Switching From Windows To macOS: What You Need To Know.
You finally did it! You’ve switched to Mac from Windows, which hopefully means you will visit the Switch to Mac page in the future! At this point, you’re looking at a macOS desktop, and while it looks like Windows, things aren’t quite what you’d expect.
We’re here to help you get up to speed quickly. By the end of this article, you will know the most important things from a Windows user perspective to get started quickly. We are using macOS Catalina here, so some new features may not apply to older versions like Mojave or High Sierra.
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The Apple Button is your friend
The very first thing you should be familiar with after switching from Windows to Mac is the Apple button in the upper left corner of your screen. Just move your mouse over there and a menu should appear. The two most important entries on this Apple Button Menu are About This Mac and System Preferences.
About This Mac shows important information about your Mac. This includes its serial number, specifications, available storage space, and more. This is a very useful utility.
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System Preferences is the macOS equivalent of the Windows Control Panel.
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Here you will find all the utilities to customize your Mac’s settings. If you would like to change network settings, mouse behavior, or display settings, you can do so here.
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How to right-click (and use gestures)
Oh boy, coming from Windows, trying to figure out how to right-click (alternative click in Mac language) can be incredibly frustrating. You can set up your Magic Trackpad or Magic Mouse for right-clicking, just like you would on a Windows computer. Just adjust your mouse settings in System Preferences. However, if you hold down Control on your keyboard and left-click, it turns into a right-click.
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If you are using a Magic Trackpad or Mouse, you can also use gestures to move. For example, swiping left or right on the trackpad with two fingers will cause horizontal scrolling. Swipe between desktops with three fingers.
One finger can be removed on the Magic Mouse. One for directional scrolling and two for switching between areas of the desktop. You can of course change them in the settings.
Dock is everything
The dock is at the bottom of the screen, hiding unless you hover your mouse over its area. This is where you can store frequently used apps, and recent apps are displayed to the right of the dock splitter.
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If you right click on an application icon, you get a very handy context menu for that application. When an app wants to grab your attention from the dock, its icon pops up from the bottom of the screen.
Finder is explorer, operator like start
Speaking of the dock, by default you’ll find a strange smiling face icon in the far left corner of the dock It is a Finder and essentially a file manager for macOS It also works more or less the same, so we don’t need to go into details.
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By default, there should be a small rocket next to it. This is Launchpad. If you click on it, all the apps you’ve installed will be displayed, not just the ones in the dock
Managing Windows and Desktop Devices
This is probably where Windows users moving to macOS experience the greatest culture shock. Window controls are located in the upper left corner of each window. The red button closes the window, the yellow one minimizes, and the green one maximizes.
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macOS also uses multiple virtual desktops. If you maximize the window, it will have its own workspace. If you want to split the screen between two windows, there are two ways to do this.
If both windows are in the same workspace and are not maximized, press and hold the green button and then select the left or right split.
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After splitting the first window, you can choose another one.
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If one window is already maximized, you can split it with another window, but by going to the workspace of the smaller window, grabbing it and moving it up in the middle of the screen, drag it to the maximized workspace of the application in the pop-up window and release it on the left or right half.
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This panel displaying multiple desktops is known as Mission Control and you can use keyboard shortcuts or mouse gestures to use it effectively. Check Mission Control preferences in System Preferences for keyboard shortcuts, but mouse gestures are probably more useful.
On the Magic Touchpad, swipe up with three fingers to open all workspaces for each display. Using the Magic Mouse, double-tap with two fingers. Once opened, you can move, delete and manage all of your workspaces
Spotlight search is the best thing since slicing
The last feature we have to highlight for moving from Windows to Mac is quite possibly the best trick in all of macOS It’s known as Spotlight Search and lets you find everything on your Mac instantly. including attachments.
To be honest, we prefer to use Spotlight Search over Launchpad as it is much faster. All you have to do is press Command and Spacebar at the same time. Now enter what you are looking for into the search bar. If the first hit is already what you want, just press Enter to select it.
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For example, if we type “calc” and press Enter, the calculator application starts immediately. You will wonder how you have ever lived without Spotlight Search
Mac & Me
There’s a lot more to learn about macOS if you’re moving from Windows to Mac, but the features listed above are the features you’ll need to quickly get started navigating and using your macOS computer.
The rest is up to you, but keep in mind that there are thousands of helpful articles on switching to Mac here that will turn you into Mac masters before you even know.
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