Listed below is a selection of posts from across the AppleVis website which have been especially selected to help you setup and get to know your first Mac.
If you use a Mac, at some point or another, you will need to drag an item from one place to another. You could be, among other things, trying to move a file, reorder a list, or attach photos and other files to a document.
While there is no, “Magic solution,” to drag and drop with VoiceOver, there are several methods you can employ that just might work to accomplish the task at hand. These tips come predominantly from my own personal use, as literature on how to do this is rather scarce. Therefore, if you know of additional tips and tricks, sound off in the comments.
In my first Pages guide, I described what certain typographic elements looked like such as bold text and underlining. In my second guide, I provided a crash course in how you can quickly apply styles in your Pages documents. In this guide, let’s tackle some more complex concepts. You can apply these to the test document available in my second guide, or use one of yours as a playground.
In this episode, Jonathan Simeone discusses and demonstrates the autosave and versioning features of macOS. These provide the peace of mind of knowing that your work is being automatically saved as you type, and that it’s quick and easy to revert to a previous version of a document. While TextEdit is demonstrated in this tutorial, these features work in a variety of macOS apps.
I've always used Audacity for digital recording projects, including ripping my vinyl collection for use in iTunes. A 64-bit Audacity build for Mac exists, but it doesn't work with VoiceOver. As a result, Audacity is no longer a viable option for blind Mac users.
GarageBand makes it amazingly easy to create music. In this blog, I'll show you how to create the following blues-based rock jam. You don't need an instrument. You won't have to play a single note.
Safari is the Mac's default web browser, and it does all the usual web browser things - opens webpages, downloads files, plays audio, all that. It has some neat tricks, too, like the Reader that can show you only the meat of an article.
However, if you are coming to the Mac for the first time, especially from a Windows background, Safari can seem like a clunky app at best, and a totally unusable mess at worst. As with all things on the Mac, though, you just have to understand how and why it does what it does. Eventually, you will be flying through webpages again, and there are even some nice tricks that VoiceOver can pull off to make your life easier.
Finder is the Mac's file browser. With it, you can look at files and folders on internal, external, and network drives; copy, cut, and paste items; tag files for easier locating later; search for files; and more. The problem is that, particularly for those transitioning to the Mac from Windows, Finder is a confusing mess that makes you scared to even go looking for a file. I understand that, because I was there too. Hopefully, in writing down what I've learned over the years, I can save you a lot of time and frustration, and let you get on with your Mac much better.
For Windows Users
If you are switching from Windows to Mac, there are a few things you should know about the Finder.
First, try very hard to get used to pressing command-o to open things. Pressing enter will prompt you to rename them, not open them. If you do accidentally press enter, simply press escape to cancel.
When you first get a Mac, and are learning VoiceOver, it can be hard to remember the myriad commands available. Some are pretty easy, like control-option-w to read the current word. Some are quite complex or seldom used, such as control-option-command-f5 to move the mouse pointer to where VoiceOver is focused. Then there are the core concepts, like interacting, moving around dialogs, getting to menus, and plenty more. So, I wanted to offer a guide that does not explain most of the commands and concepts, but rather tells you where to go if you need help. Mailing lists, books, online resources, and cheat sheets are great, but there are powerful help facilities built right into every Mac, just a keystroke or two away at any time. The trick is knowing how to access them.
In this episode, Tyler demonstrates how to assign your own keyboard shortcuts to menu bar commands that lack default shortcuts in macOS.
An example of where this may be useful is in System Settings, where many settings can be quickly accessed from the View menu, however none of these commands have default keyboard shortcuts mapped to them. To create your own shortcut for a command:
In this episode, Tyler shows us how to automatically delete messages on iOS, iPadOS, and macOS.
By default, the Messages app on iOS, iPadOS, and macOS retains messages and conversations until you delete them. However, particularly if you receive a large number of attachments, messages can occupy a significant portion of space on your device. To automatically delete messages after a set amount of time after they've been received on iOS and iPadOS, go to Settings > Messages > Keep messages, and choose an option. To do the same on macOS, open Messages, choose Messages > Settings, (or press Command-Comma) click the General button in the toolbar, and choose an option from the "Keep messages" popup menu.
In this episode, Tyler demonstrates how to change Safari's default search engine on iOS, iPadOS, and macOS.
To do this on iOS and iPadOS, go to Settings > Safari and double-tap "Search engine" to specify the search engine for standard browsing windows, or "private search engine" if you want to specify a different search engine to be used in private browsing windows. On macOS, in Safari, choose Safari > Settings (or press Command-Comma) click the Search button in the toolbar, and choose from the "Search engine" or "private browsing search engine" popup menus.
In this episode, Alex Hall shows us how to change the default app for opening a certain type of file on macOS.
This may be useful if, for example, you'd rather RTF documents opened with Pages instead of TextEdit by default. To make this change:
In Finder, navigate to and select a file of the type you want opened with a different app, and choose File > Get info (or press Command-I.)
Press VO-Space to expand the "Open with" disclosure triangle if it isn't expanded already, and choose the app you want to open the file with from the popup menu. If the app you want is not in the menu, you can choose "Other" and manually locate the app; note that your results will vary depending on that app's compatibility with the given filetype.
Click the "Change all" button to open all files of this type with the app you chose, then click Continue to confirm the change.
In this quick tip, Jamie Pauls takes us through the various options for how VoiceOver reports rows added in a table on macOS. These options, found in VoiceOver Utility > Verbosity > Announcements, allow you to choose whether VoiceOver speaks the number of rows added to a table in focus, plays a tone when a row is added, or provides no feedback at all.
By default, VoiceOver does not start automatically at the macOS login prompt. In this episode, Tyler demonstrates how to change this. The steps to do so are as follows:
Choose Apple > System Settings, and select Lock Screen in the table.
Click accessibility options and toggle the “VoiceOver” switch on.
Click done.
On some older Mac models, if FileVault disk encryption is turned on, which is the default, VoiceOver should start when the Mac boots and prompt for the username, and then prompt for the password if the username is entered correctly. However, if you’d rather not have to manually enter your username or be able to navigate other elements in the window, you must turn FileVault off. To do this, open System Settings, select Privacy & Security in the table, and click “FileVault turn off.”
In this episode, Tyler demonstrates how to configure your Mac to announce the time automatically.
To do this in macOS Ventura and later, open System Settings > Control Center > Clock options, and enable the "Announce the time" toggle. You can then choose how often the announcement will play, as well as the voice, rate, and volume macOS will use for the announcement.
In this episode, Tyler demonstrates how to disable predictive text suggestions on macOS.
As you type on your Mac, macOS by default attempts to finish words and phrases it thinks you're trying to type. If you find that hearing these suggestions spoken by VoiceOver is more distracting than helpful, you can turn them off by going to System Settings > Keyboard, clicking the Edit button under the "Text input" heading, and toggling the "show inline predictive text" switch off.
transcription:
Disclaimer: This transcript is generated by AIKO, an automated transcription service. It is not edited or formatted, and it may not accurately capture the speakers’ names, voices, or content.
Hey, Apple vissers, Tyler here, with a quick tip for how to disable predictive text suggestions on macOS.
By default, as you type on your Mac, macOS attempts to finish words and phrases that it thinks you're trying to type.