Inside Leopard: 10 Overlooked Gems of the Apple OS

Print Preview

Being a printer guy, I have spent a lot of time over the years pondering the print dialog box. One thing has regularly confounded me: why can Microsoft can give me a (small) preview of what I'm about to print in Word or Excel, but I have to click a Preview button in the standard Print dialog box? I don't want to launch Preview to see the preview, especially because it's not really Preview, since I can't do anything other than preview. I want it inside the Print box. I'll need something new to complain about though, since Leopard gives me a nice big preview every time I go to print.

Better Scripting

Automator has two new features that should make scripting more productive for experienced scripters and people like me, who know just enough to be dangerous, but not enough to be productive. The Watch Me Do feature will record any actions you perform, even in applications that aren't scriptable. And support for variables in Automator actions should make it much simpler to create complex actions, but it will also significantly expand the range of possible actions.

Wikipedia Joins the Dictionary Club

In Leopard, the Wikipedia becomes a full-fledged part of Dictionary, with the full Apple look-and-feel. Sure, I can use Safari to do the same thing, but I like the uncluttered feel of the Dictionary, which is one of my favorite little OS X apps.

Scrolling Background Windows

A few months ago, I ran into an issue on the small screen of my MacBook, where I was going back and forth between Microsoft Excel and Safari, trying to synchronize data between a Web page and an Excel workbook. All I was doing in Safari was scrolling the window as I was checking data. After the third click-to-Safari-and-back, I remarked to myself that I really wanted background scrolling capabilities. And Apple just went out and did it in Leopard. If you put your cursor over a non-active window, you can now use your trackpad or mouse's scroll wheel to scroll it up and down without having to click in it. That's cool.

See our Complete Leopard Coverage

Rick LePage is Macworld's editor at large and curator of the Creative Notes blog.