Using the Application Windows Feature (Expose) On a Mac

With Application Windows, also called Exposé, you can see all of the windows in use by an app and switch to one. You can also switch to recently-opened documents, or switch to a window in another app entirely.

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Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. Today let's take a look at Application Windows, or Exposé on the Mac. 
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There's a feature on your Mac called Application Windows. But it used to be called Exposé and it's actually still called that in a couple of places. Whatever you call it here's how it works. Say you're working in an app, like I'm in TextEdit now, and I've got a ton of windows open. If you activate Application Windows you get to see the windows without them overlapping each other. I'm going to use the keyboard shortcut Control, it's Control not Command, and then the down arrow. You could see how it separates those six windows so I could see them. I could move my cursor over anyone I want and click on the one I want to bring to the front. 
Now there's also a way to activate this using the trackpad. You can use either three or four fingers on the trackpad and swipe down. So I could do that here with my trackpad and it brings it up the same way the keyboard shortcut does. If you go into System Preferences you could see the keyboard shortcut in Keyboard and then Shortcuts, then Mission Control and there's Application Windows. So it has to be activated and there you could customize it. For the Trackpad you have to go to Trackpad and then More Gestures and you'll see App Exposé. So here's a place where Apple still calls it Exposé. You can set it to three or four fingers swiping down. 
But there are other ways to bring it up and there's even more functionality to it. For instance, I could bring it up and then I can move to another app. So let's say I want to see the windows in another app, not TextEdit, I can use now the Tab key and it will switch to another app. I could go through all of my available apps but it only shows the ones that aren't hidden. So right now I have the Finder with several windows as well but I had it hidden before. So now let's launch App Exposé or Application Windows and I could Tab through my apps. You can see there I get to TextEdit, I get to other apps that I'm running, and then back to Finder. Then you could go and simply click on a window in here and it brings that to the front. So you can actually use it as an Application Switcher allowing you to see all the windows open in different apps and then selecting a specific window in a specific app.
Another thing it does is it allows you to see recently opened documents. So let's switch it on and in addition to the six windows here I'll see these other documents here at the bottom. These are ones that are recently opened ones. I can click there and it jumps to it if it's already opened. If it's not already opened it would simply open it up. So it's also a way to view recent documents. 
Now another way to bring this up is to use the Dock. If you select an app in the Dock, say the Finder, and Control click it you can select Show All Windows. That goes into the same Application Windows or Exposé view. You could also double tap with two fingers on the trackpad any item in the Dock and it will bring it up. This works even if it's not the current app. So, for instance, I could have Safari as my front most app and I could go over to another app like the Finder and I could tap twice with two fingers and it brings up Exposé for the Finder. This also works on the Magic Mouse using two fingers and tapping twice on the surface of the mouse but not clicking down. I also find it works with one finger, for me, on the Magic Mouse. Two taps but not a full click.
So that makes it really easy to switch to a window in another app. I could go over to TextEdit here in the Dock. I could tap with two fingers. Select the window I want. Now it jumps right there. Look how it didn't even bring the other TextEdit windows to the front.  I still see Safari as the next window behind this TextEdit window. Better yet, it works with apps that aren't even running. For instance, I have Pages not running right now. But if I tap twice with two fingers it brings it up saying no available windows for Pages but I see the recent document here. So I can double tap on Pages with two fingers on the trackpad here and then select a Document and it will open up Pages and open up that document. It even works pretty well with just the keyboard. I can do Control down arrow. I can move between these windows with the arrow keys including the recent documents here at the bottom. I can switch to a document just by pressing Return and it opens it up. 
The one place it doesn't work well at all is if you have a full screen app. So I've enlarged this Pages window to be a full screen window here. So I've got, actually in Mission Control, you see my Desktop and then Pages is in Full Screen. Now almost none of that works. If I do Control and down arrow it doesn't bring it up. If I do the gesture on my trackpad it doesn't bring it up. If I were to double tap two fingers on the trackpad it doesn't work. Even Control clicking here and choosing Show All Windows won't work. So you really have to be in regular Desktop mode here, not a full screen window, to use this.
Now here's one more trick I want to show you. You can use this with the App Switcher. So the App Switcher is Command and then Tab. Then you could switch between the apps by continuing to hold Command down and then using Tab to move forward. When you're at an app and you want to see the windows in that app you can use either the up arrow, the down arrow, or the number one key. Let's use down arrow here since it's kind of consistent with the other shortcuts. You could see it brings it up for TextEdit right there. At that point I can release the Command key. So, for instance, if I want to see all the Finder windows I can go over to Finder. I can use one of those. Let's press one here and you could see how it brings it up. I can release the Command key. I can continue to use the arrow keys to select the window and then Return to jump to it.
So whether you call it Application Windows or Exposé there's a lot of functionality here. You could use it to switch between windows in the app that you're currently using and you could use it to switch to another window in another app without having to first jump to that app and then find the window in it. 
Hope you found this useful. Thanks for watching.

Comments: 12 Responses to “Using the Application Windows Feature (Expose) On a Mac”

Robert Rutledge

9 months ago

Lovely concept but it sure doesn't work in Apple Mail. If I have two new messages in the works I still have to the menu bar window menu to switch to the one I want. Expose only shows the message viewer in one frame and the new message I have used most recently in the other frame. Am I missing something?

Gary Rosenzweig

Robert: Definitely works with multiple Mail composition windows. Maybe you have one of those minimized?

Ger

It's also a handy option for "hot windows".

Razvan Mihai

Gary: Thanks for the well-explained tips. I often find myself in the scenario where I have an application window opened in desktop 1 (Safari, for example) and a Notes window opened in, let's say, desktop 6. What would be the easiest way to bring the most recent open window of a given app (Notes in our example) into the current desktop (desktop 1 in our example)?

Razvan: You could Click and hold the icon in the Dock, then select Options, Assign To, This Desktop. It will pull the window to the current Desktop.

Yes, Expose works in Mail but NOT if multiple new messages are created in Tabs (which was what was happening in my case). That setting is in System Preferences/General/Prefer Tabs:. Thanks for making me dig deeper. Happy camper now.

Robert: Oh, yes. Tabs are within the window. Expose is about windows.

Gary: Thanks a lot! Tried your suggestion and found that once the app is brought into the current desktop, the extra step of unassigning the app from the desktop is needed. Otherwise, the app will open on that particular desktop going forward. I wish this task could be as quick as Command-Option-Tab, but MacOS seems to be application-focused instead of project-focused.

Razvan: You can always enter Mission Control and then drag and drop the window to the desktop space you want.

Gary: Indeed! But this requires the extra steps of knowing the desktop number you are working on (I swipe up and down with 3 fingers), then moving to the target application with Command-Tap, and ultimately dragging the app with the mouse into the desktop of choice. I find the whole process counter-intuitive. I will give your original suggestion a go. Your tip has the advantage of bringing all the open windows of a given app into the working desktop if this is the intention. Thanks a lot!

nick

Gary: I've been using Mission Control, which shows windows from all open applications, and those from multiple documents with an app (ex Pages). Is there an important difference between Exposè and Mission Control that I'm missing? thx

nick: "App Expose" shows you windows from one app at a time. Mission Control shows you all windows on the current desktop space, across all apps.

Using the Application Windows Feature (Expose) On a Mac

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