12 hidden features of macOS
Explore some of the less well-known and quirky features on your Mac.
One of the many delights of being a Mac owner is that there is always another layer of intrigue hidden behind all the headline features, no matter how thoroughly you explore your system.
In this article, we will be looking at some of the secret treasures of the Mac, from hidden games (including your own digital psychiatrist) to more useful features, such as the ability to navigate your system more quickly and sign documents.
We will also explore how to activate and download offline text dictation and dictionaries in various languages, as well as Sierra’s famed Picture in Picture mode, which is the bane of employers everywhere, as it allows you to watch streaming videos in a discrete corner of your desktop while you work.
None of these features are particularly harmful, nor do they require huge amounts of space. We nevertheless always encourage you to do a full backup of your system before making any major changes.
Many of these features also assume that you’re running macOS Sierra or newer on your Mac. If you’re uncertain, go to Apple > App Store, and click on Updates to confirm that everything’s in order.
If you plan to use the Universal Clipboard feature, you will also need an iOS device, such as an iPhone, running iOS 10 or later.
1 MAC PSYCHIATRIST
Your Mac contains a number of hidden gems, including several retro games. One of these is a version of Eliza — a program created in the 1960s at MIT with which you can have a simulated therapy session.
To get started, click Spotlight on your Mac, enter Terminal, and press Return. When Terminal opens, enter ls /usr/share/emacs/22.1/lisp/ play to show a list of installed games.
To launch a particular game, for example, your Mac psychiatrist, enter: emacs -q --no-splash -f doctor
If you have no use for therapy, replace ‘doctor’ with ‘tetris’ or any of the other listed games.
2 USE TAGS AND STACKS
You can organise your Mac files using colour coding with tags. To categorise files, for example, ‘Urgent’, Control-click and choose a coloured tag, available in the Finder sidebar.
“Your Mac contains a number of hidden gems, including several retro games.”
Click on a particular colour to display all files with that tag.
Stacks are found on the right-hand side of your dock, and are a convenient way of viewing multiple files. By default, your Mac has a stack for files you’ve downloaded, for instance. You can also create a stack for a particular tag; simply drag it from the sidebar in Finder to the right-hand side of your dock. Click this to view files with that tag.
3 USING TEXT SHORTCUTS
Your Mac can save you time when it comes to words you use repeatedly. This is governed in the Text section of your Keyboard setting in System Preferences.
You can use this to transform an abbreviation into a longer phrase — ‘appt’ could become ‘Appointment at:’. The text box supports paragraphs, so you can also use this to store longer email signatures.
To use these shortcuts, enter the shortcut in a word processing application, such as Pages, and wait a moment and the replacement text will appear in a blue suggestion box, floating next to it.
4 SWITCH TO DARK MODE
The macOS Sierra includes a new feature called Night Shift, which gradually shifts your display colours away from the blue end of the spectrum after sunset.
Alternatively, in order to reduce your risk of eye strain, you can choose to use dark mode.
Click Apple > System Preferences > General. Tick the option marked ‘Use dark menu bar and dock’. If you wish, you can also click the Appearance menu to change buttons, windows and menus from blue to graphite.
5 DOWNLOAD DICTIONARIES
If you use a word processing application on your Mac, it most likely has a built-in spell checker, but if you’re a true logophile then you may prefer to use macOS’s Dictionary app.
This is particularly handy if you want to look up the meanings of words in another language. Dictionaries are downloaded directly to the Mac, so you can use them offline, unlike online translation services. The app also looks up terms in Wikipedia if you are online.
To get started, click on Spotlight and type dictionary. Press Return to launch the app itself. If this is your first time using the app, it may ask you to download some dictionaries before use — in English-speaking countries these will be the Oxford American Dictionary and the British Oxford Dictionary of English. Click Download to continue. Bilingual dictionaries will list both languages, for example, German — English.
Next, click on Dictionary > Preferences. Here, you can drag your dictionaries into order of preference.
“Your Mac can save you time when it comes to words you use repeatedly.”
British users may prefer to place the British Oxford dictionary at the top.
Select the tick box next to the name of any supported dictionary, like the Oxford German Dictionary, to download it. Once the download is complete, you can click your chosen language at the top of the dictionary window to look up a term.
6 PICTURE IN PICTURE
Picture in Picture is useful for watching sporting events and other media as you use your Mac.
The feature (which requires macOS Sierra 10.12.6) lets you display streaming video from compatible websites in a small window, which will stay on top of other apps as you work.
Open Safari, and begin playing a video on a compatible site such as Vimeo or YouTube. Control-click on the video, and choose ‘Enter Picture in Picture’ to start play. To stop the video, close the Safari window or tab.
7 UNIVERSAL CLIPBOARD
If you have a compatible Mac and iPhone (see bit.ly/sys_req_continuity), you can use the Universal clipboard. This lets you copy text, images and videos on one device and paste them to another, so long as they are near each other. To use this feature, your iOS device and Mac must be signed in using the same Apple ID. You must also make sure both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi are enabled. Universal Clipboard requires iOS 10. Go to Settings > General > Software Update to check your iOS version.
8 SMART SEARCH IN PHOTOS
The Photos app in macOS Sierra now uses new technology to identify objects and scenes. For instance, you could type ‘ birthday cake’ or ‘car’ to find images that fit into that category. To get started, simply click the search bar in the top-right corner of the app, and enter your text. While this new feature is exciting, it isn’t foolproof, and it likely never will be. During our tests, for example, when searching for the term ‘car’, it displayed all related images, except for one of a car against a snowy backdrop.
9 REMOVE CLUTTER
Over time, your Mac may become overloaded with various files, which can impair system performance.
“The Photos app in macOS Sierra now uses new technology to identify objects and scenes.”
If you’re using macOS Sierra, you can quickly resolve this by clicking on Apple > About this Mac and choosing the Storage tab. This will display the amount of free space and what kind of data has been stored, such as images.
Click on the Manage button to try to save some precious space. These options are fairly self explanatory. Start by examining the left-hand pane to see how much space is taken up by certain apps, like iTunes. If you download a lot of media files, you may wish to turn on the Optimise Storage option, which automatically removes iTunes movies and shows you’ve already watched.
The ‘Store in iCloud’ option is designed to work in harmony with iCloud Drive. It uploads the contents of your Desktop and Documents folder to iCloud, keeping only recently opened files on the Mac itself. If you have multiple Macs, this is also an excellent way to keep all your files in sync across various computers.
Click the ‘Turn On’ button to remove items that have been there for more than 30 days.
You can also click on ‘Review Files’ to show documents and data in order of size. This may be helpful for removing old data. Make sure you run a backup before deleting anything.
10 ENHANCED DICTATION
The basic dictation feature in macOS transcribes your speech into compatible apps. Begin by going to System Preferences > Keyboard. Click on the Dictation tab, then on the radio button to switch Dictation on. If you’re using macOS Sierra, you can also use Siri and say “turn on dictation”. Your Mac must be connected to the internet to use dictation, as your words are sent to Apple to be converted to text. This has privacy implications, and can be very slow. Click the check box marked ‘Enhanced Dictation’ to enable offline dictation. This also allows for continuous speech as well as support for dictation commands. (For a full list, see bit.ly/dictation_commands).
11 SIGN DOCUMENTS IN PREVIEW
Preview allows you to add handwritten signatures to documents and images. Open a docment using Preview, then click on the Tool menu at the top of the screen. Choose Annotate > Signature > Manage Signatures. A new pop-up window will open.
When you’re ready, choose ‘Click here to begin’ and use the trackpad to trace your signature. You can also use the Camera tab to create a signature using iSight if you prefer. Click Done to save your signature. You will now be able to insert this into documents.
12 HOT CORNERS
Hot Corners enables you to activate functions by moving the cursor to a corner of your screen. This can increase your productivity, as you no longer have to remember shortcuts.
Go to Apple > System Preferences > Desktop and Screensavers, then click the Screen Saver tab. Find the Hot Corners button in the bottom right, then click on it.
An Active Screen Corners window will open. You can assign a function to any corner via the dropdown menu, then simply move your cursor to it to activate the feature.