23 Useful Mac Keyboard Shortcuts You Need to Know

Generally, screen capture is a function you might use if you are looking for a way to snag whatever image that is on your screen. In some cases, it may be that the image you have on screen cannot be printed or saved; doing a screen capture will help save the image permanently. There are a few different ways of making this happen:

• -Command-Shift-3: You are taking a shot of the screen and saving it as a file to desktop.
• -Command-Shift-4: You will select an area, take the shot, and then save that as a file to the desktop.
• -Command-Control-Shift-3: Take a screenshot and save it to the desktop.
• -Command-Control-Shift-4: Take a screenshot of a particular area.

This is a function that is used frequently on a PC, but there are many individuals who have no idea how to make use of this functionality on a Mac. However, locking your screen is the best way to ensure that no one will come along and try to get into the files you are working on. People may do this as a joke to you, or they may do this for more nefarious purposes. Regardless, it is important to take appropriate precautions, and you can do this simply by pressing Control-Shift-Power for Macs without an Eject button, such as on a Macbook Air, or Control-Shift-Eject for Macs with an Eject button.

Sometimes, your Mac may need a restart. This may be as a result of your screen freezing or something else entirely. Pressing Control-Command-Eject on Macs with an Eject button will restart you immediately. On Macs without an Eject button, simply hold down the Power button.

The Delete key on a Mac's keyboard does not technically function to delete; it is more accurately termed a backspace. To delete words in front of the insertion point, you need to hit Control-D.

To copy a word or block of text, simply highlight the text and hit Command-C.

This is a good command to use if you need to walk away from your computer for a little while without wanting to shut it down. Generally, your computer is already preset to go into Sleep mode after a few minutes of inactivity, but there are ways of doing this with a series of hotkeys. Command-Option-Eject works if you have an Eject button on your keyboard, but Macbook Air does not have this feature. To put all displays to sleep on your Mac, you could also hit Shift-Control-fn-Power.

If you want to log out immediately without waiting for the countdown timer to finish, hit Command-Option-Shift-Q. If the countdown timer doesn't bother you, go for Command-Shift-Q.

Sometimes, your Mac may need to shut down if it is running to slow or appears on the verge of freezing on you altogether. If that is the case, the keystroke combination you would look for is Command-Option-Control-Eject. You would have to replace Eject with the Power button on Macbook Air or other Mac products without an Eject button.

Sometimes, there are programs that simply stop responding to your commands, which is annoying and slows down what you may be trying to do. You might see the spinning "beach ball of death" – the indicator that your program(s) have stopped working. The easiest way to bring up the Force Quit window is to hit Command-Option-Escape.

After you have selected an image or text, hit Command-X to cut it.

Spotlight is a great search function for your Mac. By hitting Command-Spacebar, you can bring up or hide the Spotlight search field.

Sometimes, you just need to go to the Finder in order to locate the files you need. The easiest way to bring up a Finder window is simply to press alt(option)-Command-Shift.

Sometimes, particularly if you are a teacher, you may receive assignments from students via electronic means. You may then, in the interests of saving paper, want to mark it the same way. The all-purpose checkmark is the way to go. Simply hit Option-v and you will have a checkmark. It may look a little like a square root symbol, but it's pretty close.

This is a handy way to indicate editing changes online. Simply hit Command-Shift-X.