Work smart, work faster
Six more productivity tips to boost your Mac’s efficiency
1 UNLOCK WITH WATCH
If you have an Apple Watch, go to System Prefs’ Security & Privacy pane. Under General, tick ‘Allow your Apple Watch to unlock your Mac’. Now you’ll no longer have to laboriously type in your password to wake up your computer every time you return to it.
2 INVEST IN A LAUNCHER
You can open all sorts of items using Spotlight, but if you regularly work with specific apps, docs, or files, consider adding BetterTouchTool ($6.50, folivora.ai). It can assign key combos to lots of actions, like opening an app or file, or resizing windows.
3 FILE COHERENTLY
If you make lots of files, make sure they’re easy to find. Get used to naming files sensibly, adding status/ project tags in Finder, and put files in project folders in your Documents folder. Even with Mojave’s Stacks feature to hand, try not to leave everything loose on the desktop.
4 FIRE UP iCLOUD
When using multiple devices, sign them in to your iCloud account. On your Macs, open System Prefs’ iCloud pane, click Options next to iCloud Drive and ensure Desktop & Documents Folders is ticked. Files in those locations are then available on all your Macs and iOS devices.
5 SCAN WITH iPHONE
You could import a doc using a scanner like it’s 2005, but why not use Mojave and iOS 12’s Continuity Camera for convenience? In Finder, Notes, Pages and some other apps, Ctrl–click an empty area and pick a device under ‘Import from iPhone or iPad’ to scan using its camera.
6 CUSTOMIZE ICONS
If you recognize things in Finder or the Dock more easily by their icon, spotting individual folders becomes much easier when they’re visually distinct. Use Image2icon (Free or $9.99, img2icnsapp.com) to add custom images to your folders’ icons to make them stand out.