The Little Things I Like… (Part I)

Since the switch from my hp pavilion laptop to this MacBook, I’ve really been more and more pleased with OS X. I like the way it just works. Apple has put a lot into the OS X interface, making sure that the environment is consistent across the board. Granted, there are some inconsistencies, but I’m not concerned with them right this second. What I am concerned with are the little things I like about my MacBook.

Here’s a perfect example. Say I download an application to try out- a text editor or whatever. It doesn’t really matter. Now my mind is racing and I want to get down some thoughts so I open my newly downloaded and installed text editor and start typing…But wait! The text is bright green! I hate green! Green is the devil! Green is the mindkiller. Green is the little death that brings total Oblivion. And no one likes Oblivion. So what do I do? “Well it depends on the program, you know. It depends…Is it Text Wrangler or BBEdit, or are you using TextMate, maybe did you actually download Emacs?” But you’d be wrong because 99% of the time it does not depend. All you need to do is press Command-Comma. That is consistently the easiest way to get to an application’s preference pane and change that horrid shade of green.

Do you know how to do that in Windows? “Well, Rebby, if that’s your real name, it’s probably as easy as…well…um…it depends.” Correct! It’s as easy as clicking on “Tools” and then “Options” or “Preferences”, or maybe “View” and then “Options” or “Preferences”, or even “File” and then “Preferences”, or even some other combination of clicks. You get my point. I’m not bitter about Windows. I don’t even think that three mouse-clicks is torturous. I’m just saying that it is so much easier in OS X to get to the pane that changes the font color to something besides that putrid shade of green. And to me, that’s important.