MacMost: MacMost Now

A typical problem new Mac users have is a Downloads folder that quickly fills with lots of files taking up a large amount of hard drive space. The Downloads folder is the default location for web downloads and it can be easy to forget to maintain it. It is accessible like any other Finder folder and you can easily sort it and delete or move items from it to keep it clean.

You can switch between the standard keyboard and the Emoji keyboard easily fi you know which key to tap. The key changes its symbol and position depending on which keyboard you are currently using, which can be confusing. You can cycle through your existing keyboards, or just right to a specific keyboard by tapping and holding that key in some cases.

You can open standard MIDI files in GarageBand. You can then view the notes in each track, change them, and change the instrument being used to play that track. You can combine MIDI tracks with other Apple Loops to create interesting remixes of music.

If you have several printers on your network, it can sometimes be difficult to know which one is which. But you can name your printers to make it easier. Names will carry over to other users on your Mac, but not to other Macs or devices on your network.

The iPad Dock is a persistent Home screen feature that allows you to easily switch to your most-used apps. You can customize the left side of the Dock, while the right side shows your most recently used apps. You can also bring the Dock up inside of other apps for quick switching or multitasking.

If you are new to Mac, you may not yet be using the Notes app. This is a handy built-in app where you can store small pieces of text and create lists. When you use iCloud, your Notes sync across all of your devices, so you can create them and edit them anywhere. You can also share notes with other iCloud users.

Some people may prefer digital iTunes gifts instead of physical CDs and DVDs. You can send a specific album, movie, app or book as a gift to another Apple user from within iTunes. You can include a special message and even schedule the gift.

Apple Music users can easily download playlists, albums, artists and songs for offline listening. After a while, you may have a large collection of downloaded music taking up space on your iPhone. You can easily remove these downloads in the Music app, or in the Settings app.

You can use the Photo Booth app on your Mac to simulate a green screen with any stable background. You can use some preset replacement backgrounds, or your own image. The key is to use your Mac's built-in camera and have a stable background and surface for your Mac.

A useful new feature of Photos 3.0 is the ability to see all of your imported photos organized by the time they were imported. You can see all of your imports going back in time. You can use this view like any other, jumping directly to editing or organizing.

If you are new to Mac, then you may not be familiar with the modifier keys like Command, Option and Control. These each have special symbols that you will see in articles and the menu bar. Learn how to use these important modifier keys and how they differ from Windows modifier keys.

You can no longer use your Mac to arrange apps on your iPad or iPhone home screens. But thanks to iOS 11, it is now much easier to do so directly on your iOS device. You can quickly and easily move one app. You can also select multiple apps and move them from screen to screen or into a folder.

When editing text in TextEdit, Pages and other apps, you'll often see options for Kern, Ligatures and Baseline. These adjust the character spacing, combine some letters into a single character, and adjust the vertical positions of the letters. See examples and learn how to use these text features.

The new iTunes version 12.7 removes the ability for iTunes to easily store and sync ringtones to your iPhone. But the method for manually adding and removing ringtones is easier than ever. Learn how to add custom ringtones to your iPhone through iTunes on your Mac.

With the latest versions of iTunes and iOS you can set up a social profile and share playlists and music your are currently listening to with your friends. You can also follow artists and special Apple Music channels to see the latest news and media from your favorite artists.

New Mac users may not know about TextEdit, a simple but deep text editing and word processing tool that comes with your Mac. You can use TextEdit to create documents in cases when a full word processor like Pages or Microsoft Word isn't necessary. TextEdit has two modes: plain text and rich text. You can use the first for writing, notes and coding. You can use the second for word processing. TextEdit also allows you to open Microsoft Word documents which is useful if you are sent one but haven't bought Word.

A new feature in iOS 11 is the ability to zoom in on malls and airports and see inside with accurate maps of interior locations. This can be handy for navigating indoors in these crowded and often confusing places. However, indoor maps are only available for a handful of locations at the moment, with more coming soon.

With iOS 11 you can export documents from many different apps as PDFs using the Share function. Other apps have special save or export functions for PDF creation. But any app that can print can also create a PDF using a hidden feature in the AirPrint function.

In the past it has been tricky to select an entire clip or a range inside a clip in iMovie. With the latest version of iMovie, just clicking on a clip gives you the entire clip, and holding down the R key allows you to select a precise range from within the clip. This works in the timeline as well. The i and o keys can be used to adjust a range start and end.

A new feature in iOS 11 is the ability for Siri to translate your speech into Mandarin, French, German, Italian or Spanish. You can simply ask Siri to translate a word or phrase. Siri will speak the translation aloud, which could help you communicate while traveling. You can also see the text in both languages on the screen.