New Tutor Tip: How to always show the scroll bar on a Mac July 21, 2016 / in Tips for Mac / by Dan Wassink. We have another Tutor Tip ready for you. In this Tutor Tip we look at how we can always display the scroll bar on a Mac instead of having it disappear when we move our cursor away from the right edge of a window.
Published 6:00 AM EST Jan 4, 2015
Q. I replaced an old Mac laptop with a new MacBook Air, and now the scroll bars keep vanishing. How do I get them back?
![]()
A. If you don't agree with Apple's judgment that scrolling in OS X should work as it does in iOS — where you can't see the scroll bar until you actually try to move up or down a page or document — you can fix it in four clicks.
But if you've gone from a well-aged Mac that hasn't been able to run recent releases of Apple's operating system, the ongoing mashup of iOS and OS X interfaces will be new to you, and so will the workarounds for these changes.
(Apple's Mac-migration tools generally do a fine job of moving applications, data files and program settings from one Mac to another, but there are no scroll-bar-visibility settings in 2009's Snow Leopard to preserve — leaving the default settings of newer releases free to take over.)
In this case, you'll want to click on the Apple-icon menu at the top-left corner (that's one click), choose System Preferences (two), select the General category (three) and, next to the 'Show scroll bars' heading, click the button next to 'Always' (four).
Almost three and a half years after Apple dropped this change on users in 2011's Lion release, I still don't understand what problem Apple was trying to solve.
Laptop and desktop computers don't have the compact screens of smartphones and tablets. And they're often used to view and work on much longer documents, in which a scroll bar's sliding 'thumb' control makes it obvious how far along you are. So why force a fundamental part of the onscreen interface to pull this disappearing act?
Mac users skipping multiple versions of OS X on their way to a new computer may find two other iOS-influenced changes confusing but less irritating.
One is the way Apple would prefer you get at your apps: Not by opening a Finder window and navigating to your Applications folder, but by clicking Launchpad's rocketship icon in the Dock. This will fill the screen with a grid of app icons, much like an iPad's home screen.
You can click on any one to launch it, but it can be faster to start typing a program's name, watch Launchpad cull the selection to feature only titles matching that search, and hit Enter once only one matching title remains.
The other is the ability to add your social-media accounts to OS X, via the Internet Accounts pane in System Preferences. Your reward for doing that is being able to post things to Facebook, Twitter and so on from pretty much anywhere in the system, not just whatever browser is logged into those social networks.
But remember that Apple's aging, due-to-be-replaced iPhoto may require you to enter those logins a second time. When I tested it, that photo-album app picked up on a Twitter account I'd added to OS X but knew nothing about a Facebook login I'd saved to the system.
Tip: Find resource-hogging Web pages in OS X's Activity Monitor
![]()
When Apple shipped OS X Yosemite, it didn't announce one change to the Activity Monitor app that I've long relied on to report how much memory and processing power, and even energy, each program consumes.
Unlike earlier versions, this one doesn't just show a total figure for the Safari browser, but breaks down each open page's appetite for processor cycles and memory. And where OS X Mavericks' version of the app required you to mouse over each generically named 'Safari Web content' line to see the Web address behind it, this version displays the first 25 or so characters of that address.
The numbers Activity Monitor throws out can still be hard to decipher, but if you consistently see one site at or near the top of its memory- or processor-use lists, it may be time to bookmark a competitor. And if that site happens to be one that you run, please get to work curbing its appetite.
Rob Pegoraro is a tech writer based out of Washington, D.C. To submit a tech question, e-mail Rob at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/robpegoraro.
Published 6:00 AM EST Jan 4, 2015
The Windows Store is almost unrecognizable from the barren wasteland that it was when it first went live. Microsoft clearly envisages a future in which all your mainstream apps are available via the Store10 Windows Store Apps You Didn't Know Existed10 Windows Store Apps You Didn't Know ExistedBig names have finally entered the Windows Store. You might not realize just how good it's become. Let us show you what you've missed.Read More, and they have been making a concerted effort to get everyone onboard with the idea as quickly as possible.
But Windows Store apps (or UWP apps, modern apps, metro apps, universal apps, or whatever else you want to call themAre You Confused by the Windows App Terminology?Are You Confused by the Windows App Terminology?Did you ever wonder what's the difference between an application, program, or software? Or whether that Windows app is metro, modern, universal, or plain straight? You're not alone. Let us clear things up!Read More) still have one major annoyance: the lack of a scrollbar. Or, more accurately, the auto-hiding scrollbar.
How are you supposed to know the page is scrollable if there’s no bar on the side of the window? It turns out you can unhide the scrollbar so it’s always visible. Let’s take a closer look on how to do this.
How to Unhide Scrollbars in Windows Store Apps
To make scroll bars permanently visible in Windows Store apps, follow the step-by-step instructions below. Note: You need to be running Windows build 17083 or later.
Alternatively, you can edit the registry:
To begin, open the Registry Editor and go to HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelAccessibility. Next, in the right-hand pane, create a new 32-Bit DWORD value called DynamicScrollbars. To complete the process, set its value to 0 (setting the value to 1 hides the bars again.)
Explore more about: Windows Store, Windows Tips.
Comments are closed.
|
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |