Comment by djfdat | Hacker News Reader

Comment by djfdat | Hacker News Reader

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- Peek at desktop

- Quick hide-all-windows to copy something from your desktop to your clipboard, then bring everything back

- Alt-tab, especially when it comes to apps with multiple windows, and windows in different states, such as minimized

- A modern/fully-featured default web browser without a locked down extension ecosystem. - A start menu for seeing all your applications

- A taskbar with application grouping

- File Explorer is much more full-featured than Finder

- Better settings, especially when it comes to relevant settings being in one place

- The concept of uninstalling an application vs just deleting the application

- In some cases, an actual function key row

That said, I've used Windows for almost 15 years now, and I think many of its choices are second nature to me. Many of my friends are masters of switching windows with Expose, which I absolutely despise. And I still use Windows for work, but use Mac in personal usage. I usually end up frustrated at things that work on Windows but don't on MacOS, but rarely vice versa.

Desktop peek: Part of “Mission Control”: spread thumb and 3 fingers, or press Fn+F11.

Alt tab: press cmd-tab to cycle applications, then cmd-` to cycle windows of that application. This typically has better number-of-keypress to get the window you want compared to Windows alt-tab which requires iterating over all windows in the worst case.

Browser: Safari is fits your criteria

Start menu to see all apps: this is called “Launchpad”, and is in the Dock by default for new macOS users, but can be removed.

Uninstall vs delete: apps installed from the Mac App Store can be uninstalled from launchpad. Otherwise, isn’t “apps are files, drag to install, cmd-delete or drag to trash to uninstall” objectively simpler than using a wizard to install, and digging around in a control panel to uninstall?

Function key row: you can swap the behavior of the fn row so that the keys send Fn1-Fn12 by default, and needs the fn key held down to send commands like “volume up”.

Settings layout: this one is opinion; I’ve always found Windows settings horribly organized. From 2001-2007, there’s no contest that System Preferences is better organized than Windows XP’s control panel. From 2007-2015, the Vista-era control panel split things awkwardly between the “new style” Vista panels and old-style windows XP/2000/98 panels. Since Windows 10 things are on more even footing in my view, although some details in macOS Network and Displays are annoyingly hidden in some versions.

Also for desktop peek you can customize “hot corners” to show the desktop when you put your cursor in one of the corners.

I... should have thought about this. Will give it a try!

> Alt tab: press cmd-tab to cycle applications, then cmd-` to cycle windows of that application. This typically has better number-of-keypress to get the window you want compared to Windows alt-tab which requires iterating over all windows in the worst case.

Except that you can select a window with cmd-tab and then have absolutely nothing happen as a result. It will show windows that it does not let you muster on screen, except with a secret key combination it does not tell you about. The existence of this secret method of actually getting the application to do what you expect it to in no way excuses the default behavior of not doing what it should do.

I'm not sure quite what situation you're describing with the secret key thing, but in case it's relevant: Cmd-tab selects applications, not windows. If the application has no windows open, then when you cmd-tab to it, you won't switch to a window (but you will see the menu bar switch). The situation cannot occur in Windows because it insists that an application must have at least one window open to interact with it at all.

You can see a description of the problem, and its obscure (in the sense of being hidden) solution, in this stackoverflow thread.

https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/112350/cmdtab-does...

All applications are open in this case. MacOS just doesn't display anything in certain quite common cases, such as one of its windows being hidden or minimized. There is a mechanism to display these windows (the obscure, well-kept secret does work) but Apple chose not to apply it.

Aaaah, minimized windows, a feature I only use by accident. I always “disable” the cmd-M shortcut.

(“Disable” meaning set it to cmd-opt-shift-ctl-M for all apps.)

But still, switching to the app does show all the non-minimized windows. And minimizing a window is explicitly asking for it to be hidden. So it would be wrong to show it every time you switch back to the application.

>Alt tab: press cmd-tab to cycle applications, then cmd-` to cycle windows of that application. This typically has better number-of-keypress to get the window you want compared to Windows alt-tab which requires iterating over all windows in the worst case.

In the case where you need to switch to a window that you haven't been using for a while, perhaps. But switching back and forth on the other hand, is infuriating because the z-order is polluted. And I also find it incredibly frustrating that all the other windows are brought to the top just because they happen to share a process.

Launchpad can also be started by taking four fingers spread out and bringing them together into one spot. I think that is enabled by default. (Control panel, at least in older versions, also had a little animation for all the gestures, and you can assign different functions to them)

You can also swipe up with three fingers to get a view of all the windows on your current desktop (and also select other Spaces). Normally I just use Cmd-Tab, but if your window is very visible this can be faster. I keep my source control app's window hidden behind Xcode, and then 3-swipe-up to click on it when I need to commit something.

Desktop Peek: I'll try setting this up on a hot corner and see how it works for me. I don't think I'll use it with a keyboard shortcut, so maybe I can remember to use it this way.

Alt+Tab: Using Ctrl+` tab switch between windows of an application is annoying second layer to me. I'm going to have to live with it, because the half-dozen or so third-party applications that I've tried to recreate Windows behavior either fail, work differently than I want, or have been abandoned.

Browser: I was specifically saying not this. I really really try to like Safari, but every time I start trying to use it as my primary browser, I start running in to annoying roadblocks that insist I work in the "Apple way".

Launch Pad: I forgot about this, I removed it from the dock. Doesn't open as easily as the start menu, with it's own dedicated button, and organizing it is terrible. Just like Launchpad on iOS. Start Menu Tiles and the ability to mix files/apps is way more powerful and behaves the way I expect. I do really like Raycast/Alfred, but I miss the comfort of an organized start menu.

Uninstall - I do think that this is fine, but an uninstall wizard is sometimes helpful. For Backup settings mostly, but I guess there really should just be a better way to do that.

Function Key Row - I do have this swapped to function keys by default, but what I was referring to was the touchbar macbook models. Terrible design choice that was thrust upon users.

Settings: Fair points on the different styles, but that doesn't bother me much. Like I said, I've been Windows for a really long time, so the familiarity outweighs the inconsistency. System Preferences was okay, but had options scattered where they shouldn't be. And System Settings now is definitely worse.

> Alt tab: press cmd-tab to cycle applications, then cmd-` to cycle windows of that application. This typically has better number-of-keypress to get the window you want compared to Windows alt-tab which requires iterating over all windows in the worst case.

Sure, it may save you some keypresses but it introduce the cognitive overhead of - do I need to switch to the window of current app or other app and then decide which key combination to press.

> The concept of uninstalling an application vs just deleting the application

Uninstalling is a workaround for the failure of windows to actually contain an apps data. The way macos handles it is much better.

But isn't there app data still left around on the disk somewhere in Library? Aren't apps able to generate and save off app data outside of the .app?

They can, though I guess it depends on what the user is actually trying to do when they remove a program. I'd say the user wants to free up disk space and to not have the app start up on boot or run in the background consuming resources. Deleting the .app does this while on Windows, the uninstaller is the only way I know how this would be done.

The fact that the app might leave some documents and configs behind seems inconsequential. If you delete Word, you wouldn't want it to wipe out your documents with it for example. The fact that some configs remain in system dirs doesn't really matter when they take up no space.

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