Mama fus menu

If you’re looking for a simple stopwatch menubar timer for Mac OS X, look no further than a little utility called Thyme. No, not the herb, Thyme is a very simple Mac app that sits in your menubar and allows you to quickly start and stop a timer. Wondering how long it takes you to perform a certain task? No problem, use Thyme and figure it out. Or perhaps you’re thinking of using it for a DIY Pomodoro technique, that works too. Whatever the reason you need for a simple timer in the Mac menu bar, Thyme does the trick. Once installed, you can quickly activate and deactivate Thyme from the menu bar item, or by hitting Control+T (with a customizable keyboard shortcut), otherwise just access it from the menubar where you’ll find a Start, Pause, Finish, and Clear option, along with a simple elapsed time indicator that will technically run for days in case you’re timing some multi-day computing experience. Not into the default keyboard shortcuts it provides to start and stop the … [Read more...] about Simple Stopwatch & Timer for Mac OS X Menu Bar: Thyme

If you’re new to the Mac or Apple platforms, learning the menu keyboard symbols that appear in the menus and on some keyboard keys, can be a little daunting. Nonetheless it’s not too complex, and knowing what the Apple keyboard symbols mean and what keys they stand for to access the function is essential for accessing various shortcuts throughout Mac OS X and iOS. Not only do the Mac menus use the symbol short form as seen in the screenshot, but many websites will refer to the symbol rather than the text printed on the keys (⌥ instead of Option, for instance). With this in mind, here are the Mac menu symbols, and Apple keyboard symbols as translated to the keys they represent: Mac & Apple Menu Symbols and the Related Keyboard Symbols The three symbols you’ll find most often in menu items on the Mac and iOS are control, shift, command, but sometimes you may see others too. Typically the full menu symbol list and their associated key is as such: This is the … [Read more...] about The Mac Menu Symbols & Keyboard Symbols Explained

PatentlyApple is at it again, this time they discovered a patent for automatically updating Mac OS X menu items. The idea is somewhat simple; given items in pull down menus would be actively updating, and text or data would scroll in that menu item. The concept is not limited to pulldown menus, as PatentlyApple describes: Although embodiments of the present invention are described primarily with respect to pull-down menus, it will be appreciated that embodiments of the invention may be implemented within other types of graphical user interface menus, such as, but not limited to, menus in which options are highlighted by a bar that is moved from one menu item to another, pop-up menus (e.g. a menu activated by clicking an on-screen button), contextual menus (a menu that appears temporarily when a mouse button is right clicked on a selection; once a selection is made from a contextual menu, the menu usually disappears), cascading menus (a submenu that opens when a choice from … [Read more...] about Mac OS X to gain updating menu items?

The Mac App Store includes a hidden Debug menu that can be enabled with a simple defaults write command. The menu includes a variety of interesting options and tweaks that are clearly intended for internal development purposes. One of the more interesting parts of the Debug menu is the ‘Debug Panel’ which has various hidden preferences and features that can be enabled or disabled, including “Enable Purchase Check,” Application & Distribution signing, the ability to adjust AppleID authentication servers, the ability to ‘fake’ an Authentication Server (presumably for internal testing), download and installation logging options, and tweaks to the Mac App Store GUI (see screenshot below). Warning: Proceed at your own risk, nobody knows for sure what these hidden options do, but it’s safe to assume they are hidden for a reason. We are not responsible for you screwing up your App Store account. Enable the Mac App Store hidden Debug menu Precautions aside, here is how … [Read more...] about Enable Mac App Store Hidden Debug Menu

The more apps you install on your Mac, the more bloated your “Open With” menu gets. Some apps that are completely unrelated to the file type may show up in the “Open With” menu and just serve to clutter your choices. This is annoying, so lets restore the menu to what it should have. How to clear the “Open With” menu in Mac OS X You need to get to ~/Library/Preferences/, you can get there with the Go to Folder (Command+Shift+G) option, or by the instructions below: Open your Home directory Open the “Library” folder Find and open the “Preferences” folder Once you are in the proper folder: Locate “com.apple.LaunchServices.plist” Rename “com.apple.LaunchServices.plist” to “com.apple.LaunchServices-backup.plist” or just relocate it elsewhere (you can delete it completely if you aren’t worried about backups) Now the next time you use the “Open With” menu it will only include current applications in the list. You may need to log in and out of your user account for … [Read more...] about Clear the “Open With” menu in Mac OS X

We’ve shown a few different ways of how to lock your Mac screen with a keystroke or a hot corner, but another option is to lock the screen and desktop of your Mac through a little-known Mac OS X menu bar item. The result is a little lock icon in the menu bar of OS X that you can pull down to access and instantly password protect the desktop and everything on your Mac, requiring a user log in to regain access again. Launch “Keychain Access”, which is located in /Applications/Utilities/ or you can launch it through Spotlight From the ‘Keychain Access’ menu, select and open Preferences Select the checkbox next to “Show Status in Menu Bar” so that it is checked Now that the lock menubar item is enabled, you’ll find a little lock icon in your menu bar. Once the menu item is enabled, just click on the lock icon and drag down to “Lock Screen” to immediately lock your Mac OS X desktop. To regain access to the Mac, you’ll need to enter your login credentials. … [Read more...] about Lock the Mac OS X Desktop via Menu Bar