Here’s how this will typically work. Now it’s time to up your keyboard game. By default, in low light, your keyboard’s backlight will turn on whereas in bright light, it will turn off.
Once you have chosen the language by clicking on the flag in the menu bar, go back to the same flag in the menu bar--click and hold, beneath the flags representing the languages you have chosen will be a couple of other options. If you just want to control that aspect of your computer yourself, you can uncheck this box.
For example, while you can always use an app’s menu to quit it, it’s just faster and easier to use “Command + Q”. The Shortcuts settings have all the different aspects on OS X you can affect in the left pane, and the right pane breaks each one down into individual actions. To use a keyboard shortcut, press and hold one or more modifier keys and then press the last key of the shortcut. It’s fairly easy to see why longtime Mac users are such enthusiastically emphatic keyboardists. He's covered Windows, Android, macOS, Microsoft Office, and everything in between. As we mentioned, there’s quite a few shortcuts programmed into the system already, and there are many that aren’t. Take some time also to familiarize yourself with the shortcuts you see on menus and throughout the system. When you use a Mac, you’re almost obligated to use keyboard shortcuts to do things other computer users might default to the mouse for.
Of special note are the controls to adjust your keyboard’s backlight (such as on Macbooks). In the following screenshot, you can see our custom replacements, which will automatically change when you use an applications like TextEdit or Messages, where shorthand might come in handy. At the bottom of the settings there’s an option to control full keyboard access. We double-click this shortcut’s key combo until it is selected, hold down the modifiers and then the new key. Quit is different depending upon which application you’re using so it will be printed on the menu as “Quit Google Chrome” or “Quit iTunes,” and so forth. Hope this helps. Using the keyboard to perform routine and repetitive tasks is a great timesaver and really ups your skill level, but did you know you can add or even customize keyboard shortcuts? Similarly, there’s an icon that you can click to access Spotlight, if you really want to always go to the upper-right corner and do so, or alternatively, you can just use “Command + Space”. Now it’s time to up your keyboard game.
Want to switch between languages with a Latin alphabet, such as English, Spanish, or French, and a language with a non-Latin alphabet, such as Arabic or Chinese. Many of these are universal and can’t be changed, but you can adjust them per application. Unfortunately, to write all these into the system would require way too much screen real estate.
For example, to use Command-C (copy), press and hold the Command key, then the C key, then release both keys. Mac shortcuts are a little different than on other systems. ("French," for example, is abbreviated as "FR," while "English" appears as "EN.") The first tab is dedicated to keyboard behavior, so if you want to adjust how fast keys repeat or whether functions keys use special features or act as standard function keys, you can do that here.
On that note, the backlight’s timeout can be adjusted from five seconds to never.
Before we dig into the shortcuts, let’s take a look at OS X’s keyboard settings, because there’s some interesting things you can do that have nothing to do with combinations and bindings. In the screenshot, we see how this looks when we select the Dvorak layout.
The Language bar will not be shown if only one language is registered or if a user has elected to hide it. Mac keyboard shortcuts.