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Comment by ricardobeat | Hacker News Reader

> I built boringBar so I would not have to use the Dock

Does anybody really use the dock as a an app switcher? MacOS is built around shortcuts, alt-tab, show spaces, etc. The dock is there for starting apps – which you can also do via spotlight, and as a “favorites” list after you remove all the built-ins.

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I personally use Raycast, which has a Switch Windows global hotkey (Opt + W) that brings up a list of all active windows and apps. From there, you can start typing part of the window title and hit Enter to bring the corresponding window to the foreground.

Slightly related but AltTab is also a nice window switcher with built-in thumbnail previews if you prefer being able to tab by "window" and not by "process" (aka more like Windows).

https://github.com/lwouis/alt-tab-macos

I see a lot of people treat the dock like the Windows taskbar. They have it filled with as many apps as they can fit in it and leave it on-screen. I used to use the dock like that when I first started using macOS. Now it lives off the left edge of the screen and spends most of the time hidden. I can open any app I need with Spotlight and Mission Control, CMD+Tab, and moving between virtual desktops lets me move around my currently open apps.

I’ve used it to get me to the desktop where the app is open but yeah, generally you’re right. I use spotlight more often for searching the Mac and opening apps or swiping desktops

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