Applicable OSX Versions: Tiger and Leopard (That I know of!)
Because I’m a MAJOR keyboard junkie, I tend to find little nuggets of hidden OSX fun from time-to-time. This is just such an occasion. While looking at the Dashboard today to see what time it was in Macgasm-land (aka Ottawa) it occurred to me to try a screenshot — Apple-Shift-3 — for no REAL reason other than to see what would happen. I didn’t REALLY expect it to work, but when I heard the familiar “shutter” noise, I quickly jumped to the desktop to find this:
This is by far not the first time that something like this has happened. Often, I feel like Apple reads my mind with these things. Stuff like this is what I’m talking about when I tell people that OSX “just works”.
Ok, that’s a little fanboy-ish, but you see what I mean.
Of course, I’m not entirely sure how useful this will be, although off the top of my head I’d say it could be very useful if you happen to be a Dashboard Widget developer. Luckily, I’m geeky enough not to really care how useful things are, as long as they’re obscure and a bit fun.
Comments with similar keyboard goodness are most welcome!
June 19th, 2008 at 8:43 am
Easter egg! If you zoom in a bit you'll notice that me and Josh in iChat learning how to calculate time across time zones.. It's harder than it sounds.. really!!
More from author
June 20th, 2008 at 11:27 am
Another cool screenshot key combination is Apple-Shift-4. That will give you cross-hairs to select a portion of the page that interests you.
More from author
June 20th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Thanks for the tip. Isn't there one for just grabbing the current window?
More from author
June 21st, 2008 at 11:30 am
I'm just taking pictures of everything now. pretty awesome.
More from author
June 21st, 2008 at 1:44 pm
Haha, you've got to love OS X. Every time I stumble across some new “feature” I beat it to death.
More from author
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:13 am
I think you have to use Grab.app to do just a window.
More from author
June 23rd, 2008 at 11:23 pm
Apple-Shift-4 gives you a crosshair that lets you select a certain area of the screen to capture, and Apple-Shift-4 then Space captures the active window. If you want to capture your desktop or a window directly to the clipboard, press Apple-Shift-Ctrl-3 to get the whole desktop, Apple-Shift-Ctrl-4 to get the crosshair, and Apple-Shift-Ctrl-4 then Space to get the active window.
More from author
June 24th, 2008 at 12:45 am
Thanks a ton for the comment. I had a hunch that it was possible to do the active window, but I'm constantly being told that it was only a grab thing.
More from author