added to the document!
6. Use Your Photostream as Your Wallpaper
If you’d like a changeable wallpaper, then you need to set up your iCloud’s photostream as your wallpaper! While you can add individual photos to serve as the background, you can also use the entire Photostream.
To do this, you need to follow a few easy steps. Load up the Display and Screen Saver settings. Here, you need to select your iCloud Photostream as the library. Then, pick a folder for your Mac to source images from.
If you’d prefer to keep your wallpaper static, you can use the Photostream as your screensaver instead!
7. Swipe Between Your Open Apps on Macbooks
Looking for cool things to do with a Macbook Air or Macbook? Then you’ll love this tip, which is exclusive to Macs with a trackpad. You might think that multitouch is limited to your iPhone, but that couldn’t be further from the truth! And with more people using social media apps on their mobile devices than ever before, it’s important to not only download and use the right ones, but also make sure they are seamless and fast to navigate through as well.
Your trackpad is equipped with multitouch, too! You can use this to swipe between open apps.
Put three fingers on the trackpad and swipe left or right to navigate between fullscreen apps. If you swipe up with three fingers, you’ll open up Mission Control, and if you swipe down, you’ll open up Expose. Using these tips can speed up your navigation!
8. Make Summaries of Long Documents
If you’re a writer, a student, or regularly need to write long documents, you’ll love this feature. You know how constricting word counts can be. I’m wrestling with that right now!
If you use a Mac, you can make summaries in a second, all without lifting a finger! To summarize a document, you need to enable this feature. Go to System Preferences, then Keyboard, then Shortcuts, then Services: here, enable Summarize!
To summarize text, highlight the text you want to summarize. Then right-click, hit Services, then Summarize! This feature will pull out the most salient points and make rewriting a breeze.
9. Rename Multiple Files at One Time
Sometimes having an organized filesystem can seem impossible. Renaming a huge batch of files one at a time is no way to get it sorted, either. Luckily, on Mac, you can rename batches of files in a snip!
Highlight all the files that you want to rename. Then just click on “rename x files,” where x is the number of files selected.
This will open up a window that lets you rename the whole batch of files in one go.
10. Text from Your Mac
Did you think that texting had to be limited to your phone? That’s not true! If you want to, you can set up your Mac to both send and receive texts. You don’t even need an iPhone to do this! As reported by many Apple Tech fan blogs, this is one of the top favorite features that people love, but many average users simply don’t know about.
To set this feature up, you need to set up your new Mac with the same email address that your iMessage account is linked to. Then head to Settings, then Messages on your iPhone. Here, turn on Text Message Forwarding.
Click on a phone number in your contacts, and you can send texts! This will also use iMessage, in the same way that texting from iPhone to iPhone does.
11. Find Apps with Ease
Do you know the name of an application that you want to use, but don’t have a shortcut to hand? Never fear, you can still find that app!
Load up Launchpad and start typing the name of the app that you want to use. The list of apps that have been pulled up will get smaller with each keystroke. You’ll soon be greeted with the app that you want to use.
If you need to find apps quickly and without any fuss, learning to learn Launchpad is essential!
12. Encrypt Folders
If you’ve been watching TV recently, you may have seen the privacy ads that Apple is running. Apple has got some excellent approaches to privacy, and one of the best examples of this can be found in one of the cool things to do on a Mac: encrypting files and folders.
If you want to protect your data from prying eyes, it couldn’t be easier.
In Disk Utility, go to File, New, and Blank Disk Image. Set its name, location, and size, and choose your encryption method. Hit Create.
Things For Ios
Congrats! You now have a secure location on your disk where you can save all your most important files!
Cool Things to Do on a Mac: Making Your Life Better
We hope that you like these cool things to do on a Mac. Every tip that we’ve talked about can make your life a little easier. Start using all of these and your productivity will increase!
Best Screen Recording Thing For Macbook Pro
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