Mac setup

Got a new mac? Here's how to set it up so that it isn't annoying.

Safari

Preferences you should change

General

• New windows open with:Empty Page, unless you always want to start on a certain page.
• New tabs open with:Empty Page, ditto
• Uncheck "Open 'safe' files after downloading", because there's no such thing.

Tabs

• Decide whether you want command-click to open a link in a new window or a new tab. I prefer multiple windows to multiple tabs, especially since we have Exposé.

RSS

• Uncheck "Automatically update articles" if you don't want Safari to chug every time you open it, and every 30 minutes, unless you have limited RSS bookmarks. Updating NYT etc. takes a lot of disk access and time. I leave it on, but remove RSS feeds I don't want.

AutoFill

• Decide whether you want to AutoFill usernames and passwords. For most sites I prefer it doesn't remember either.

Advanced

• Never use font sizes smaller than xx is great. I've never used it before today, but now I will.
• Press Tab to highlight each item on a webpage. I use this so that I can easily navigate forms and links with the keyboard.

Searching for substrings on a page

One time I was searching for random-number generating functions on a page that listed functions, so I entered "rand" into the find field of Safari. It displayed matches of words that began with rand, but not Frand, which is a random function I would have liked to have included. By default, Safari now only searches for words that begin with the search term, but you can change that on the go by selecting "Contains" from the popup menu next to the magnifying glass, or you can change it permanently on your computer for you or all users: All users (you'll need to be an administrator or know the administrator's password):

sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.Safari FindOnPageMatchesWordStartsOnly -bool FALSE

Just you:

defaults write ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.Safari FindOnPageMatchesWordStartsOnly -bool FALSE