Article by George Norman

On 03 Feb 2009

In our previous Windows Renegades article we covered some of the most common problems a person switching from Windows to Mac might encounter and how to solve them. We briefly mentioned that keyboard shortcuts are called aliases, but we did not go into any in-depth details on what these shortcuts actually are, so a follow up article was in order.

The first thing to keep in mind is that unless you have the pink keyboard for blondes , the differences between the Windows and Mac keyboard are not significant: Ctrl is still in the same place, Windows is replaced by Option (says Ctrl on it and display a squiggly symbol), and Alt is replaced by Command (you can’t miss it since it always display the Apple logo on it). Command offers similar functionality to Ctrl in Windows.


Here are some of the most used and to my opinion some of the handiest keyboard shortcuts you can employ in Mac OS X. Some of them might look familiar:
- During startup press X to force MAC OS X startup, press Option-Command-Shift-Delete to locate a different startup volume, press C to start up from CD, press N for NetBoot, press Shift for Safe Boot mode.
- Ctrl + Eject to access the Restart/Sleep/shutdown dialog.
- Ctrl + Command + Eject to reboot with no confirmation dialog.
- Ctrl + Command + Shift + Eject to shut down the machine with no confirmation dialog.
- Shift + Command + Q to log out.
- Option + Command + Esc to perform a force quit.
- Command + W to close a window.
- Option + Command + W to close all windows.
- Command + M to minimize a window.
- Control + F4 to highlight a window.
- Command + X/C/V to cut/copy/paste.
- Command + A to select all.
- Command + Left arrow for list view.
- Command + Scroll wheel to zoom in and zoom out. Alternatively you will want to use Option + Command + “+” or “-” (that is the plus sign and the minus sign).
- Command + Option + D to hide the dock and bring it back from hiding.
- Command + ? to access the help menu.
- Shift + Ctrl + Eject to put the monitor to sleep.
- Ctrl + Option + Command + 8 to invert the colors on the screen.
- Command + Shift + Option + Backspace to empty the Trash (known as Recycle Bin in Windows)



Tags: Apple, Mac OS X, Keyboard Shortcuts

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