OS X nuances - HELP

[bearxor]

So I started working at a company, and it's my first real experience with OS X. It's nice, but there's a couple of things that work differently that I was wondering if you guys had experience with so that I could change it to fit the style that I work in.

First, the home and end keys do not work properly for me. If you press the home/end keys they take you all the way to the top/bottom of whatever you're working on. What I want is to be able to mistype something, go back to it using the arrow keys, fix it and then hit the end key to get me back to where I was. Now, I have to use the arrow keys both ways, or reach for the mouse.

Secondly, Firefox. I am using my MX700 as my mouse on this thing. On PC, I can use the middle mouse button to open a link in a new tab, and when I'm done, use the middle mouse button again on the tab to close it, instead of using the tab close button. Now, I am forced to right-click the link and select open in new tab, and then right click the tab to close it, or use the tab close button. Very irritating. More irritating than the whole home/end thing. I really need to get that fixed.

One more thing about FF in OS X, completely off-topic anyways, why don't they put the tab close button on the left of the tab bar. I mean, in Windows, it's at the right, but the main window close button is too. Since OS X puts the main window close button on the left, shouldn't the FF OS X devolopers conform and switch the position of the tab close button around?

Any help is greatly appreciated, BTW.

Thanks

 

[Ecgtheow]

You can use Option-Left Arrow and Option-Right Arrow to respectively move back and forward one word. Command-Left Arrow and Command-Right Arrow will respectively move to the beginning and end of a line. Option-Up Arrow and Option-Down arrow will respectively move to the beginning and end of a paragraph.

As for Firefox, the Mac version is really lacking in a lot of areas. Supposedly the next version (1.1) will fix a lot of the major Mac issues (like the middle click bug and a whole bunch of UI problems), but that won't be out until July. If you can, you should try Safari. It's a lot more polished, if not quite as featured as Firefox.

 

[eigen]

yup.Learn your keyboard shortcuts.

 

[bearxor]

Thanks, ecgtheow.

It's a little irritating having to use a keyboard shortcut like that, instead of being able to hit one button, and I'm sure I'll forget the differences between the option and command shortcuts for a little while, but it sure is a lot better than reaching for the mouse.

As for Safari, I tried it, but it seems to work just like FF as far as tabbed browsing goes. That's the single most important feature on a web browser for me. I would still be using IE on a desktop PC if it had tabbed browsing. I know I can do the apple-click, but if I'm laid back in the chair, I don't want to have to reach for the keyboard, though Safari does give each tab it's own close button. I'll be looking forward to that new release of FF.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Camino is a pretty good browser too. Far ahead of firefox, IMO.

 

[XBoxLPU]

I really like the Opera 8 beta 1.