IN THIS CHAPTER

Controlling your iMac from the Finder menu

Discovering widgets and Guides

Flexing new muscles in Safari and Messages

Have you upgraded to Monterey from the previous version of macOS, Big Sur? Or have you just bought a new iMac with Monterey preinstalled? Either way, you’ve opened the door to a number of new features, and this chapter was written especially for you. (And if you’re not rubbing your hands together with gleeful anticipation, you should be — I know I am.) Here, you’ll find descriptions of my favorite new features that ship with the latest version of macOS.

Note that a number of other new Monterey features appear elsewhere in the book. The Shared With You feature introduced with Monterey is covered in Chapter 12, for example. The new features you find here, however, are what I consider the real standouts, so they’re showcased separately.

Let the fun begin!

Shortcuts Hit Your iMac

Shortcuts have been around on the iPhone and iPad since the arrival of iOS 13, and the application has become quite popular on these devices. (Note that I’m not talking about keyboard shortcuts here, but a new feature entirely.) Shortcuts make it easy to perform a series of actions with one click. For example, a Shortcut can automatically open the News application and display the articles from the Top Stories section, all with a single click from the Dock or the Finder menu.

Shortcuts can include dozens of actions, and your iMac can prompt you for any specific information the Shortcut may require to finish the task. Typically, you select a folder, file, or document as the target of the task and then run the Shortcut. Heck, you can even add Shortcuts to the right-click menu for the ultimate in convenience!

Never one to ignore what works, Apple’s macOS version of Shortcuts includes many of the features that made it such a standout on iOS:

• Apple offers a great selection of prebuilt, ready-to-run Shortcuts that you can download to your iMac.
• You can create your own Shortcuts and share them with others, or edit existing Shortcuts.
• Shortcuts are automatically shared across all your Macs and Apple devices.

The Shortcut Edit window (shown in Figure 4-1) uses drag-and-drop to build a Shortcut, using a library of actions that are processed by Monterey in the order you add them.

And here’s the best part: Even if you don’t want to create your own Shortcuts, you can pick your favorites from the Gallery of prebuilt Shortcuts and enjoy them on your iMac.

Let’s Get Focused

Have you ever wished you could eliminate distractions and interruptions while you’re at work, or sleeping, or gaming, or relaxing to music on your iMac? Sure, macOS has had a Do Not Disturb feature for some time now, but it wasn’t very configurable, and it certainly didn’t take into account the activities you were currently performing on your Mac.

With the arrival of macOS Monterey, you now have the ability to create an environment, called a Focus, that provides you with control over exactly which notifications and interruptions are allowed and which are hidden. For example, you can create an Office Focus that immediately displays messages, notifications, and email from your coworkers, but hides the same type of communications from your gaming friends (and game applications on your iMac) until your workday is done. Then, of course, you can switch to your Gaming Focus and hide everything work related. (I know I do.)

A Focus can be selected manually, or it can be set to activate based on a schedule you specify. A Focus can automatically enable specific hardware or applications that you commonly use during that activity. And, of course, the Focus you set on your iMac is shared with your iOS devices, so you can switch to your iPad or iPhone and maintain that Focus.

Figure 4-2 shows the Office Focus I created within the Notifications & Focus pane in System Preferences. Now I’m ready to center my attention on my work (at least from 8:00 in the morning to 4:30 in the afternoon)!

Putting Tags to Work

Tags are a wonderful new addition to macOS Monterey that appear in two of my favorite applications, Notes and Reminders. Tags begin with a pound character (#), and are used as search criteria within these applications, making it easy to locate specific entries. For example, you can use the tag #soccer within both applications to tag reminders about your kid’s soccer practices, upcoming games, and even notes about the all-important snacks and drinks you have to bring.

You can assign any number of tags to a reminder or a note, and they now appear as a separate heading within the Sidebar for each application. I can tell you that searching for specific notes and reminders has become far easier and more powerful now that I’m using tags, and I highly recommend them.

Hiding Email the iCloud Way

Most of us are unlucky enough to be bombarded with spam email. In fact, I know of many friends and coworkers who have created “junk” email addresses to substitute for their primary addresses on websites and social media, just so that they can avoid the possibility of a barrage of unsolicited mail and phishing attacks. Unfortunately, this gambit requires you to check those junk email accounts as well as your primary account, making it quite a hassle to monitor everything. True, you’re protecting your primary account from spammers, but is it worth it?

Apple has recognized this problem and has delivered an ingenious solution called Hide My Email. Within Monterey, you can easily create unique “alias” email addresses. These addresses forward any messages they receive to your primary address — but without sharing your primary address! For example, I can create the address [email protected] and use it on a website, and any messages sent to that address are automatically forwarded to [email protected]! This way, the website doesn’t get access to my actual email address, and I don’t have to monitor any junk email accounts (instead, I let the spam filter on my primary account take care of that junk mail).

You can find the Hide My Email settings tucked away within the Apple ID pane in System Preferences, which I discuss in detail in Chapter 5.

FaceTime … Over the Web?

In the past, FaceTime calls have been limited to Macs and Apple devices, so if you wanted to chat with someone who didn’t have a Mac, an iPhone, or an iPad, you were out of luck. Monterey changes all that with the addition of FaceTime web links, which allow you to connect with someone over FaceTime using a web browser!

It’s easy to create a link and send it to one (or more) of your friends using Messages or Mail. Clicking the link either opens the FaceTime app (if they’re using a Mac or an iOS device) or launches their web browser, and they can join your chat if they have a camera or microphone on their device. Well done, Apple!