Teaching your Mac to Right Click

Those who use both computer platforms, Windows and Macintosh, sometimes find themselves wishing their Mac could do some of the things available with a right-click of the Windows mouse. The secret to making your Mac learn to right-click is:

control + click (hold down the control key first, then click)

Desktop
Windows view	Similarities	Macintosh view
	Windows offers a richer menu of choices but many of the same functions are available on a Mac. One of the things you can do in Properties is to Change the Desktop Background. Active Desktop offers features similar to Mac's View choices. Arrange , Line Up and Refresh accomplish the same things as View , Clean Up and Arrange . Mac's New Folder option is also available in Windows New menu. However Windows offers the ability to launch recent applications from this menu as well.

Alias/Shortcut
Windows view	Similarities	Macintosh view
	The Windows right-click menu is customized and may not appear exactly like yours. Create Shortcut is similar to Add to Favorites , an alias is added to the favorites list in the Apple Menu Items. Windows Delete is exactly like Move to Trash Open works exactly the same on each platform Get Info is similar to Properties . Mac offers two choices not available in Windows The Help menu is found in all Control + click windows Show Original allows you to find the application icon, from which the alias was made

My Computer/Hard Drive
Windows view	Similarities	Macintosh view
	The Mac control + click window is weak. It offers some standard choices, some of which don't really apply to a hard drive- Put Away , for example. Put Away is used to remove a floppy disk. Sure hope you can't remove the hard drive with that command! Make Alias and Create Shortcut perform the same functions Get Info and Properties can be used to find specifics about the object.

A list of files
Windows view	Similarities	Macintosh view
	In each screen shot you see, a group of files were highlighted so they could be discarded. More choices are available on a Windows computer, but the more common actions can be found in each menu: Delete = Move to Trash Copy = Duplicate Create Shortcut = Make Alias Open = Open

Recycle Bin/Trash
Windows view	Similarities	Macintosh view
	If you have cut a document from a directory or from the desktop, you can Paste it into the Recycle bin. That is one of the primary differences between these two windows.

Excel, right/control clicking within a cell
Windows view	Similarities	Macintosh view
	Any of the right click features of Excel can be accessed on a Mac by using control + click . All that I know of work exactly the same in Office 97 for Windows or Office 98 for Macintosh.

Word, right/control clicking on a misspelled word
Windows view	Similarities	Macintosh view
	Any of the right click features of Word can be accessed on a Mac by using control + click . All that I know of work exactly the same in Office for Windows or Office for Macintosh.