f you need to leave your Mac unattended for a while but want to temporarily stop it going into sleep mode, open a Terminal window and type the following:
pmset noidle
For as long as the Terminal window is open and the command is still running, the computer won’t go to sleep. To end the wakefulness, either hit Control + C or simply close the Terminal window.
Let’s say you’ve created a form letter that you periodically send out to different people, changing only the name and address details. Some word processors allow you to create document templates. These are master files that, when opened, will create a new file containing the document’s contents. But did you know that this feature is built into your Mac, and you can use it with any kind of file?
It’s also possible to automatically insert boilerplate (that is, stock phrase) text into a document or new email using OS X’s Text Substitution feature.
Creating and Using a Template
To create a template, simply create or locate an existing file, then save and close it. Locate the file using Finder and select it before hitting Command + I to bring up the File Info dialog box. Then put a check in Stationery Pad, under the General heading near the top of the dialog box.
From now on, whenever anybody double-clicks to open the file, a copy of the file will automatically be created and opened for editing (usually with the filename of the original plus the word copy appended).
To open the original for editing at any stage, click and drag it straight to an application’s Dock icon or open it using the File->Open menu option within an application.
To return the file to being an ordinary nontemplate file, just repeat the steps above but remove the check from the Stationery Pad box.
Creating and Using Text Substitution Phrases
OS X includes the ability to autocorrect mistypes. For example, type “teh” and it will correct it to “the.” This feature is known as text substitution, and it can be subverted so you can insert just about any word, sentence, or paragraph—even a series of paragraphs—when you type a particular keyword. Here’s how to set it up:
1. Open System Preferences (Apple menu->System Preferences), then click the Language & Text icon.
2. Click the Text tab, then in the list of substitutions on the left, click the plus button at the bottom.
3. In the Replace field, type the keyword you want to trigger the substitution. For example, if you wanted to insert a boilerplate paragraph of legalese, you could type legalbp. It’s important to choose a keyword that you’re not going to type in everyday use.
4. Hit Tab to move to the With field. Here’s where you should type (or paste in) the word, sentence, or paragraph(s) you want to appear when the keyword is typed (hit Option + Return for a line break and Option + Tab to indent the text). Don’t worry if the text you type doesn’t appear to fit in the small field—it will all be recorded. Hit Return when done.
Repeat the steps above however many times are needed to store all the boil- erplate phrases you want.
In any application where you want to use the substitutions, you must select the Text Replacement option on the Edit->Substitutions menu so that it has a check next to it. You only need to do this once. (Remove the check next to the entry to deactivate substitution for that app).
Note that any substitution won’t appear until you hit Space after typing the keyword.
In Mail, first click within the body of an email you’re composing before attempt- ing to activate substitution. The To and Subject fields within a Mail compose window can have text substitution set independently of each other and inde- pendently of the mail body.
To delete a substitution, again open System Preferences and navigate to the Text tab of the Language & Text pane. Select the entry in the list and click the minus button. To temporarily deactivate a substitution, simply remove the check next to it.
Activity Monitor can show CPU activity at the present time.
1. Start Activity Monitor (Finder->Applications->Utilities->Activity Monitor) and click the window menu. Then select Floating CPU Window and choose from either horizontal or vertical displays.
2. The floating window will appear at the bottom left of the screen, and you can click and drag to move it around.
On most modern Macs, you’ll see two or four charts, representing each of the cores in the processor. If you’re using a high-end Mac Pro system, you might have up to sixteen processing cores and therefore sixteen bar charts!
To get rid of the graph, select None from the Floating CPU Window menu. To see a graph showing the CPU load over time, select the CPU History entry from the Window menu. To get rid of it, just click the close button on the window.
If you’re used Windows, you might be used to periodically pruning the list of programs that start at login by editing the Startup folder on the Start menu. You can find the equivalent function on Macs by opening the Users & Groups component of System Preferences (Apple menu->System Preferences). Unlock System Preferences if necessary by clicking the lock icon at the bottom left (note that only system administrator-level accounts can change startup items), and then select your account in the list on the left. Then click the Login Items tab on the right. To remove a program from the list, select it and click the minus button beneath the list.
Note that a check alongside an entry in the list has no bearing on whether it starts at login. The checkbox merely controls whether the program starts hidden, that is, whether the program starts with its window invisible (the equivalent of minimized under Windows). There are a variety of different ways to add a program so it starts when you log in:
• Click the plus icon within the Login Items view and navigate to the pro- gram using the File Open dialog box.
• Drag and drop icons from the Applications list within Finder on top of the startup application list within the Login Items view.
• Right-click the program’s Dock icon and click Options->Open at Login.
TextEdit is the basic word processor provided with your Mac. You might be interested in a hidden feature that will automatically turn web and email addresses into hyperlinks that, when subsequently clicked, will open the link in the default web browser or email client.
It’s always been possible to insert a link by highlighting any text and clicking Edit->Add Link, but this new method will create links automatically as soon as you type them.
1. Click Preferences on the application menu. 
2. In the bottom of the dialog box that appears, put a check in the Smart Links box. 
3. Close the dialog box and then close and restart TextEdit for the changes to take effect.
Here are a few tips for getting maximum life from your MacBook, MacBook Pro, or MacBook Air.
Keeping the Display Dim
Modern Mac laptops use LED displays. Although it’s better than the older cold cathode technology when it comes to battery life, running a screen at full brightness will still drain your battery quickly. Whenever I’m using my MacBook Pro, I turn the screen down to as dim as possible, bearing in mind ambient conditions.
Although it’s not rigorously scientific, I used the free utility coconutBattery to find the battery drain on my MacBook Pro at the various screen brightness settings.2 At maximum brightness the overall power draw on the battery was 16.1 watts. With just three bars showing in the onscreen brightness display —which is arguably the lowest setting at which the display is still usable in daylight—this figure dropped to just 11.5 watts. That’s an improvement in power consumption of about one-third.
Turning Off Keyboard Backlighting
Needless to say, switching off keyboard backlighting is also a good idea if your portable Mac is equipped with this feature. You can do this using the keyboard hotkeys—usually the F5 and F6 keys.
Turning Off Wireless
If you don’t need Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, you can also try turning them off to maximize battery life. To deactivate Wi-Fi, click its icon in the top right of the screen and select Turn Wi-Fi Off. To reactivate it at a later time, repeat the step and this time select Turn Wi-Fi On. To deactivate Bluetooth, open System Preferences (Apple menu->System Preferences), click the Bluetooth icon, and remove the check from the box labeled On. To reactivate Bluetooth later on, repeat the step and ensure the On box is checked.
smallQWERTY is a Free Mac app. It is a keyboard app. The app offers the standard QWERTY layout, along with easier access to symbols and function keys. Along with keys, there are shortcuts to common system functions as well. You can input the following functions in groups of 4×5 buttons with left clicks, some of which in groups of 3×3 buttons with left or right clicks:
You can also alter the degree to which the background blurs. This can create a more subtle effect than the default. To do so, open a Terminal window (Finder->Applications->Utilities->Terminal) and type the following, this time replacing X with any number between 0 and 255 (0 is no blur, while 255 is maximum blur):

defaults write com.apple.dock springboard-blur-radius -int 150;killall Dock
Experiment a little with different settings. Generally speaking, values between 1 and 10 produce the most subtle effects. To revert to the default degree of blur at any point, open a Finder window and type the following:
defaults delete com.apple.dock springboard-blur-radius;killall Dock
Hit Command + M in keyboard. You can activate a curious motion blur effect that appears when you move between the various pages of Launchpad. Hit Command + M in keyboard. You will turn it off.
Launchpad uses the desktop wallpaper as a backdrop in Mac OS X Lion 10.7. But it slightly slightly. You activate Launchpad in Mac OS X, and hit Command + B in keyboard. you can cycle through different backdrop effects—a black and white version of the wallpaper; a blurred black and white version of the wallpaper; and no blurring at all, so you simply see the full-color wallpaper. Hit Command + B one more time to restore the default blurred effect.
