Getting Started With the Mac

In the first of a series of podcasts intended to help new users of VoiceOver on the Mac, David Woodbridge shows us how to get VoiceOver running on any Mac laptop or desktop.

These demonstrations were recorded on a Mac running OS X Snow Leopard, but the procedure is still the same at the time of posting.

In the second of a series of podcasts intended to help new users of VoiceOver on the Mac, David Woodbridge shows us how to use the Keyboard Helper feature in OS X to familiarize yourself with the keyboard layout and functions.

These demonstrations were recorded on a Mac running OS X Snow Leopard, but the procedure is still the same at the time of posting.

Intro

Each year in June, Apple previews the next major version of macOS, along with updates to its other software platforms, at its World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC.) At this event, Apple announces and demonstrates a select number of headlining new features, and makes a prerelease version available to developers so they can test the new software and provide feedback before the public release in October.

This is important because when substantial feature additions and changes are made to an operating system as intricate as macOS, many bugs will also be introduced. This can include issues with how third-party apps and accessories interact with the operating system, making thorough testing by developers crucial.

For macOS Sequoia

Intro

If you’re like most people, you likely have many online accounts with usernames and passwords. In this guide, I will describe how Apple Passwords, the password manager built into macOS and other Apple platforms, can help you create, use, and manage strong credentials for your online accounts.

While Apple Passwords is also available on iOS and iPadOS, as well as Chromium-based browsers, this guide will focus primarily on how to use it with Safari on macOS, in an effort to limit information overload. However, once you become familiar with Apple Passwords on macOS, you’ll likely find that it works similarly on other platforms.

Intro

Since 2005, I have used a variety of Macs, and have regularly used every version of macOS from Tiger to Monterey since then. Over that time, I’ve witnessed the various changes to VoiceOver, both major and minor, as well as how VoiceOver on macOS helped usher in a whole new world of mobile accessibility on iOS and iPadOS.

Today, with the Mac’s transition to Apple Silicon and the performance potential that it’s helped to unleash, it can be argued that the Mac is experiencing something of a renaissance. Indeed, as an AppleVis member, I’ve noticed an uptick in posts related to macOS, including from those who are potentially interested in buying their first Mac, those enquiring about how to complete various tasks on macOS, those experiencing issues, and others. No, I don’t have a hard number to back that up, just my observation.

Earlier this year Apple came under some criticism after a report by the Guardian on how Apple hired contractors to listen to a small percentage of anonymized ‌Siri‌ recordings to evaluate the responses with the purpose of improving accuracy and reliability.

In response, Apple promised that it would introduce options in a forthcoming update that would allow users to opt out of sharing their audio recordings.

Those options arrived with the releases of iOS 13.2, iPadOS 13.2, and macOS 10.15.1.

In this podcast, Tyler walks us through how to access and change these new options.

In this episode, Jonathan Simeone shows us how to add and remove items from the Finder sidebar on macOS.

The Finder sidebar is a list of folders and devices that can be quickly accessed from any Finder window or open and save dialog in macOS. You can choose which categories of items appear in the sidebar by choosing Finder > Settings, (or pressing Command-Comma) clicking the Sidebar button in the toolbar, and selecting the categories you want to include.

To add a specific folder, focus on it in Finder and choose File > Add to sidebar (or press Command-Control-T. To remove a folder, focus on it in the Sidebar and choose "Remove from sidebar" from the context menu, accessed by pressing VO-Shift-M.

In this quick tip podcast, Tyler demonstrates how to create and use text replacements, short snippets of text which are substituted with frequently used words or phrases when typed, and which synchronise across all your Apple devices.

For more information, see:
Replace text and punctuation in documents on Mac
Save keystrokes with text replacements on iPhone

In this podcast, Tyler discusses and demonstrates the Grouping Behavior options available for VoiceOver on macOS. These allow you to choose whether VoiceOver requires an action to interact with items in a content area (such as a scroll area) or a group (such as a toolbar):

The four available options are:

In this podcast, Jonathan Simeone shows us how to access and use the diverse emoji icon set on the Mac.

In this podcast, Carlos Taylor gives a walk-through of how to restore a single file from a Time Machine backup using VoiceOver.

Note: In macOS Ventura, rather than locating a backup by interacting with a slider, each backup is represented by a button in the timeline controls window; clicking this button selects the backup. Aside from that minor change, the process is still largely the same as it was at the time this podcast was recorded.

Written steps for how to do this are as follows:

In this podcast, David Woodbridge demonstrates how to use the Caps Lock key as the VoiceOver modifier key on macOS … either on its own or in conjunction with the Control and Option keys.

In this podcast, Scott Davert walks us through how to use the system-wide spellcheck facility on macOS.

In this episode, Tyler demonstrates what to do if an app on your Mac becomes unresponsive.

If VoiceOver announces that an app is "Not responding," the first thing to try is to Command-Tab away from it, wait for VoiceOver to announce that the app is ready, and then Command-Tab back to it. If that doesn’t work, Command-Tab away from the app and turn Voiceover off, wait a few seconds, then turn it on again. Finally, if all else fails, force quit the app by Command-Tabbing to it and pressing Command-Shift-Option-Escape. Alternatively, you can press Command-Option-Escape to open the force quit window and select the problem app from the table.