The long ribbon of icons at the bottom of the Mac's screen is called the Dock. With the Activity Monitor app in macOS, you can force quit misbehaving apps, find out how much energy your Mac is using, and see which apps or processes are eating the most processor cycles.
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Search on the App Store and Mac App Store allows customers to find apps, games, stories, categories, in-app purchases, and developers. Searches use app and in-app purchase metadata from your product page to deliver the most relevant results. Your Mac will take a while to gather information about your apps and then displays a list of all the apps on your machine. Find the column headed '64-bit (Intel)' and click on the column heading. By default, your Mac stores downloaded content from the Web in the Downloads folder. Access it via the Finder directly or through a browser. You can also change the default location.
We tend to think of the term ‘search’ as a web-only initiative, but your Mac can handle searches, too! Both Spotlight and Finder are excellent resources, and learning the proper ways to use search within those macOS features can help you discover what you’re looking for much faster.
You can also search within documents like PDFs to find phrases or words important to you. Here, we’ll show you how to search on Mac, the right way to Spotlight search Mac computers, and surface some great apps you may prefer to using Apple’s built-in services.
Best ways to search on Mac
Your Mac has become very adept at search. In document viewers, Finder, and even Spotlight, you can likely find what you’re looking for without too much effort. Over time, Apple has woven search into a ton of its packaged apps, and made Spotlight search much better at finding what you need in short order.
Spotlight search on Mac
Spotlight is your Mac’s system-wide search bar. It can search, files, folders, documents, events, reminders, email, the web, and your browser history or bookmarks. Here’s how to Spotlight search on your Mac:
Instead of thinking about how to search for a word on Mac, you can also ask Siri to find your files and folders by saying what you're looking for using natural language. For example, 'Show me my New York photos' will bring up all photos the Photos app shows were in a ‘New york’ folder, or when the photo geolocation shows it was taken in New York. To use Siri, click the Siri icon in your menu bar.
How to Search with Finder
Finder, like Spotlight, is a simple way to find items, but is also a bit more direct for discovering files and folders. The tool also lets you organize folders and files according to your preferences. You can open the Finder by clicking on the Finder icon in your Mac’s Dock.
When it comes to finding what you're looking for, the Finder works in exactly the same way as Spotlight. All of the search narrowing tips that we talked about above can also be applied here. Here’s how to search using Finder:
That’s all you need to do. Finder will automatically show you all the files associated with your search. You can also toggle Finder to search your entire Mac, a designated folder you have selected, or all shared items.
A better option for your searches may be Lacona. Like Siri, the app focuses on natural language to help you find things. It’s a great app for those who want to talk to their computer rather than type – but that’s not all Lacona is great at.
Plainly put, Lacona is just more powerful that your mac’s search, and a lot more powerful. We enjoy its direct method for search; when you query Lacona to find something, it surfaces options for more direct searching in some situations. As you can see below, Lacona allows you to search many popular websites directly.
You can customize Lacona with IFTTT commands, and it has a veritable ton of keyboard shortcuts. You can also open files directly from Lacona after a search, create reminders or schedule events using natural language, do simple math, get definitions for words, translate certain phrases, and move or copy files. Lacona is an incredible Spotlight replacement.
How to Search Messages on Mac
Have you ever thought about a message you sent, and wondered “how to search through iMessage on Mac?” It’s a fairly common question; we may have shared info about an event with someone, or need to bring up details about a conversation. If you’re a dedicated iMessages user, you’ll want to know how to search the Messages app on your Mac. Here’s how to do it:
This will search through your iMessage conversations for the term you enter. Any active conversation with the search term will be highlighted, and you’ll be able to click on those conversations to see highlighted text. Keep in mind searching through the Messages app limits your search to iMessage conversations.
How to search for a word on Mac
Searching for words on your Mac is the same process as searching for anything else. You can open Spotlight, search in Finder, or use Lacona to search your Mac. Knowing how to find word on Mac devices is universal to search.
But you can use a few keyboard shortcuts to make it easier. The most direct shortcut is Command + F, which opens Finder and searches your entire Mac for a word you enter. It’s great for those times you know the name of a document, but aren’t sure where it’s located.
You can also use metadata attributes to narrow your search. Here are a few metadata attribute tips, courtesy of Apple Support:
How to search for lost files and folders with Disk DrillHow To Search Ios Apps On Mac
If you search your Mac and still aren’t finding what you need, there are a few more things to try.
You can try searching documents you know have the keyword. If you were searching for phrases in a large document, try opening that document in the Preview app and using its search function. This is how to search a document on a Mac directly, and its search field can be found in the top right corner of the Preview window.
There’s also email search, which can sometimes be a more direct way to discover keyphrases in emails.
But what happens if the file that you're looking for doesn't show up in any of your searches? It could be that you've overwritten the file or deleted it by mistake.If this is the case, try not to panic. Take deep breaths. We're going to sort this.
Now, go and download Disk Drill. Disk Drill is the most powerful data recovery app available for Mac, and it's the tool that's going to return your lost files in five simple steps.
Like magic, your files will be back on your hard drive and available in search queries.
The more you use your Mac to download files, create documents, and upload photos and media, the harder it becomes to locate files and folders using the simple scroll features and the easier it becomes to accidentally delete things that you want to keep.
Conclusion
Finding files on your Mac has never been simpler. Like so many Apple features, Spotlight and Finder search are great, but could be a lot better. That’s why we prefer Lacona. It’s a far better search tool than Spotlight, and its low learning curve will have you feeling like a power user in no time.
We also like that Disk Drill and Lacona are free as part of a seven day trial of Setapp, an incredible suite of productivity apps for your Mac. Alongside Lacona and Disk Drill, you’ll get unlimited access to over 175 additional apps that round out the Setapp catalog ranging just about every category you can think of.
When your free trial is over, Setapp is only $9.99 per month for continuous access to its incredible suite of apps. Families will really like Setapp’s $19.99 per month family plan, which grants full access to the entire Setapp catalog for up to four unique Macs. What are you waiting for? Give Setapp a try today!
Setapp lives on Mac and iOS. Please come back from another device.
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![]() How to find and list all applications that exist in Mac computer storage?
In certain situations, you may need to know the number and type of applications installed on a Mac computer. This could be to check for malicious applications that are sometimes bundled with other software, or to list existing apps that might be occupying excessive storage space. If you have recently acquired a Mac, you may wish to know information about existing applications and this guide can help. Furthermore, if you are a keen or enthusiastic user, you can also manually check versions of installed software.
There are a number of ways to check all existing applications on the Mac as detailed here. The methods work with all versions of the Mac operating system. With the guidance offered, you can easily perform the checks. We start with simple methods, and then move to more advanced ones, which should present no problems if you carefully follow the steps within the guide. For example, we start with those requiring the least knowledge with Finder, and then walk through using Terminal and printing results into a text-based file on the desktop.
Table of Contents:
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Check installed apps via Finder
This is the easiest method, however, it also displays the least results: app names, date/time last modified, and size occupied on internal storage. Simply launch Finder and select the Applications folder from the left sidebar. Alternatively, press the keyboard shortcut of Shift, Command, and A. This will display all apps that were added through Mac App Store, came together with the operating system, installed through package managers, and manually attached by users via the drag-and-drop method. All user-level applications are included - enabling list view will allow you to freely scroll through existing apps.
Alternatively, Launchpad also serves to list applications and is one of the easiest way to locate apps for novice users. Note, however, that the Application folder is generally more useful for regular users. Furthermore, this method can be used to generate a list of all existing apps within a text-based file simply using a few keyboard shortcuts. In the applications folder, press the combination of Command and A to select all items within the window. Then press Command and C to copy the selection. Launch the TextEdit application using Spotlight - press the combination of Command and Spacebar, and then type TextEdit. In the text-based window, click on Edit in the menu bar at top of the screen, and then select Paste and Match Style.
You can save and rename this file. The applications folder can help you to determine which apps you might force to close, without crashing the operating system. You can also delete software directly from this folder. Detailed information can be found in this article.
Inspect the applications list through System Information
In you need more detailed information about each app stored on the computer, including system software, a more advanced method is available. This is simply a system report, and so you can use this option without fear of damaging the system, corrupting files, and so on. Therefore, you will not be able to delete or disable applications listed within the System Report. To access the information, hold down the Option (Alt) key on the keyboard and click the Apple logo in the menu bar at top of the screen. Then select System Information. In the new window, click on Applications under Software in the left sidebar. In the main area of window, you will see a list of all existing apps and additional information, such as version, source, where the app was obtained, and date/time of last modification. Clicking individual items in the list will display location in storage, information about the developer, and basic information expressed as a 'Get Info' string. User-level apps are displayed and also those necessary for system functions. Therefore, we strongly recommend that you do not delete or modify applications from this list, unless you are an advanced user (otherwise this could result in an operating system crash or making your computer inaccessible).
Find all application using Terminal
One of the most efficient methods to find app information is via the built-in command line application called Terminal. This, however, does require some advanced knowledge. Using this app, you can access useful functions, ignoring restrictions and even protected folders. To list all existing applications, you can use the find function, sudo command, which will grant access to all user and system folders. Launch Terminal using Spotlight - press the keyboard shortcut of Command and Spacebar, type Terminal, and then press Return. Alternatively, go to the Utilities folder under Applications. Once the application has launched, type the following command and press return to execute it (you will be asked to enter the administrators password, since you are trying to grant super user permissions):
Android Search Apps
Since there are many files using the .app extension within the Mac operating system, displaying all them within a Terminal window might force the app and/or your computer to freeze. Therefore, as an alternative, we recommend that you print the results into a text-based file using the following command:
How To Search Apps On Mac Computer
Using this syntax, all files that contain the .app extension will be written into the text-based file stored on the Desktop. You will also be able to find the location of those apps. This is probably the best option if you wish to check storage for possible malicious software - within the text file, you can use the Find function by clicking on Edit in the menu bar at top of the screen and selecting Find.
How To Search For Apps On MacVideo Showing how to list all Apps on MacComments are closed.
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