How to use the Apple Mac Finder tool

Apple computers are an increasingly common sight in UK homes, whether as a second computer or a replacement for a Windows PC. Each has its pros and cons – something we discussed in depth last year.

A common cause of frustration for anyone using a Mac after becoming familiar with a PC is the Finder. This is the name of the Mac user interface and, although it uses the same idea of a Desktop, icons, windows and menus as Microsoft Windows, it works differently enough to make it a little disorientating if you’re using it for the first time.

Fortunately, most of the differences are simply cosmetic and, once you’ve got to grips with a few peculiarities, things should start to make sense. Trial and error isn’t the quickest way to figure out a new Mac, though, which is why Computeractive is lending a helping hand with this simple guide.

Start a Mac for the first time and after you’ve completed its basic setup, you’ll see a screen full of empty space – literally. This is the default Mac Desktop with its interstellar ‘Aurora’ wallpaper, and the row of icons that runs along the bottom is the Dock.

The Dock is the Mac equivalent of the Windows Taskbar, but it behaves a little differently (though Windows 7 users may recognise some features).

Macs don’t use a Start menu, so some common application icons are instead pinned to the Dock for quick access. Hovering the mouse pointer over any Dock icon will show its name, while a single click launches the application. Begin by clicking the left-most smiley face icon – this is the icon for the Finder and it opens a new Finder window on the Desktop.

Finder basics
Finder windows look much like those in Windows, with a Sidebar on the left containing icons for connected disk drives and other locations. These locations are grouped by type, starting with ‘Devices’ for local disks – the hard disk, USB memory keys, external hard disks, and so on.

This is followed by ‘Shared’ for any drives accessible over a network, ‘Places’ – customisable shortcuts for quick access to folders, and finally, some simple searches.

Select any location in the Sidebar and its contents appear in the main window. By default, Finder windows show files and folders as large icons, and you can change their size using the slider at the bottom right of the window.

Double-clicking a folder opens it in the same window and you can return to its parent folder by clicking the ‘Back’ button – the left arrow at the top left of the window’s toolbar.

Three other window views can be selected using the buttons on the window’s toolbar – there’s a group of four, with the first selected for the default Icon view. List and Column views are probably the most useful, since they keep parent folders visible as you browse, while Cover Art view is best reserved for folders containing images.

Unlike in Microsoft Windows, the Finder sorts all folder contents by name and so folders are mixed with files, rather than listed separately. Even so, dragging, dropping, left-clicking, right-clicking and double-clicking all work in a similar way to Windows Explorer so you can work with files and folders just as you would in Windows 7, Vista or XP.

Working with windows
There are four buttons at the top of every Finder window – three coloured circles on the left and a grey oblong on the right.

The right button toggles the display of the window toolbar and Sidebar, and it turns blue when active. You may prefer this simplified view for some windows and it works with application windows, too.

The three coloured buttons on the left work like the three buttons at the top-right of all windows in Microsoft Windows – the red button closes a window, while the yellow one minimises it to the Dock (restore it by clicking its Dock icon).

The green button, however, is for ‘expand’ rather than ‘maximise’ and it resizes a window to what the Mac thinks is the best fit for the Desktop – which usually isn’t full-screen. The green button behaves differently with some Mac application windows though, and it’s the Finder feature that most confuses many experienced Windows users.