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Mac OS X: Sane way to switch between windows

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Re: Mac OS X: Sane way to switch between windows

#41

Post by DigitalJack »

etrautmann wrote: post #35
DigitalJack wrote: post #33

I don't know what this person is talking about... maybe it's another version of OSX. On mine, you get this effect by pushing up arrow... you don't have to stop cmd-tab or do anything else, just hit up arrow and it shows you that window. not what you want? keep going with cmd-tab. Once you've hit up arrow, it's like a mode switch, now you are in app window switching mode. Use use tilde (on english keyboards) instead o…

this is amazing, thank you. More hidden but incredibly useful features...

Yeah I agree, OSX, and iOS are suffering greatly from lack of discoverability of features.

Re: Mac OS X: Sane way to switch between windows

#44

Post by jason_pomerleau »

thought_alarm wrote: post #23

> You might come across a situation, where you want to switch to an application or open a new instance of it. You press (Command ⌘ + Tab) combination. and you don’t get your window, just the title in the menu bar! If you're having that problem then you're not using the Minimize command correctly. Never use Minimize when you intend to switch between apps. You only use Minimize when you explicitly do not want to see a…

Thank you for this. Until now I had no idea how to explain the inconsistent behavior I saw with ⌘ + Tab, and it drove me crazy. It's one of a handful of things that triggered occasional (though short-lived) thoughts of going back to Windows.

I put a lot of effort into minimizing mouse usage via keyboard shortcuts. I've been using ⌘ + m consistently, not realizing I've been punching myself in the face the whole time, and thus gave up on ⌘ + Tab ages ago.

Looking forward to a bit more productivity.

Re: Mac OS X: Sane way to switch between windows

#45

Post by developer2 »

guelo wrote: post #17

As a long time user of both I don't think there's any doubt that OSX's window manager is inferior to Microsoft Windows'. Windows can handle things like multiple monitors and full screen modes much more seamlessly with less confusion. If it wasn't for the Unix layer, and the occasional need to open XCode, I personally would have ditched Macs.

You clearly have not used OS X since at least a couple of versions ago. They finally fixed the multi-monitor and full-screen problems. Mission Control properly handles everything now, and is vastly superior to Windows in how it functions these days.

Re: Mac OS X: Sane way to switch between windows

#46

Post by developer2 »

thought_alarm wrote: post #23

> You might come across a situation, where you want to switch to an application or open a new instance of it. You press (Command ⌘ + Tab) combination. and you don’t get your window, just the title in the menu bar! If you're having that problem then you're not using the Minimize command correctly. Never use Minimize when you intend to switch between apps. You only use Minimize when you explicitly do not want to see a…

I don't understand why everyone is talking about Cmd+Tab. If you're on OS X, you use Mission Control with a trackpad or a mouse. People coming from Windows who refuse to adapt to using Mission Control, and instead rely on Cmd+Tab like a Windows user that has no other option is sorely missing out.

The old Exposé was a hindrance due to lack of proper multi-monitor support. Honestly it was a disaster and mostly unusable. As of a couple versions ago, multi-monitor has worked flawlessly. Mission Control has become indispensable to my daily workflow. Aside from a proper terminal with tools like ssh (seriously, fuck cygwin or Putty as replacements), Mission Control is the reason why OS X is amazing to me, and I can't stand to use Windows which lacks any kind of proper window management. Alt+Tab and Win+Tab on Windows are a joke, and all of the third-party software packages that try to hack on multi-desktop, multi-monitor functionality are a mere shadow of a native implementation. Last time I was forced onto a Windows machine at work, Dexpot was the only software that was even remotely bearable to use, and even then required binding mouse gestures via an additional third-party tool.

If you are reading this and using Cmd+Tab on OS X, do yourself a favor and spend some time retraining yourself to use Mission Control. It will save you so much time hammering the Tab key.

Re: Mac OS X: Sane way to switch between windows

#47

Post by simo7 »

developer2 wrote: post #46
thought_alarm wrote: post #23

> You might come across a situation, where you want to switch to an application or open a new instance of it. You press (Command ⌘ + Tab) combination. and you don’t get your window, just the title in the menu bar! If you're having that problem then you're not using the Minimize command correctly. Never use Minimize when you intend to switch between apps. You only use Minimize when you explicitly do not want to see a…

I don't understand why everyone is talking about Cmd+Tab. If you're on OS X, you use Mission Control with a trackpad or a mouse. People coming from Windows who refuse to adapt to using Mission Control, and instead rely on Cmd+Tab like a Windows user that has no other option is sorely missing out. The old Exposé was a hindrance due to lack of proper multi-monitor support. Honestly it was a disaster and mostly unusable…

Man it's not about coming from Windows, quite the opposite...using the mouse (trackpad) is too slow, many try to avoid it if possible, it's a liberating feeling really.

Personally I have 7 global shortcuts for the 7 major apps I use on Cmd+Shift+Number. And for frequent switching between only 2 apps Cmd+Tab. I'd be 10 times slower with the mission control, no doubt.

Re: Mac OS X: Sane way to switch between windows

#49

Post by wodenokoto »

rsync wrote: post #40
wodenokoto wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My big grief with that is that it implements a different ordering logic than cmd+tab does. cmd+tab orders by last active application, while cmd+` orders by last window created.

... and not even that ... it changes direction every time you use it and it even very slightly reorders things in a way I still can't predict. (see my other comment above)

You are right. It reassess the order of windows when you change application. And here I just thought I was bad at keeping track of my windows.

Another thing I noticed just now is you can browse to no-window-selected using cmd+`

As far as I can tell, the logic is the following, with numbers representing order of creation, with 0 being no window:

    [3,2,1,0]
If you switch app with window 3 selected, the order is maintained. If you switch with window 2 selected, the new order will be

    [2,3,1,0]
if you switch with window 1 selected, the new order will be

    [1,2,3,0]
If you switch with window 0 (no window) selected the new order will be

    [0,1,2,3]

Re: Mac OS X: Sane way to switch between windows

#50

Post by thomas-st »

josefdlange wrote: post #25
thomas-st wrote: post #18

Some other keys that work while using Cmd+Tab: - Press "q" to quit the selected application - Press "h" to toggle hiding the selected application - Press "1" to show all open windows for the selected application Does anyone know if there is a built-in way to only switch to the frontmost application window (by default Cmd+Tab puts all app windows in the foreground)? Sometimes I need to switch between two windows of di…

Command + ` (back-tick, right above your Tab key)

I need to switch between two windows of different applications. Cmd+` only switches within the same application.
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