What features of Mavericks are beneficial to you?

Question

This question serves to share and collect the enhancements that make a large difference to how you use your Mac.

Please post one feature per answer. Please also check to see if your answer has already been posted - duplicate answers will be deleted. To search answers for this question use inquestion:this (directly from the question page) in addition to your search terms in the search box in the upper right hand corner of this page.

The best answers will not only list a feature, but provide details on how to configure that feature, and provide an image of how to use the feature to be more efficient or effective with Mavericks.

As always - questions about site norms and governance are best asked on [meta] since the comments here became dominated with what's on or off-topic here or on other sites. Meta allows a more careful discussion of the problems and merits of wiki questions - both in general and in specific here. Cheers and thanks for your assistance. — bmike, Oct 22 '13 at 22:35

bmike · Accepted Answer · 2013-10-24T18:59:00.400

54

The overhaul of the virtual memory system makes it clear that memory pressure is the primary factor to track and not how many free pages, inactive pages or overall virtual memory is allocated.

Mavericks Activity Monitor - memory

The bottom panel is invaluable for diagnosing a slow machine and knowing whether to rule out memory contention as a cause of the slowness. After running your Mac for a week, you should reach a nice steady state like shown above and can know if adding more RAM or adjusting the programs you run will affect performance.

edited Oct 24 '13 at 18:59

answered Oct 22 '13 at 21:36

bmike

235,889

13

And, best of all, this feature renders moot all the angst and confusion about inactive memory on OS X. Boom! – bmike Oct 22 '13 at 22:30
Even more it compresses the memory - so I have 1G of swap files rather than 8-10G, or is that a separate entry – mmmmmm Oct 22 '13 at 22:46
1

@mark I have never had swap storage issues so I can't say how well it will reduce swap allocations but the signs are promising so far. – bmike Oct 22 '13 at 23:18
It has improved mine so far – mmmmmm Oct 22 '13 at 23:22
10

750MB for the kernel?!!! – sds Oct 22 '13 at 23:47
@sds I know - here's more details on the memory allocation. That 650-800 MB for the kernel seems to be a very stable estimate on what we'll see on Mavericks and newish Intel CPU. http://cl.ly/S5NO – bmike Oct 23 '13 at 00:29
@sds video memory for onboard integrated graphics is marked as used by kernel as well. That used memory has to be attributed somewhere... – Eugene Bujak Oct 23 '13 at 17:45
@EugeneBujak: r u sure video memory is included there? – sds Oct 23 '13 at 19:06
4

I would encourage either Eugene or SDS to explicitly ask what is included in kernel_task as a stand-alone question. We can't really answer a question posed in a comment. – bmike Oct 23 '13 at 19:07
5

@bmike: What is included under kernel_task in Activity Monitor? – sds Oct 24 '13 at 00:17
1

@sds, kernel takes 9GB for me http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/106697/insanely-high-kernel-ram-usage-over-9gb-in-mavericks – houbysoft Oct 25 '13 at 19:21
@sds 1.8GB here – Render Nov 09 '13 at 11:39

MachineElf · Answer 2 · 2013-10-23T22:24:35.587

47

With a text field active, Control ⌃ + Command ⌘ + Space opens a characters panel including Emojis.

enter image description here

edited Oct 23 '13 at 22:24

answered Oct 23 '13 at 13:30

MachineElf

637
1
11
28

1

Does not work in MS Word :( – F'x Oct 23 '13 at 15:48
18

Very few things work in MS Word - I think they use a custom text engine or something. – Oct 23 '13 at 17:06
A panel opens even without a text field selected (in Finder for example), so it should be possible to drag and drop a character that way. – MachineElf Oct 23 '13 at 18:02
6

It is not just emoji, but a quicker better way to search for any unicode character like: , ÷, ∪, or Δ – Andrew Hoos Oct 23 '13 at 22:10
1

While I agree it is a nice feature, they should have sticked with the old shortcut Cmd + Shift + T. In fact, it was the first thing I changed on Mavericks. – Egon Oct 24 '13 at 07:15
Good thing we have such quick access to the recycle symbols. – asmeurer Oct 25 '13 at 07:10

bmike · Answer 3 · 2013-10-23T04:12:47.160

The energy consumption view that collects 8 hours of history and graphs the charge level in your battery as well as showing each process that drained measurable amounts of energy is going to make squeezing extra productivity out of one charge much easier.

energy usage - 8 hours

Not only will developers (I'm looking at you Dropbox) know that they have to be better stewards of battery life, it makes it easy to see which apps support App Nap and even that a program that is quit now was responsible for using energy in the past 8 hours. This tool provides actionable information for users to better manage their experience when away from wall power on a portable Mac.

This detail is quite hidden inside Activity Monitor, but Apple does expose the biggest users of energy in the menu bar for apps using significant energy.

undo is unicode U+238c or &#9100

score 41 · Answer 4 · edited Oct 22 '13 at 19:32

Secret Wallpapers

OS X ships with a bunch of really cool sample photos that are not normally available for use as desktop backgrounds.

Previously in OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion, these were located at:

/System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.Framework/Versions/A/Resources/Default Collections/

In OS X 10.9 Mavericks, they’re now located at

/Library/Screen Savers/Default Collections/

Here's how to get them:

from Finder, use the menu Go → Go to Folder… (or hit ⌘⇧G) and paste in: /Library/Screen Savers/Default Collections/

You should see 4 folders, and inside them you’ll find lots of really cool Wallpapers:

Note a slight change to the Mountain Lion address: /System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/Versions/A/Resources/Default Collections/ — coco, Oct 27 '13 at 03:20

score 41 · Answer 5 · edited Dec 16 '13 at 10:00

41

Bring Your Home Folder's Library Back with One Checkbox in Mavericks:

Apple decided to hide the Library from its users in recent OS X updates, but in Mavericks you can now change that with a simple checkbox.

In the past you had to enter a Terminal command with every little system update:

chflags nohidden ~/Library

With OS X Mavericks, you can just navigate to your home folder, press Command+J to bring up the folder settings, and check the box next to "Show Library Folder" instead.

edited Dec 16 '13 at 10:00

nohillside

100,768

answered Oct 23 '13 at 13:41

Simon

7,451

Great answer - we have a more targeted question covering this aspect over there -> http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/106645/how-do-i-tell-finder-to-always-show-my-library-folder-on-mavericks – bmike Oct 24 '13 at 18:52

score 36 · Answer 6 · edited Oct 24 '13 at 21:26

36

Put your computer to sleep quickly

If you're using OSX Mavericks on a MacBook, tapping the power key briefly immediately puts your computer to sleep—a simple tweak that makes saving energy even easier. For the usual shutdown dialog, just keep holding for three seconds, or press control+power.

As always, you can put just the display to sleep by pressing control+shift+eject or control+shift+power, depending on your model.

edited Oct 24 '13 at 21:26

Daniel

34,803

answered Oct 22 '13 at 21:57

Simon

7,451

I've always used a hot-corner for that, and I think I still prefer it that way. – Elliott Oct 22 '13 at 22:07
@Elliott Good thinking. – Simon Oct 22 '13 at 22:09
Not shutting the computer down when someone just taps the power button is going to make life with a cheeky 3-year-old easier! :-) – Rob Gilliam Oct 23 '13 at 09:13
It's control + shutdown button for the dialog, 3 second hold is immediate shutdown. – MachineElf Oct 23 '13 at 10:05
not only turns off the display, but also locks the computer. – Daniel Benedykt Oct 23 '13 at 12:33
2

ctrl+shift+eject since (at least) 10.6 – Filip Haglund Oct 23 '13 at 14:08
As pointed out by Filip, ctrl+shift+eject has been around for years. I don't think many users know this shortcut though. Most people are just bad at shortcuts. – 4ae1e1 Oct 23 '13 at 16:36
and Airs don't have an eject key – dstarh Oct 23 '13 at 20:38
Ctrl+shift+power instead of eject works for MacBook Air (at least on a Mid-2012) – joelseph Oct 23 '13 at 22:19
11

ctrl + shift + eject(or power where no eject key) turns off the display - power key sleeps the Mac. – MachineElf Oct 24 '13 at 11:35
ooooooooh, is THAT what's going on now when I hit the power button? Very confusing change if you're expecting the shutdown dialog box. – emmby Oct 30 '13 at 20:01

score 36 · Answer 7 · answered Oct 22 '13 at 22:00

36

Using multiple desktops on multiple displays is finally usable. Now I can switch desktops on my left hand monitor while the right hand monitor doesn't change.

answered Oct 22 '13 at 22:00

Moriarty

151
2
11

Can you elaborate on how this has changed from Mountain Lion? – Shog9 Oct 23 '13 at 02:35
Put a Safari window on both displays. Cover them both with Finder windows. Now, on the left monitor, bring the Safari window to the foreground... pre-Mavericks, it would bring Safari to the foreground on both monitors. Maybe that's not what he's describing, but if it is I too find this a boon to my productivity. – IAmNaN Oct 23 '13 at 02:44
10

I wouldn't exactly call this an under documented feature. It is one of the 'tent pole' features of Mavericks. – Steve Moser Oct 23 '13 at 03:20
20

You are right that it's not under-documented. But the question originally asked "What are your favourite features in Mavericks?". It has since been significantly rephrased, thus pulling the rug out from underneath my answer. – Moriarty Oct 23 '13 at 03:29
1

I was looking forward to this feature, but actually find it doesn't work how I'd like it to at all. I expected each display would get its own row of workspaces, but it doesn't -- instead you keep the same number of workspaces all the time, divided between whatever displays are being used. One very annoying negative of this is that you can no longer drag a window off the edge of a display onto the neighbouring workspace any more, when using multiple displays. – calum_b Oct 23 '13 at 09:59
2

@scottishwildcat - Yeah, that only works if the workspace you're dragging the window to is a desktop (as opposed to a full-screened app). – Nick Chammas Oct 23 '13 at 23:40
@scottishwildcat, I currently have Finder Safari and the desktop open on my main screen, And I'm just a desktop and another Safari window open on my external screen. So I don't understand what you mean by needing the same number of workspaces all the time. Also I can drag windows between desktops, but obviously not from a desktop. And can drag tabs from a full screen Safari onto a desktop on another screen. Perhaps you haven't ticked the box "displays have separate screens" in mission control preferences? – Jonathan. Oct 25 '13 at 17:46
I have that preference checked, and now I can no longer drag windows to other workspaces on the same display, without using Mission Control. This is annoying and I don't really understand why it's no longer possible. – calum_b Oct 25 '13 at 19:13
As to the other point, hard to explain in a comment, but I was just surprised that when adding new workspaces on an external display, they didn't disappear again when I disconnected that display. So the external display doesn't have its 'own' workspaces as such, it just borrows from the main pool when connected. Which is a bit confusing, since when using a single display, that pool is conceptually arranged as a single row, but when you connect an external one, it suddenly splits into two rows with not necessarily the same number of workspaces in each. – calum_b Oct 25 '13 at 19:17
The whole feature is kinda buggy at the moment o.O – Martin Marconcini Nov 01 '13 at 06:28

score 33 · Answer 8 · answered Oct 22 '13 at 22:49

33

The battery menu in the top bar now shows apps using high amounts of energy - nice for killing energy-hogs:

enter image description here

answered Oct 22 '13 at 22:49

I'ma swipe your picture for my answer on Activity Monitor... I hope you like the source code I used to edit my post. – bmike Oct 23 '13 at 04:07

grg · Answer 9 · 2013-12-16T17:51:59.233

30

Move Dashboard in Mission Control

You can now drag to rearrange the Dashboard to move it between your desktop spaces and full screen apps. It can even be dragged to alternative monitors, providing that "Displays have separate Spaces" is enabled in System Preferences → Mission Control.

edited Dec 16 '13 at 17:51

answered Oct 22 '13 at 19:11

grg

201,078

You can move Desktop 1, too. In Mountain Lion, you could only move Desktop 2 and up. – daGUY Oct 23 '13 at 18:09
How did you make the GIF like that? That's clever! – Danijel-James W Oct 28 '13 at 06:04
2

@DanijelJ With LICEcap :) – grg Oct 28 '13 at 09:57

score 30 · Answer 10 · edited Jun 15 '20 at 08:04

30

Mac App Store Notifications Now Include Multiple "Later" Options

You can choose from a handful of times in the future to remind you about pending updates from the Mac App Store.

enter image description here

Credit to this reddit.com/r/mac post.

edited Jun 15 '20 at 08:04

Community

1

answered Oct 23 '13 at 20:36

p.campbell

1,435

Ɱark Ƭ · Answer 11 · 2013-10-23T14:14:12.230

24

Battery Life

It's hard to beat getting an additional hour of use on a battery charge. I've been getting at least that much more use before having to plug in my 2012 MacBook Air. My experience matches up well with Apple's claim during the announcement keynote where the 13 inch Air from 2013 with Haswell benchmarked with another hour to an hour and a half of battery life just by installing Mavericks.

edited Oct 23 '13 at 14:14

answered Oct 22 '13 at 20:37

Ɱark Ƭ

9,566

1

Is this really a new / undocumented feature? Do you know if there's any connection to the battery monitoring that Undo points out? – Shog9 Oct 23 '13 at 02:35
@shog9 This is the net effect of many fundamental hidden under the hood features of Mavericks. I'm not yet sure which of the alphabet soup of features announced publicly today make this possible. This most certainly is part of the monitoring now in place to report energy use that both Undo and I have reported on this thread. – bmike Oct 23 '13 at 04:20
I don't believe that this is a valid answer. Linking a comparison between it an Win8 doesn't show us anything about what's improved since 10.8. Give us a list of features of what's caused this improvement. – agweber Oct 23 '13 at 14:04
1

Somebody is putting words in my mouth, and the answer is confusing. All I was trying to say is that the biggest immediate improvement since going to 10.9 is the improved battery life on my 2012 11" MBA. That is a fantastic feature. Getting better performance from my hardware by just upgrading some software is pretty amazing. – Ɱark Ƭ Oct 23 '13 at 14:11
Could list; iTunes HD Playback Efficiency, Safari Power Saver, App Nap in more detail than is included from http://www.apple.com/osx/advanced-technologies/ – agweber Oct 23 '13 at 14:32
This is not un(der)-document at all! They stressed this out a lot. :P – entropid Oct 24 '13 at 04:05
This question didn't state under documented when I posted my answer. I was about favorite Mavericks features. – Ɱark Ƭ Oct 24 '13 at 10:49

score 24 · Answer 12 · answered Oct 25 '13 at 15:20

24

Finder messages are now Notification Center alerts

Prior to Mavericks, alerts from Finder would show up as a modal window, however they now show as a Notification Center alert, such as below:

answered Oct 25 '13 at 15:20

grg

201,078

score 22 · Answer 13 · edited Oct 24 '13 at 15:05

Disable App Nap on a per app basis in OS X Mavericks:

You may or may not know that one of the more discreet features in OSX Mavericks will be App Nap.

Apps will enter App Nap when they’re completely hidden from view by other apps and when they aren’t actively working. This is a great way to reduce your running apps from killing your Mac’s battery life.

Also, you may want certain apps to never enter App Nap. This could be true for apps that are important to you but sometimes perform long non-interactive tasks.

To prevent apps from entering App Nap, go to Finder -> Applications -> right click on the app you want -> click on Get Info -> and look for the option that says “Prevent App Nap” right under the copyright section, as shown on the picture below:

enter image description here

Please note that said option won’t be there for apps that don’t support App Nap.

@Mark I believe that's what they said at WWDC - all Cocoa apps support it out of the box, but there are some API calls that can be implemented so your app knows about it.. — , Oct 22 '13 at 22:49

score 21 · Answer 14 · answered Oct 22 '13 at 19:44

21

Show Desktop using Trackpad now follows motion

Using the Show Desktop gesture, the motion of the windows now follows the motion of your fingers on the trackpad. No longer is it a set speed, you can move the windows at the exact speed of your fingers, and even pull them back half way through to cancel the motion.

answered Oct 22 '13 at 19:44

grg

201,078

1

I think this is probably my least favorite feature (that I've noticed so far). It's the same for 5-finger swipe to launch pad, and a quick swipe is no longer smooth, it stutters before deciding on going to the launch pad or fading out of it. – JuJoDi Oct 23 '13 at 01:28
Pure toy, usability disaster. The animation of hiding the windows serves no real purpose, it should be as brief as possible. – Konrad Rudolph Oct 25 '13 at 12:27
1

One of the best features. I enables you to have a quick look on your desktop without also doing the oposite gestures afterwards. – bot47 Apr 16 '14 at 19:38

score 20 · Answer 15 · answered Oct 24 '13 at 16:02

20

Gatekeeper shows most recent app in System Preferences

After Gatekeeper blocks an app, going to the relevant option in System Preferences shows the app name and a button that allows you to open the app.

"Fantastical.app" was blocked from opening because it is not from an identified developer. 'Open Anyway'

This means it is no longer required for new users to know that clicking Open from the right-click menu will bypass Gatekeeper.

answered Oct 24 '13 at 16:02

grg

201,078

It still requires them to know about and be able to find the Gatekeeper security settings though. I’m ready to bet that almost all casual users won’t be able to run non-App-Store applications because of that. – Konrad Rudolph Oct 26 '13 at 14:25

score 19 · Answer 16 · edited Oct 22 '13 at 21:39

19

Open PSDs directly in Safari

You can now preview PSD files (Photoshop Documents) directly in Safari without actually opening Preview, or even downloading the PSD to your Downloads folder.

edited Oct 22 '13 at 21:39

p.campbell

1,435

answered Oct 22 '13 at 19:48

grg

201,078

I am not sure what you mean by "without downloading" but QuickLook works for PSDs in 10.8 too – beroe Oct 23 '13 at 14:58
@beroe Clearly OP means a PSD file online. – 4ae1e1 Oct 23 '13 at 16:37
@beroe The quote was taken out of vital context: "downloading the PSD to your Downloads folder". …and yes, whilst QL has worked for PSDs, now they will display in Safari. – grg Oct 23 '13 at 16:43

score 19 · Answer 17 · answered Oct 22 '13 at 22:05

19

AirPlay display:

The Apple TV makes it easy to see on your TV the media content that is on your Mac, such as to stream videos or photos.

In OS X Mountain Lion, you could also mirror your Desktop to the Apple TV, such as for presentations.

OS X Mavericks takes that to the next step, treating the Apple TV as just another monitor, so you can extend your desktop onto an Apple TV-connected TV or projector.

answered Oct 22 '13 at 22:05

Simon

7,451

How well does this actually work? I've struggled getting any usability from this... http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/106264/airplay-quality-issue-from-macbook-pro – Charlie74 Oct 24 '13 at 19:26

score 15 · Answer 18 · answered Oct 24 '13 at 07:51

15

Enhanced Dictation

Enhanced Dictation allows offline use and continuous dictation with live feedback.

Great for those without Internet connections and those not wanting to have their dictation processed outside of their network.

Dictation and Speech settings

answered Oct 24 '13 at 07:51

Graham Miln

43,776

I've been using this quite a bit... mostly because I enjoy the live feedback. – Charlie74 Oct 24 '13 at 19:24
When I checked out this panel, I found Use Enhanced Dictation was already checked, but I didn't recall it downloading the offline data. Clicking Off then On started the download… apparently. – Mattie Oct 24 '13 at 19:49
Apparently it is checked by default, but it doesn't actually download the data until the first time you use dictation. – asmeurer Oct 25 '13 at 07:06
The Use Enhanced Dictation was not checked after I upgraded from Mac OS X 10.8. I also had dictation disabled in Mac OS X 10.8. The settings being upgraded may influence the initial state in Mac OS X 10.9. – Graham Miln Oct 25 '13 at 07:51

score 15 · Answer 19 · answered Oct 24 '13 at 08:02

15

ColorSync Utility: New Calculator

This little known included application continues to improve with a new colour Calculator.

Colour Calculator

Not new to Mavericks but certainly hidden, ColorSync continues to provide interactive 3D colour space visualisation for profiles.

3D colour space

answered Oct 24 '13 at 08:02

Graham Miln

43,776

WHOA, that is super cool! – cbowns Oct 25 '13 at 18:53
Color calculator isn't new; it's been there since 10.7 at least. – kirb Oct 26 '13 at 01:45
Thanks @kirb. Mavericks is the first time I have actively noticed the calculator. Have they changed anything in ColorSync Utility for this update? – Graham Miln Oct 26 '13 at 09:39
@GrahamMiln, just compared side-by-side with 10.8; only change I could see was the new dropdown and checkbox at the bottom of the calculator. – kirb Oct 26 '13 at 13:27

score 11 · Answer 20 · answered Oct 22 '13 at 20:42

11

Improved Multiple Screen Support

It is pretty awesome having a menu bar on each screen and being able to full screen apps on a per screen basis. I never used full screen mode before since I always had the linen background on my other screen.

answered Oct 22 '13 at 20:42

Ɱark Ƭ

9,566

1

I was looking forward to this feature, but actually find it doesn't work how I'd like it to at all. I expected each display would get its own row of workspaces, but it doesn't -- instead you keep the same number of workspaces all the time, divided between whatever displays are being used. One very annoying negative of this is that you can no longer drag a window off the edge of a display onto the neighbouring workspace any more, when using multiple displays. – calum_b Oct 23 '13 at 10:02
1

@scottishwildcat I may misunderstand your description but taken literally it’s the opposite of true: that’s exactly what Mavericks provides: each display has its own row of spaces now, and you can absolutely drag windows between spaces and screens, both when using multiple windows and when not. – Konrad Rudolph Oct 25 '13 at 12:30
@KonradRudolph Maybe I didn't describe what I expected very well (and it's probably not worth trying to explain again here), but I definitely can't just drag windows onto neighbouring workspaces on the same display any more, I have to use Mission Control for that now. I can only drag windows between displays. – calum_b Oct 25 '13 at 14:31
@scottishwildcat Ah, now I see what you want. Yes, you indeed need Mission Control for that. Pity, but the old way of dragging between spaces was quite sluggish anyway. – Konrad Rudolph Oct 25 '13 at 17:37
I didn't even know you could do that, but I think thats worth losing to have a different set of Spaces for each screen. – Jonathan. Oct 25 '13 at 17:48
@scottishwildcat You can still use Control → and Control ←, even while dragging, to switch spaces. – Jean-Philippe Pellet Oct 29 '13 at 11:41
@JPP Doesn't work for me... aside from the fact Ctrl and arrow keys are on opposite sides of my MBP keyboard so I wouldn't have any hands left to drag anything if I had to do that, as soon as I start dragging, my 'switch workspace' shortcuts (which luckily I redefined to Cmd+Alt+arrow many years ago) stop working. – calum_b Oct 29 '13 at 15:24
@Jonathan I don't understand why we need to lose it all, though. I can't see any reason it shouldn't still work with the new model. – calum_b Oct 29 '13 at 15:26
@scottishwildcat Did you check the Missing Control shortcuts in the Keyboard pref pane? – Jean-Philippe Pellet Oct 29 '13 at 15:42
@scottishwildcat, because when you drag a window to the edge of the screen should it go to the external monitor or to the next space of the current monitor? Most people will expect it to go to the other monitor. – Jonathan. Oct 29 '13 at 20:21
@Jonathan I have my monitors arranged vertically, and OS X knows that because I had to tell it, so that shouldn't be an issue in my case at least. – calum_b Oct 30 '13 at 10:04

score 11 · Answer 21 · answered Oct 22 '13 at 22:07

11

Driving directions for iOS:

OS X Mavericks adopts iOS's Maps app. That by itself is not a huge deal, even though it's nice to have an alternative to Google's Web-based maps. But what's cool is the ability to get driving directions and send them to your iPhone or other iOS 7-based device. They show up in the iOS Maps app, ready for you to follow while driving or walking, and they remain in your bookmarked directions for access later if needed.

answered Oct 22 '13 at 22:07

Simon

7,451

How does it transfer these? I would have originally thought AirDrop, but AirDrop on OS X is not compatible with AirDrop on iOS. Bluetooth? Some iCloud magic? – xdumaine Oct 24 '13 at 19:20

Erik Madsen · Answer 22 · 2013-11-07T09:24:42.157

11

New Safari setting to power off plugins when inactive to save battery life as featured in this Ars Technica article.

I have high expectations that this will stop the issues occurring when my girlfriend has 15 tabs with flash players open in the background while working in other programs.

edited Nov 07 '13 at 09:24

answered Oct 23 '13 at 07:39

Erik Madsen

571

But will it stop the issues when the girlfriend has 15 tabs with flash players open in the background... in Firefox? – Michael Oct 23 '13 at 20:08
12

@Michael No. In that case you will have to change to a newer version of girlfriend that supports Safari. – Erik Madsen Oct 23 '13 at 20:12

score 11 · Answer 23 · edited Oct 25 '13 at 12:24

11

Easily Identify New Apps:

If you use Launchpad, any new apps you download will sparkle to denote their newness.

Once you acknowledge them, or they've sat there neglected for awhile, the sparkles will disappear.

enter image description here

edited Oct 25 '13 at 12:24

mmmmmm

30,160

answered Oct 23 '13 at 13:45

Simon

7,451

score 10 · Answer 24 · edited Jun 15 '20 at 08:04

10

Move Dock Between Monitors

The Dock starts on your main monitor, but if you put your cursor in another monitor, go to the bottom of the screen, and then keep moving down, the Dock will pop up (and disappear from wherever it was previously). This is really nice if your "main" monitor isn't actually.

The motion has to be pretty straight down and surprisingly long - it's a bit finicky.

edited Jun 15 '20 at 08:04

Community

1

answered Oct 23 '13 at 00:25

Aaron Dufour

101

2

This is applicable only if your dock is at the bottom (I have it on the left). – rm -rf Oct 23 '13 at 02:30
1

@rm-rf True; if you use the left/right options it is locked to the left/right side of the left-/right-most monitor. – Aaron Dufour Oct 23 '13 at 13:56
@AaronDufour How do you disable this feature? – Alexej Magura Oct 28 '13 at 18:31
@AlexejMagura I haven't found a way to disable it. Feel free to add it if you find one. – Aaron Dufour Oct 28 '13 at 19:16

score 10 · Answer 25 · answered Oct 23 '13 at 18:36

10

Responsive scrolling

In Mountain Lion and earlier, any window content that doesn't fit in the current frame of the window (like a long webpage) isn't drawn until scrolled into view. In Mavericks, this offscreen content is "pre-rendered" during idle time, which results in vastly improved scrolling performance (especially noticeable with complex documents or webpages).

answered Oct 23 '13 at 18:36

daGUY

7,813

2

In general, though, I've found the scrolling performance, at least in Safari, significantly more sluggish (Macbook Air 11" 2012). Was trying to see if someone had a trick for disabling Timer Coalescing to see if that was the culprit. – Michael Scott Asato Cuthbert Oct 24 '13 at 04:53

score 10 · Answer 26 · answered Oct 24 '13 at 10:51

Disable Notification Center on the Lock Screen:

enter image description here

Notification Center doesn't see a whole lot of improvement this time around, but the update does mess with your settings a little bit. If you're not a fan of getting a million notifications, you're going to want to pop into System Preferences > Notifications and take a look at the new options. The big one to check is "Show notifications on lock screen."

If you don't want your emails or anything else showing when you're computer is locked, uncheck this box.

If you want nothing, you have to uncheck the box for each separate application? That's a pain… why can't it be a global setting?! — F'x, Oct 25 '13 at 21:58

score 10 · Answer 27 · answered Oct 25 '13 at 15:14

10

Zoom pictures in QuickLook

You can now zoom pictures in QuickLook using the default zoom gestures: Pinch In & Pinch Out, as well as panning with two fingers.

answered Oct 25 '13 at 15:14

grg

201,078

Pressing alt works as well – Agos Oct 30 '13 at 13:27
@Agos Pressing alt has worked since forever afaik… – grg Oct 30 '13 at 13:39

grg · Answer 28 · 2013-10-25T17:23:12.187

10

Debug menus have been updated

The debug menus have been updated for various apps.

_{Below is the debug menu for App Store and Contacts:}

To activate the menus, run the following commands (and restart the apps):

defaults write com.apple.appstore ShowDebugMenu -bool true
defaults write com.apple.AddressBook ABShowDebugMenu -bool true

Replace true with false to remove.

edited Oct 25 '13 at 17:23

answered Oct 25 '13 at 15:17

grg

201,078

How to activate these menus? – hashier Oct 25 '13 at 17:01
1

@hashier See Terminal commands in edit. – grg Oct 25 '13 at 17:23
Do you now a defaults that activates this on ALL application? Or do you know any more applications where I can activate it? – hashier Oct 25 '13 at 19:54
@hashier Unfortunately, the key is slightly different for each app, so the -g (global) flag doesn't work… Many of Apple's apps include a debug menu, including Safari (different from the Develop menu), Disk Utility, Calendar, and many more. I seem to remember a list of apps and their relevant defaults key required to enable it, however I can't find it at the moment. Once I find it I'll edit the post and ping you - until then, Google [app name] debug menu to see if/what the command is for enabling the menu for each app. Don't forget this works for some 3rd-party apps too :) – grg Oct 25 '13 at 21:11
In Safari there's an option in the preferences to enable the Debug menu. – Martin Marconcini Oct 26 '13 at 05:55
@Martin There's an option to enable the Develop menu, which is substantially different to the Debug menu :) – grg Oct 26 '13 at 07:57
@grgarside damn, I must stop reading this late at night… ;) – Martin Marconcini Oct 27 '13 at 02:29

score 8 · Answer 29 · answered Oct 24 '13 at 10:48

iCloud Keychain stores and syncs Secure Notes across Macs.

The new iCloud Keychain stores website usernames and passwords, credit card numbers and Wi-Fi network information and keeps the data up to date across all of a person's Apple devices, including the iPhone and iPad.

It also stores and syncs Secure Notes across Macs, like this:

score 6 · Answer 30 · edited Oct 23 '13 at 19:15

6

Notification Center appears on current monitor

In a multi-monitor setup, Notification Center now appears on the monitor where your cursor is currently located. This is a nice improvement if you invoke it while you're working on a secondary monitor: it appears on the monitor you're looking at, rather than the primary.

edited Oct 23 '13 at 19:15

njahnke

143

answered Oct 23 '13 at 18:04

daGUY

7,813

Extra points if someone can find a trick to disable that. I like all my notifications and crap to be on the other monitor so I have one for pure work. – Michael Scott Asato Cuthbert Oct 24 '13 at 05:50

score 6 · Answer 31 · answered Oct 23 '13 at 20:32

6

You can now sort your documents in Finder even when you have the grouping feature turned on. (For example you group the download folder by filetype and files inside the group are sorted by name)

answered Oct 23 '13 at 20:32

Nils

1

avi · Answer 32 · 2013-10-26T16:24:04.407

5

Now you can see which all apps are using your location. And you will also a new Privacy tab in Security & Privacy in System Preferences :

enter image description here

edited Oct 26 '13 at 16:24

answered Oct 25 '13 at 06:28

avi

527

score 5 · Answer 33 · answered Oct 25 '13 at 15:24

5

Safari tells you when a tab crashed

Whilst Safari has always been able to restart crashed tabs, now it tells you when it's done so:

answered Oct 25 '13 at 15:24

grg

201,078

Now that is both cool and useful to have. – bmike Oct 26 '13 at 16:41

score 4 · Answer 34 · edited Oct 24 '13 at 16:09

4

Messages (iMessages) can be created quickly in Notification Center

edited Oct 24 '13 at 16:09

grg

201,078

answered Oct 24 '13 at 16:06

Christian Fries

131
5

score 4 · Answer 35 · edited Apr 24 '18 at 23:56

4

Full screen finder:

Pretty simple, but really nice.

edited Apr 24 '18 at 23:56

Community

1

answered Oct 25 '13 at 10:45

Fuad Saud

260

4

still no two finger swipe for back and forward though :( – Jonathan. Oct 25 '13 at 17:38
… and apparently no hotkeys for switching between tabs? I thought the whole point of tabs here was that they behave exactly as in Safari … – Konrad Rudolph Oct 26 '13 at 14:26
2

@KonradRudolph cmd + shift + { works for me – Fuad Saud Oct 28 '13 at 13:07
@fuadksd So it does. I could have sworn that Safari has a different combination. Still kind of annoying that there’s no agreed-on standard, so that all other application use different keys (in particular Firefox, Chrome, Opera using ⌘+⌥+arrow keys (EDIT: I just realise that they also support Safari’s style). – Konrad Rudolph Oct 28 '13 at 13:50
It supports both cmd + {|} and ctrl + shift + tab. Those are supported by safari, and I think, they're like, Cocoa standards. – Fuad Saud Oct 28 '13 at 18:42
ctrl + tab works, however it doesn't in Safari? +1 for same shortcuts in all apps! – MachineElf Oct 30 '13 at 23:00
ctrl + tab works in Safari – Fuad Saud Oct 31 '13 at 00:52

Simon · Answer 36 · 2013-10-25T11:27:48.990

Using Speakable Items and Automator To Command Your Mac By Voice:

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) uses an automator script and the new "Speakable Items" option in Mavericks to achieve this:

System Preferences > Accessibility > Speakable Items to launch apps.

When it's set up, you simply hit a key on your keyboard, speak a phrase, and that launches the apps you choose.

Their example is a simple "Good morning" to start your day.

There is a list of preprogrammed things you can say to command your Mac as well.

They have a video tutorial which takes you through the various steps.

Redandwhite · Answer 37 · 2013-10-25T22:24:22.327

4

Fairly certain that System Preferences has had some visual tweaks, including larger text and icons. There's a new iCloud icon too.

Edit: As per comments, the category titles have been removed.

prefs

edited Oct 25 '13 at 22:24

answered Oct 25 '13 at 19:39

Redandwhite

3,087

2

They removed the category titles from each section, too. – daGUY Oct 25 '13 at 21:43

score 4 · Answer 38 · answered Oct 26 '13 at 16:26

4

LinkedIn and few others are now supported in Internet Accounts :

enter image description here

answered Oct 26 '13 at 16:26

avi

527

score 4 · Answer 39 · answered Oct 29 '13 at 18:41

4

Automatically Installs Updates

My favorite feature is the ability to have updates install automatically in the background just like they do in iOS 7.

answered Oct 29 '13 at 18:41

Gavin Anderson

70
4

score 4 · Answer 40 · answered Nov 08 '13 at 15:20

Charging state of an iPad is notified to the user

Because of insufficient current on some Macs, especially older ones or because of USB multipliers, iPads can't get charged or they only get charged when their screen is idle.

Of course, Mavericks can't fix this situation, it's basically an electrical problem but it seems that Apple now made it a little bit more manageable by notifying the user through a Notification Center message if their iPad is not being charged when plugged to their Mac.

enter image description here

I had no idea that some Macs could charge iPads - charging works with Retina Macbook Pro late 2013. — RichVel, Dec 03 '13 at 06:16

score 4 · Answer 41 · edited Dec 26 '18 at 12:16

4

Finder Tabs

Safari Style

Command + T opens a new tab (as it does in Safari)
Right click (or control + click) a file or folder within a finder window > "open in Tab"
Control + Tab to cycle through each
Bunch of open Finder windows? Window > "Merge all Windows" to neatly arrange into one Finder window with tabs.

edited Dec 26 '18 at 12:16

Glorfindel

4,057

answered Nov 11 '13 at 00:42

njboot

8,541

score 4 · Answer 42 · answered Nov 15 '13 at 07:27

4

Activity Monitor tells you what pages a Safari process has open

If you mouseover any Safari subprocess in Activity Monitor you can see what pages are loaded in the process in the tooltip.

answered Nov 15 '13 at 07:27

CyberSkull

2,567

score 3 · Answer 43 · answered Oct 28 '13 at 05:52

3

The Mail.app for Mavericks supports exporting emails now as PDF files, which is useful. Although if attempting to export multiple emails as PDF, it will simply generate multiple PDF's rather than appending one large PDF file.

answered Oct 28 '13 at 05:52

Ospho

101

score 3 · Answer 44 · answered Nov 09 '13 at 11:28

Disable Mavericks Spelling Autocorrection:

If you get frustrated when OS X 10.9 attempts to autocorrect the multiple technology words that it doesn’t recognize. You should be able to disable the autocorrection feature either globally or on a per application basis.

In theory you should be able to disable it globally or disable it only in certain applications. I have not found that the global disable actually seems to turn off the corrections in all applications though. this is most probably a bug that will be fixed in future Mavericks updates. It is helpful to disable it only in specific applications anyway.

Disable Spelling Autocorrection in all Applications:

Select Keyboards under System Preferences.
Under the Text tab uncheck correct spelling automatically.

Disable Autocorrection for a Specific Application:

Open the Apple application that you want autocorrection disabled.
Right-click (or ctrl-click) into any text field. From the context menu that appears, under Spelling and Grammar uncheck Correct Spelling Automatically.

enter image description here

Remember that various applications can handle spelling correction in multiple different ways. Many applications will maintain the consistency of OS X and have this option available when right-clicking (ctrl-clicking) a text field. Disabling autocorrection in Chrome, for example, is handled this way.

Other applications such as Firefox may require you hunting through the Preferences to disable the autocorrection feature.

score 2 · Answer 45 · edited Jun 15 '20 at 08:04

2

iCloud Sync:

Automator and AppleScript Editor, both apps have been updated with iCloud compatibility. AppleScripts that you've created or Automator workflows can now be moved into the cloud and synced to all of your Macs that are running OS X Mavericks.

It's useful if you're creating and updating scripts or workflows that need to be deployed to a handful of Macs automatically.

edited Jun 15 '20 at 08:04

Community

1

answered Oct 23 '13 at 20:38

Simon

7,451

Ɱark Ƭ · Answer 46 · 2013-10-24T17:28:44.767

Show Twitter feed in Safari's Sidebar

Update: It's not the complete feed, just messages with URLs embedded in them.

Being able to see your twitter feed in a Safari Sidebar is pretty cool, and definitely under documented.

Add your Twitter credentials to the "Internet Accounts" panel of "System Preferences."
Click on the "open book" icon in the new Safari bookmark bar.
Select "Shared Links" or use the keyboard shortcut ^⌘3 to toggle "Shared Links".

I believe that this is all that I did to be able to see my twitter feed in the safari sidebar.

score 2 · Answer 47 · answered Oct 25 '13 at 10:50

2

Messages now has a color setting called auto, which will color the messages of the person you're talking to in the way that they color their own messages.

answered Oct 25 '13 at 10:50

JuJoDi

197

This has existed for ages, right? I'm sure I used that back in Snow Leopard, and possibly before?… (At least with iChat) – grg Oct 25 '13 at 15:11
Oh yup, you're right, I just checked my mountain lion machine. Maybe it just defaulted to that setting when I upgraded and I never noticed. So then it's just a cool under-documented feature of OSX hahah – JuJoDi Oct 25 '13 at 15:16

score 2 · Answer 48 · answered Oct 26 '13 at 16:28

2

This not exactly a useful feature, Java seems to be not installed by default and when you try to check java version in terminal, it takes you to the download page. Run this in terminal : java -version

enter image description here

as a feature, I find this quickest way to install Java :P

answered Oct 26 '13 at 16:28

avi

527

2

This was also the case in Lion and Mountain Lion, I believe. – Mattie Oct 30 '13 at 22:52
Isn't it unsafe to install Java or something ? – Render Nov 09 '13 at 11:56

Simon · Answer 49 · 2013-10-30T19:56:51.237

Hidden Dock won’t appear in fullscreen apps:

You may find that the Dock won’t show up from the bottom or right/left side (depending on where you put it) when apps are in fullscreen, and when you fast-move the cursor to where your Dock is hidden or when you pause right there and let the cursor hover. No Dock.

Here’s the trick:

You need to move the cursor very slowly. That’s all you need to do. If you move it too fast to the edge of your screen, the Dock won’t show up.

score 2 · Answer 50 · answered Nov 25 '13 at 04:13

2

Side dock has new UI

It now looks like this (I really like the light that indicates which apps are open, it's a lot more clearer than the bottom dock):

enter image description here

answered Nov 25 '13 at 04:13

Enrico Susatyo

2,998

score 1 · Answer 51 · answered Jun 05 '14 at 23:35

Event reminders based on travel time

When you create an event in Calendar, you can specify a location. If the address is recognized, it'll insert a map right in the event details (and even give you the current weather conditions!).

But it goes even further. Calendar can also determine your current location, so you can tell it to calculate the travel time to the event based on where you currently are. If you do, that gives you a new alert option: "when I need to leave."

This is so much better than the old fixed-time options (1 hour before, 30 minutes before, etc.) because it's dynamic based on where you are and how far you need to drive.

score 0 · Answer 52 · answered Oct 30 '13 at 01:34

0

Did someone noticed that the Remove from Dock option on the Trash icon's context menu in the Dock is gone. I clicked that a couple of times accidentally and then had to bring it back in Mountain Lion.

answered Oct 30 '13 at 01:34

Imran S.

101
3

Bob · Answer 53 · 2013-10-24T03:41:25.413

iBooks (for Mac) stinks (can't edit any metadata, kinda flakey about syncing with my iPad, you now have to interact with two programs to manage your books, etc.), but if you were unfortunate enough to have it suck all of your books out of iTunes and into its universe before you knew what was going on then here are a couple of tips.

To delete a book or PDF select the book and hit the Delete key. (There was something in iTunes that worked in that same non-intuitive way, wasn't there?)

To reduce the the flakiness of the sync I had to double-home-button-kill iBooks on my iPad, then try syncing again. It helped.

If out of habit you drag a PDF into iTunes it will be gladly accepted, but you won't be able to see it anymore, because the Books category is gone and there's no Library category anymore. It will show up as Music and you can delete it from there.

UPDATE: 9:30pm: NOW there's a "Delete" item showing up when you right-click on a book in the popup menu. That hasn't been there all day. Have no idea what made it start showing up. This program needs some work. It should have been iBooks beta.

This might work better as a stand-alone question where you state the issues you have and how you have tried to solve them. — bmike, Oct 25 '13 at 22:21

What features of Mavericks are beneficial to you?

53 Answers53

Secret Wallpapers

Put your computer to sleep quickly

Move Dashboard in Mission Control

Mac App Store Notifications Now Include Multiple "Later" Options

Finder messages are now Notification Center alerts

Show Desktop using Trackpad now follows motion

Gatekeeper shows most recent app in System Preferences

Open PSDs directly in Safari

Enhanced Dictation

ColorSync Utility: New Calculator

Move Dock Between Monitors

Responsive scrolling

Zoom pictures in QuickLook

Debug menus have been updated

Notification Center appears on current monitor

Safari tells you when a tab crashed

Automatically Installs Updates

Charging state of an iPad is notified to the user

Finder Tabs

Activity Monitor tells you what pages a Safari process has open

Side dock has new UI

Event reminders based on travel time

Linked

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