3 (more) Mac tips you probably didn’t know….

So that’s how to print four leaflets to a page!!

My dearly loved regular readers know I spend a lot of my life energy searching for great though also obscure Mac tips.

I want to share three more I think might be new to many Mac users (though probably not all).

Tip #1: The fast lane to System Preferences

Press and hold the System Preferences icon in your Dock. Wait a second and up pops a contextual menu listing all the System Preferences you have. Just select and click on the preference you want to change.

I find this faster than using Siri, even.

It should look a little like this…

Tip #2: Swift and tidy tab clean-up

Loads of Safari tabs open and you just don’t need them anymore? Here’s a super-fast yet obscure way to deal with the cruft in seconds, which works in any app that supports tabs (including Finder):

• Move your cursor over a tab you want to keep active.
• Press Option.
• Option-click the tab close button.
• All other tabs will be closed, bar the one you wanted to keep.

Weirdly this is one that’s always been sign-posted right before our eyes…

Tip #3: Print 4 (or more) up to a page without tears

If you’ve ever designed a leaflet you may remember what a chore it is to set up four leaflets to a page. I always mess it up.

Turns out I didn’t need to – the secret’s hidden in plain sight in the Print dialog. Here’s how it’s done:

• Once you’ve completed your design, save it, open it in Preview and tap Print (Command-P).
• Tap Show Details (lower left of the dialog box).
• Now look for the Copies per page item and choose the number of times you want that document to appear on that printed page.
• (You should also enable the Scale to Fit option).

This is great when you design a full-page poster you also want to circulate as flyers as it’s an easy way to get four or more copies of that information printed to a single page.

Got any more? Please let me know.

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