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"An annoying feature of the Mac is that it thinks it knows better than you do..." for everything, and that is the biggest thing I hate about Macos.

For managing windows I really recommend rectangle as a free option to e.g. you can use keyboard shortcuts as well to arrange the windows.

In a multi-monitor environment, I find MacOS often opens app dialogs in random locations, often not on the same monitor as the parent app. If you have multiple spaces assigned for each monitor, then the dialog may end up in a space that is not even visible.

As a lifelong windows user, I have finally made the jump to a MacBook in the hope that it will integrate better with my iPhone and iPad. It does of course, but the problem is all the little things that the system does differently and knowing how to change or get around them. There doesn’t seem to be a tutorial that isn’t either too basic for me or too complicated, but your videos are invaluable as they do cover a lot of those things - Thanks!

The three finger drag option in accessibility to drag windows with the touchpad is in my opinion the best hidden macOS feature.

Long time Mac user here. I actually used most of those tips after watching this. I think what made your video great is that these aren’t necessarily hidden setting, just ones that we don’t automatically think to change. Thanks!

I wish the notifications had an "all off" button as opposed to having to click in and out of each thing. System sounds and notifications are always the first thing I turn off so i'm with you there. Also thanks for having such a naturally spoken cadence in this video, the unnerving constant jumps cuts that so many KZfaqrs use are so jarring, unnatural and distracting from the video, yours was perfect so I appreciate the extra effort to get each sentence out in one take instead of stitching so many varying cadences together and cutting every pause and breath. Subbed!

A Finder window problem that I have yet to find a solution is in column view, all the columns are the same width, regardless of their content. When there is a deep and complicated folder structure (like on a server at work), it is very inconvenient to navigate. I would like the option of the columns to automatically resize to fit the content, i.e. narrow when the folder names are short and wide when the file names are long - not all the same width.

I am two months into my transition from Windows 10 on a high end HP laptop to Mac OS Sonoma on a MacBook Air. I love just about everything about the Mac. Especially how all of my devices (iPhone 14 Pro, iPad Air 5th Gen, iPad 11th gen, Apple Watch Ultra, and MacBook Air) work so seamlessly together. My experience just improved tremendously with your suggestions on Finder. Wow! So much better! Your tips are fabulous. Thank you, and will buy you a coffee.

One of your best! I used many of these! I didn't realize how much notifications were annoying me until you mentioned it.

Amazing video, very helpful. The cadence of your voice and your voice in general is very pleasant

Thank You! This is an extremely useful video for me, very helpful 😊from Dallas, Texas

VERY Helpful, thanks

Love your channel. Fab info delivered in easy to understand ways. Thank you.

Amazing….always a pleasure to watch

Great content as always. Thanks

Always one or two bits I need. Thank you!

Thanks, information is very helpful and added a couple of changes on my new Mac. Just subscribed 👍

This is very useful, Thank you! 😁

Great video. Very helpful!

Very useful video, thank you! Subscribed 😉

Your content is so interesting and useful man!

Hola thanks for the content!

Really helpful. Thanks.

Very nicely done! And for the toolbar in the finder, you can also cmd-drag just about anything to the toolbar. For example, I put 5 or 6 key apps that I use up there and can simply click on them (I have so much in my dock!) - can even put a spreadsheet or really most anything!). Steve on 2 Dec 2023

The number one annoying thing for me is when on any forum and I want to add an image from my mac, clicking on the button opens up folder view where I can go to the folder the image is in, but the thumbnails are far too small, even at their largest setting, when I have many images that are similar (Astro photography) it is almost impossible to recognise which one I want to use. If I could enlarge the thumbnails, it would make my life so much easier. I can click once on an image which will magnify it, but this just doesn’t help, as I find myself having to click on loads before finding the right image. Windows PC’s let you set the size as large as you like, but I cannot do that in my Mac

Very helpful!

THanks, fixed the disappearing scroll bar.

For window management, my personal favorite has become Swish. It’s trackpad-gesture based and requires less precision (of either clicking a button in a specific spot or having to drag windows to specific areas). Highly recommend giving it a shot, can’t imagine my macOS experience without it 👌

Most excellent, thanks

Just got a MacBook Air after 10 years of using only windows and your video was a great start, great work.

Once again, you've given me tremendously helpful tips that I can easily implement after years of using my Mac. LOL. Thanks a million for this great video.

OMG as a windows user new to mac this is SO helpful, thanks!

Thank you!

Thanks. I just got my first Mac this week and it’s a bit more tricky to switch to it than I thought it would be

couple other things i had to fix to make my mac more usable, -get an alt tab app that makes alt tab more like windows so its actually useful. -sped up the doc animation which in turn also made it way more responsive. (before sometimes moving mouse down there dock takes like a second to come up or doesn't at all, now its fast and comes up every time) -got a scroll app that made scrolling on trackpad and the magic mouse not locked to the same direction. -get rectangle so i can window snap the windows to my desired location including full screen -swapped command key and world key functions. pressing command C to copy/paste is effing dumb. now i can copy paste without cramping my hands.

Excellent. Love this content and in my language 😂. Keep up the good work.

The one thing that I hate about MacOS is the click-to-focus policy of the window manager. Is there a window manager that offers focus-follows-mouse so I can click buttons in a partially obscured window without the window rising to become the frontmost window?

I've used windows and Linux for a long time and I'm learning Mac OS now. This has been a very helpful video, thank you!

Thanks!

Thank you, I’ll be working with your pdfs this afternoon to do just about everything you suggest here, including using mom, which I’ve already download but forgot about. Is there away to copy parts of your pdfs to load into my Notes app? I haven’t been able to copy anything on my own.

I would love to know how to get rid of the annoying text identifier icon in Photos when looking at single images in full screen mode? Thanks for the great videos - I always find them useful!

Thanks, bookmarked👍🏾

These are really helpful suggestions and I will implement a lot of them. One thing I find particularly annoying is the way windows will suddenly fly off the screen unexpectedly. I have no clue why this happens. Now to get on with cleaning up the finder and tool bar!

I’ve used MOOM for years! It’s excellent!

Extremely handy video, thank you so much. At the same time I wonder why Apple choose so often for a certain very non logic default setting.

Thank you for excellent revised settings. A recent weirdness in Ventura - multiple Documents folders in sidebar. Also whose idea was it to remove the search bar window so an extra click to open it every time. There’s more…

Oh, I have 95% percent the same settings :-) One thing I'm missing here and think it can be useful: Reduce / Configurate the number of file types that are shown in spotlight. I personally enabled only "Applications".

Thanks for another great video. Most annoying in Finder is not being able to set column widths. Always having to faff with dragging a column wide enough to see the whole file name. What am I missing?

Very Very useful guide; I’ve taken your advice re VIA VPN.

I tried Moom in the past, but I prefer (and recommend Swish).

Thanks for this and your previous video on tweaks to improve the OS experience in Mac. My biggest complaint about macOS is having to click a window to shift focus. I have searched and cannot find a way to allow the focus to shift with the mouse position. It looks like there used to be, but the feature was deprecated.

I expected you to address why Finder folders always seem to be a mess. They open in different views, they are sorted weirdly, etc. But still nice video and thanks for the touchId tip, that is quite usefull. Also REALLY expected you to have a Studio Display haha.

Great video! The most annoying thing is the missing counterpart to Windows with CTRL+X and CTRL+V and that the formatted text is always copied when copying. Ultra annoying when editing text and Excel.

How you record screen and facecam at a time and what is your editing software?

@ProperHonestTech is there any way to set a toggle to enable/disable keyboard lighting in macbook's ? each time we have to fiddle in notification area. Wish there was a easy way to turn on/off the lighting like brightness functions

What happened to being able to control date formats in Finder, etc.

The window minimising Genie Effect is probably the first setting to get rid of. I remember Steve Jobs showcasing it when introducing Mac OS X but more than 20 years later, it's still there and still as annoying as on day 1. I am wondering how come Apple hasn't scrapped it already.

Hey, what kind of keyboard is this in your video?

Everything on this video, except for Siri and Touch ID (two things I never use), are things that I always change on a new Mac. When I was managing the fleet of Macs for my company, I also set up all of these settings for all our computers using Configuration Profiles and scripts via our MDM server. My users really appreciated having all these creature comforts already set up by the time they first logged into their assigned Macs. Now that our parent company is managing our computers, they don't go as deep and we have to manually change these again.

I liked your idea about Siri. Not so much an annoyance for me but your idea is a terrific workaround. I will give this a try. That way I can simply press F5 on the keys and then read the text reply. Thank you 👏🏽

Nice vid, most of which I already use. However one big annoyance, for me since Sonoma, but I hear from other users it’s on earlier versions. As a photographer I like to have my drives showing on desktop, makes it easier for backing up files/folders. Problem is, all drives down right side, put Mac to sleep, then when I wake it up again, drives are scattered all over the desktop.

Love your videos, but I have low vision. Please consider doing your demos with dark mode. It's so much easier to see than the white backgrounds

one for the next time you tackle this topic... sometimes the "minmize" button is there... sometimes its greyed out. Would love to know how to make it always there.

Dear Tom - this is a great video. Until now I had always been under the impression that Apple fans are almost sect members, defending their chosen vendor and OS with religious fervour. Having necessarily been a work user of Windows for 37 years and professional technical user of Unix, Linux and more obscure OSes I too was irritated by the decisions being made for me about convenience, appearance, defaults and more. It's so refreshing to see such a competent and experienced guy sharing his fixes for pet peeves. Luckily the OS MMI layer allows the settings to be manipulated. And of course I'm secretly relieved that there's unix under the hood in case there's some manipulation eg. of a text file that is elegantly and quicker done in unix. All the best, Rob in Switzerland

Rectangle is free alternative for window management

Some great hints and tips there - thank you. long time Mac user, but always more to learn (or re-learn) 👏

As an avid user of both Mac and windows…unless there is a specific piece of software that is Mac only, windows is a far better operating system for daily use. Everything from file browsing to search to windows snapping. macOS is just too finicky and deliberately designed to be different which means it’s designed not to be logical as other companies design to be logical.

are there any settings to bring back features from macOS Catalina notifications? It baffles me why I can no longer complete a reminder for example with one click. Ever since the macOS Big Sur redesign I have been stuck with a worse notification experience. I don't like having to hover over more options and hope it stays selected when you click. It adds extra time and extra steps for dealing with notifications. Another example is in Catalina you could quick replay to an iMessage with one click. They also used to show how many notifications were in an email stack for example. Now it is a slightly tweaked design of the notification to tell the user there are more in the stack which can be easy to miss. I haven't been happy with iOS or macOS notifications since Catalina (and the respective iOS)

Dude - you’re a lifesaver

I love the hide scroll bar because I never use it ever since I have a scroll wheel and a trackpad. It's much faster to use those 2 than mouse over the scroll bar and scroll. The files open with the wrong app is also very annoying in windows 11 too and talk about notification, windows 11 notification, especially those windows update is way more annoying than mac OS haha.

The most frustrating thing that I deal with every day due to my specific workflow is the on-screen caps Lock notification. It cans be turned off, and nags you all the time as long as 1- caps lock is on, and 2- you aren’t actively typing. Argh!

I didn’t know about the first video with 10 other things I’ll be watching that today for sure.

How in 2023 Finder doesn't show you the size in bytes of the files you've selected, but does show you free disk space is beyond me.

I'm literally about to press "buy" on a new Macbook Pro M3 Pro after using Windows For 30+ years, I am a Pixel user with an iPad Pro, and I'm dreading how it will all work 🤣🤣 but I want the Mac for Lightroom and Photoshop use, I'll be checking out the rest of your videos!

I recently converted from being a long time Windows user to a MacBook Pro user and find your videos extremely helpful in that transition. 1 question: I downloaded Google Crome (not a fan) but when I restart my device, the Google Chrome icon appears as a "?" and I have to downloaded it again. I am sure I am doing something wrong. Also have you done, or would you do a comparison of the recent iPads ? Thanks.

I also think the native windows management is awful, but with Stage Manager, using apps in fullscreen and sometimes using alt + resize, I think there is a Mac way of doing things that isn't too bad. The small problem with the third-party apps imo is that you feel OSX is not designed for it, although it works pretty well.

pia vpn is Philippines one of the countries, is there a list of these?

I find it really annoying that when tabbing between applications any kind of mouse movement will/might also move your selection to the wrong app. I have found no way to circumvent this, so if you know of a way to disable mouse interacting with the tab window, that would be amazing!

Been a PIA user for years. Don't use except in public situation. However, and this isn't a dig against PIA, but using one of their IP addresses in a foreign country to watch my USA based streaming services, mostly does not work. I get a pop up from the streaming service saying that you are using the IP of a VPN and they strongly suspect you are not where you say you are. They then won't let you stream. BTW, thanks for your content.

I really wish tabs in Safari could be colored to better highlight types of files open in Safari, and also to better highlight which tab is open. I notice you don’t use the dreadfully designed Magic Mouse. Which mouse do you use, and suggest, for the Mac? Also, how do you have different screensavers on each screen? I have two screens and have the same screensaver on both.

You’ve probably heard this a bazillion times, but I generally use windows, and I like being able to cut field to the clipboard and paste them, rather than drag and drop- is this still disabled by default these days?

should u make video about best feature of win 11 :D

Will do...forgot you were jet setting again !...have a great time and say hello to the boss..

Just one question, how it’s more convenient to disable the fingerprint scanner for passwords compared to typing passwords that are unreadable (8 symbols or more) for 20 different accounts or apps? I tend to forget passwords the moment I typed them in.

What is annoying about using touch ID to enter passwords? Personally that’s one of the things I like most about the Mac.

My biggest annoyance is that there is no way to delay the menu bar appearing when it is hidden and you move your mouse to the top of the screen. I work a lot with virtual machines and remote servers in full screen and when I go to click on a menu button in the VM or remote server the Mac menu will pop down, blocking what I was trying to click on in the VM. There needs to be a setting where you can delay it appearing for a couple seconds. This happens to me many times every day. Setting it to never is not really a good option because then there will be a menu bar in a video that I am trying to watch full screen.

Can we talk about Finder killing external disks, please?

I've been Mac user since 2007 and recently bought M3 Max computer with macOS Sonoma. I must say I am absolutely horrified by the user experience. Using this machine in "clamshell" mode hooked to Apple's very own Studio Display and scrolling text is choppy, mouse (magic mouse) lags or does not track at all, system animations are broken, etc. For the first time in 17 years I am seriously thinking of switching to Windows . It's can't possibly be this bad.

the appearance scroll bar always change is not ideal for viewing content in full screen like your youtube video, it keeps the bar there even in fullscreen.

For me, the most annoying thing about MacOS, is that I cannot use my fingerprint when I power up my macbook... Like, why not? It's way safer than my pin. Same goes for updates and other files

I wish you could keep both windows active in split screen. Having to click each one before using it is really annoying.

I've been using the Mac since '93 and I know how I want my windows arranged. Usually overlapping a bit so I can see all my windows but easily tell which one is on top. I rarely use the green button at all. Full screen is for movies and DOS users. I do like to have full info displayed on my windows. I also like New Folder and Print in my toolbars, even though these are available from keyboard shortcuts. I'm also very stingy about notifications. People talk about distractions when they're using their computer. If your dog is misbehaving, it's not his fault, it's your fault.

Why does your QR code have a periscope view of the Loch Ness Monster in the middle?!

Still looking for a solution to keep the dock in Mac display permanently instead of randomly moving to external display.

Hi I can’t send photos through messenger I just get a box come up saying file to large use a smaller one !! Is this because of the new update on iOS? Anybody . Help !!

How about it opening preview windows always on the left of the screen? Maddening.

i used magnet for window management

Hmm... Kinda strange priorities/ choices/ options, at least in the eyes of someone who begun his Mac experience back in MacOS 7.6 (Classic) - and for the time being decided to stay "below eleven", as 10.9 system seems to be the last one actually developed "by humans, for humans". No hard drives on desktop?! No labels? OK, that I can understand, labels past 10.4 just SUCKS, big time. They are basically the contradiction of what they were meant (and meant for) back in MacOS 9 when they were introduced (AFAIR). "Wrong app" for "wrong" files? Yeah, the "resource fork" thingy was a great idea, pity it's gone. Long gone. Eye-cloud? Never 'eard of 'im (and I'm gonna keep it this way as long as possible - remember, a "cloud" ain't any freakin' "cloud" - it's SOMEONE'S else computer! Which can be hacked, hint, hint...). Disabling "empty Trash warning"? Oh, dear... Wait till you develop kinda spastic mouse, which can do both right and left click at the same time, at a single click - so when you decide to check the content of the Trash, you suddenly realise the mouse briught up right-click menu AND clicked on "empty the Trash" command at the same time. And since "no warning", then "poof!" ("You cannot undo this action"...) Disappearing scroll bars and auto-hiding menu bars - oh, couldn't thing about any invention more stupid... No, WAIT! Yeah, the total lack of CLEARLY DEFINED windows' borders. Can't get any dumber than this... except maybe Firefox contextual menu which is plain white, jsut as a standard white background of a standard white page. "Green light button"? Another great leap backwards. Open Text Edit, increase magnification (aka "zoom", the window won't get bigger, so you'll see only a part of the page. Click "green light button", and PRESTO! VOILA! The window will get... fork, SMALLER. Like, how come they got it right in the Classic, all the time, and now it's all forked up? "Scale effect"? You mean, like it used to be back in, uhm... System 6? No, srsly? Wow, what a "new, amazing feature" (©Steve J.)