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You are here: MacNN Forums > Software - Troubleshooting and Discussion > macOS > Dam it! how often I stress out over "Hide Others"?

Dam it! how often I stress out over "Hide Others"?
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porrid
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Feb 27, 2010, 09:13 PM
 
One of the most annoying menu features in the OSX system in the menu application of every app is "Hide Others".

When one however frequently accidentally selects this feature, it cause various levels of stress expecially if your running a heap of apps.

One invariably has to "Show All" in order to get back to where one was.

I have, of late been running 45 apps or so when I suddenly accidently select "Hide Others" to which I scream!

Hey, is there a way of turning that off, say in Secrets or whatever ?
     
Cold Warrior
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Feb 27, 2010, 09:15 PM
 
If you are just trying to hide the active app, why not use the cmd+H keyboard shortcut? It's faster than mousing to and then clicking a menu.
     
turtle777
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Feb 27, 2010, 09:26 PM
 
LOL, I have never used "Hide Others" in 8 years of OS X.

I use Hide active app all the time.

My secret: CMD + H, like CW said

-t
     
moonmonkey
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Feb 27, 2010, 09:36 PM
 
I option click the desktop to hide active app, it's an old System 7 trick, only experts know about this.
     
Hal Itosis
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Feb 28, 2010, 04:49 AM
 
45 apps? Good grief.

I use 9 -->>Spaces<<-- but i (intentionally) want at least one to be empty!

[translation: try Spaces]
-HI-
     
ghporter
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Feb 28, 2010, 08:53 AM
 
Originally Posted by moonmonkey View Post
I option click the desktop to hide active app, it's an old System 7 trick, only experts know about this.
It works great. But not schleps like me know it. Works a lot better than minimizing an app's window, too.

Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
     
Oisín
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Feb 28, 2010, 04:25 PM
 
Cmd + H for the win.

Except of course in those Adobe apps where Adobe—in their infinite wisdom—have decided that this particular, system-wide shortcut should be disabled. Photoshop and Illustrator, I’m looking at you.
     
Spheric Harlot
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Feb 28, 2010, 04:39 PM
 
That's one of a thousand cuts Adobe is killing their market with.

"Interface conventions? **** you! WE'RE THE PLATFORM!"
     
ghporter
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Feb 28, 2010, 07:48 PM
 
Adobe does it seemingly randomly too. Reader respects Cmd+H just fine. I don't have any of the pay Adobe apps on any of my Macs to try them out though.

Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
     
Hal Itosis
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Feb 28, 2010, 08:01 PM
 
Originally Posted by Oisín View Post
Cmd + H for the win.

Except of course in those Adobe apps where Adobe—in their infinite wisdom—have decided that this particular, system-wide shortcut should be disabled. Photoshop and Illustrator, I’m looking at you.

Spaces
FTW.
(FTFY)
-HI-
     
Simon
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Feb 28, 2010, 08:17 PM
 
Nope, he's right on.

Cmd-H FTW.
     
AKcrab
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Feb 28, 2010, 08:43 PM
 
I don't really understand the issue here. You can't possible be looking at 45 windows when you're running 45 apps, so the majority of them are already hidden underneath the 2 (or 3) apps that you *can* see.
     
Hal Itosis
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Mar 1, 2010, 12:22 AM
 
Originally Posted by Simon View Post
Nope, he's right on.

Cmd-H FTW.
Cmd-H doesn't work in Adobe (Photoshop LE for example). Get it yet?

[besides... ⌘H with 45 open apps? any more jokes?]

On top of which.. it's not as if employing Spaces prevents ⌘H from functioning.
-HI-
     
porrid  (op)
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Mar 1, 2010, 12:40 AM
 
Sure I know about Command H to hide apps
its just every now and again I'm in mouse control motivation
I realise I need to get out of that habit
but its difficult for me since I get to much arthritic pain in my left hand to use it much.
this might surprise many but I mostly use only one or two fingers on my right hand to type etc

Yes, I'm likely in the minority here with this rather weird handicap, and mostly I cope, its just every now again I trip up with that menu catastrophe "Hide Others", just wish there a Secret in the Secrets Preferences to deaden that menu choice.

Thank you all for reading and commenting, have a great day.
     
Simon
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Mar 1, 2010, 10:18 AM
 
Originally Posted by Hal Itosis View Post
Cmd-H doesn't work in Adobe (Photoshop LE for example). Get it yet?

[besides... ⌘H with 45 open apps? any more jokes?]

On top of which.. it's not as if employing Spaces prevents ⌘H from functioning.
Lose the attitude. Acting like an ass doesn't make what you say any more convincing.

Cmd-H works fine for 99.9% of all apps. There's no reason not to use it just because it doesn't work in two or three Adobe apps. Which is precisely what Oisín had pointed out. None of what he said needed any 'fixing'. Besides, you should really take your own advice. Just because somebody likes to use Cmd-H doesn't prevent Spaces from functioning.
     
Cold Warrior
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Mar 1, 2010, 10:38 AM
 
Right-click an app's dock icon, choose Hide. It doesn't even offer a Hide Others option, although Quit is right there. If you don't trust your mouse pointer, use the arrow-up key to navigate to Hide if, then spacebar to choose Hide.
     
lpkmckenna
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Mar 1, 2010, 10:47 AM
 
Originally Posted by Hal Itosis View Post
Cmd-H doesn't work in Adobe (Photoshop LE for example). Get it yet?
It's been a while since I bothered with Adobe apps, but I remember PS Elements having an option to respect cmd-h for hiding and using cmd-opt-h or cmd-shift-h instead for Elements.

I used to use Hide Others all the time. I even kept a personalized ctrl-opt-cmd-h shortcut for Show All so I can quickly toggle between Hide Others and Show All. But now I just minimize apps I'm not using, so I can see at a glance what's not on the screen.

Something I'd like to see is a way to "push" a window to another Space with a keystroke. Right now, if I wanted to move this Safari window to another Space I'd have to drag it to another Space (or click-n-hold the titlebar while switching to another Space) and then switch back to my previous Space. A keystroke like ctrl-opt-2 to push the window to Space 2 would be handy, just like cmd-h is handy to push an app out of view. It would also be nice to push an entire app to another Space with a single keystroke.
     
lpkmckenna
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Mar 1, 2010, 10:48 AM
 
Originally Posted by Cold Warrior View Post
Right-click an app's dock icon, choose Hide. It doesn't even offer a Hide Others option, although Quit is right there. If you don't trust your mouse pointer, use the arrow-up key to navigate to Hide if, then spacebar to choose Hide.
Cmd-opt-click on a Dock icon will Hide Others.
     
Hal Itosis
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Mar 1, 2010, 01:43 PM
 
Originally Posted by Simon View Post
Lose the attitude. Acting like an ass doesn't make what you say any more convincing.
Attitude? Acting like an ass?
WTF are you babbling about?


Originally Posted by Simon View Post
Cmd-H works fine for 99.9% of all apps. There's no reason not to use it just because it doesn't work in two or three Adobe apps. Which is precisely what Oisín had pointed out. None of what he said needed any 'fixing'. Besides, you should really take your own advice. Just because somebody likes to use Cmd-H doesn't prevent Spaces from functioning.
So you think it makes more sense to have 45 apps in one space rather than spread them out into several spaces... and for that belief you're willing to resort to name-calling and other childish antics?

I don't even need to point out the ways that will fail... do i?

Chill Simon.
-HI-
     
dimmer
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Mar 1, 2010, 07:11 PM
 
After hitting Hide Others in error, hit Show All, then Hide <Application> should do what you want, no?
     
Simon
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Mar 2, 2010, 12:33 AM
 
Originally Posted by Hal Itosis View Post
Attitude? Acting like an ass?
WTF are you babbling about?
Yeah, thanks. This "discussion" is now over.
     
Oisín
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Mar 2, 2010, 06:20 AM
 
Originally Posted by Hal Itosis View Post
Attitude? Acting like an ass?
So you think it makes more sense to have 45 apps in one space rather than spread them out into several spaces... and for that belief you're willing to resort to name-calling and other childish antics?
First off:
Name-calling and other childish antics? Where? He did no such thing. He just said that acting like an ass doesn’t make your point any clearer, which is true.

More importantly:
Nobody ever said anything about keeping 45 apps in one space, except you. Personally, I dislike Spaces and don’t use the feature; but then again, I have no reason to run 45 apps at the same time, either. On the other hand, I use the Hide function (i.e., Cmd + H) heavily, since I also dislike minimised windows.

When I said “Cmd + H for the win”, I meant that for the purpose of hiding an app, hitting Cmd + H is far superior to going to the app menu and choosing “Hide app” from a list with your pointing device of choice. Simply telling someone to use Spaces is completely irrelevant since it doesn’t hide the app, it just moves you to a different space.

And, as Simon pointed out, the behaviour of Cmd + H doesn’t change one iota whether you use Spaces or not. They’re completely separate and unrelated functionalities. There’s no reason to belittle one and say, “Just use the other”.

Yes, it’s really annoying that Adobe in the pig-headedness choose to overrule a system-wide shortcut for some of their apps. I’m no Adobe power user, so I don’t know if it applies to other apps than Illustrator and Photoshop; but at least in both these apps, you can go to Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts and simply overrule the overruling to choose Cmd + H as the shortcut for hiding the app. Which is obviously what I’ve done, to make the shortcut work uniformly throughout the system. I’m just still annoyed at Adobe for being so pig-headed about it.
     
ccrider
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Mar 2, 2010, 02:17 PM
 
If you use the command-tab technique to cycle through your apps, you can also hold the command key while still cycling and press "H" which will hide/unhide apps, even apps like photoshop which insist on not playing by the rules of X.

(You can also use "Q" to quit apps btw)

neat trick
     
Hal Itosis
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Mar 2, 2010, 02:19 PM
 
Originally Posted by Oisín View Post
More importantly:
Nobody ever said anything about keeping 45 apps in one space, except you.

Please re-read post #1, as that might be relevant to your perception of importance.
-HI-
     
Oisín
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Mar 2, 2010, 05:48 PM
 
Originally Posted by Hal Itosis View Post

Please re-read post #1, as that might be relevant to your perception of importance.
Yeah, you’re right. Sorry, I misremembered and attributed the 45 apps to your post, rather than the OP.

That doesn’t change the rest of it, though. There’s no reason to ‘correct’ someone for saying that Cmd + H is a more efficient way to hide an app than going to the app menu and choosing the “Hide” entry with a mouse, by striking it out and replacing it with “Spaces”. They remain different tools.
     
dedalus
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Mar 2, 2010, 06:32 PM
 
AKcrab has a point.

There’s no reason for porrid to be hiding 44 apps in the first place. To be honest, were it not for his join date, I would have dismissed the post as some form of trolling attempt.

I personally tend to have an average of fifteen apps open, and I never hide any of them. Why would I? The one time I accidentally activated single application mode, it nearly drove me insane. If I just wanted to have one app in front of my face, I’d use bloody Windows*.

*Actually, I’d rather kill myself. **** Windows to hell.
     
Oisín
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Mar 2, 2010, 07:00 PM
 
^ But that’s entirely personal preference.

I never have more than one app visible at the same time (with very few exceptions), since that drives me insane.
     
dedalus
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Mar 2, 2010, 07:07 PM
 
I know, I know.

Have you tried single application mode? It’s not for everybody, but you might like it.
     
Oisín
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Mar 2, 2010, 07:18 PM
 
Originally Posted by dedalus View Post
I know, I know.

Have you tried single application mode? It’s not for everybody, but you might like it.
I’d never heard of it before, so no, I haven’t. Reading a bit about it, though, indicates that it’s tied entirely to the dock (i.e., Cmd + Tabbing to an app won’t invoke it), so it would probably be of limited use for me.

If it worked with Cmd + Tab too, though, I think I’d quite like it—though on some occasions, of course, I do need to be able to see two apps at the same time.
     
CharlesS
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Mar 2, 2010, 09:26 PM
 
Huh, writing an app to auto-hide all other apps every time the frontmost application changes doesn't seem like it would be that hard to do. I wonder if any apps for that exist already?

Ticking sound coming from a .pkg package? Don't let the .bom go off! Inspect it first with Pacifist. Macworld - five mice!
     
dedalus
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Mar 3, 2010, 10:29 AM
 
Originally Posted by Oisín View Post
I’d never heard of it before, so no, I haven’t. Reading a bit about it, though, indicates that it’s tied entirely to the dock (i.e., Cmd + Tabbing to an app won’t invoke it), so it would probably be of limited use for me.

If it worked with Cmd + Tab too, though, I think I’d quite like it—though on some occasions, of course, I do need to be able to see two apps at the same time.
You can get it to work with ⌘⇥ if you use Quicksilver.

     
lpkmckenna
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Mar 3, 2010, 02:07 PM
 
     
Spheric Harlot
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Mar 3, 2010, 03:02 PM
 
Originally Posted by Oisín View Post
^ But that’s entirely personal preference.

I never have more than one app visible at the same time (with very few exceptions), since that drives me insane.
Wow.

So to drag and drop stuff between applications, you're forcing yourself to go through Exposé?
     
Oisín
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Mar 3, 2010, 06:08 PM
 
Originally Posted by Spheric Harlot View Post
Wow.

So to drag and drop stuff between applications, you're forcing yourself to go through Exposé?
No, that’s one of the few exceptions where I do keep two apps visible at the same time (though just as often, I’ll just Cmd + Tab through to the right app and do it that way around instead).
     
porrid  (op)
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Mar 3, 2010, 07:55 PM
 
Gee wilickers, wish it were possible to whip up this much discussion in my blog !

Okay 45 Apps was one of those days where I were experiencing an overwhelming excitement of gleeful practice - and then as least expected, I took my eye off the ball and cursed having selected that menu option; "Hide Others".

Yes I'm aware of and frequently use Spaces, and not to labor the point of app usage per se, but I estimate I have roughly 500 or more apps, utilities and menu option apps etc on my drive iand probably use on an average around 25 a day.

When I'm able, I cycle through the apps with Command Tab, that though depends on whether I'm having a bad day with my left hand or nay!

No I don't use Quicksilver, and have never understood how it could benefit, let alone the fact that I'm not a coder, scripter, or programmer; merely a base level user.

Sincerely, "Hide Others" is only one menu option; there are other menu options in other apps that could do with the ability of "taking or deadening out" as it were from users abilities. I'm sayig this based on one of my hobbies, that of helping other Mac users in my vicinity with their navigation and web interfacing issues.

As a rule I have never needed to purposely use that menu option, and I'm guessing not many other users, either use it, or need to ?

Thank you all once again for reading and commenting. Have a geat day.
     
TETENAL
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Mar 3, 2010, 08:11 PM
 
I use Hide Others to reduce screen clutter. I use it more often than Hide This App actually.

I fail to see what the big issue about Show All is. You made a mistake and undoing it is just menu command. No big deal.
     
   
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