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One open application only

K

kienfred01

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 14, 2011
9
0
Hi, I am new to Mac. I bought Mac book air 11 and I enjoy using it. But why can I have only one application open at any one time? What I mean is I would like to be to browse the internet and have Skype open at the same time.

Any help appreciated :)
Fred
 
Xenc

Xenc

macrumors 65816
May 8, 2010
1,043
290
London, England
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-gb) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

You can. Resize the windows, perhaps, so you can see them both?
 
simsaladimbamba

simsaladimbamba

Guest
Nov 28, 2010
22,670
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located
As Mac OS X only has one Menu Bar and almost all applications use that Menu Bar, you will only be able to see the menus of the active application. As Safari is selected, you will still be able to see the Skype window, if it is not hidden behind another window (Safari or Finder or ...), but you have to click the Skype window (or change to Skype via CMD+TAB or clicking the Dock icon or using Exposé via the F3 key) to see its menus.

Or can you be more elaborative what actually happens? Do you experience application shutdowns when you open other applications?

Helpful Information for Any Mac User
 
K

kienfred01

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 14, 2011
9
0
Xenc said:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-gb) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

You can. Resize the windows, perhaps, so you can see them both?
Click to expand...

Thank you but this is not it. Every time I open on application the other closes

Cheers,
Fred
 
K

kienfred01

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 14, 2011
9
0
simsaladimbamba said:
As Mac OS X only has one Menu Bar and almost all applications use that Menu Bar, you will only be able to see the menus of the active application. As Safari is selected, you will still be able to see the Skype window, if it is not hidden behind another window (Safari or Finder or ...), but you have to click the Skype window (or change to Skype via CMD+TAB or clicking the Dock icon or using Exposé via the F3 key) to see its menus.

Or can you be more elaborative what actually happens? Do you experience application shutdowns when you open other applications?

Helpful Information for Any Mac User
Click to expand...

Yes, that is what it appears like. I open a new application the other disappears,click anywhere on the desktop everything disappears.

Thanks,
Fred
 
simsaladimbamba

simsaladimbamba

Guest
Nov 28, 2010
22,670
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located
Xenc

Xenc

macrumors 65816
May 8, 2010
1,043
290
London, England
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-gb) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Ah, ok. simsaladimbamba's explanation describes your situation. The Mac system is designed to work like this, and it is different to how Windows works. I'd suggest watching the "New to Mac" videos at www.apple.com to understand the concepts better. Enjoy your new laptop!
 
KnightWRX

KnightWRX

macrumors Pentium
Jan 28, 2009
15,046
4
Quebec, Canada
kienfred01 said:
Yes, that is what it appears like. I open a new application the other disappears,click anywhere on the desktop everything disappears.
Click to expand...

There is no such thing in OS X. Check your dock for blue lights under the icons and CMD+TAB like has already been suggested. You'll find your apps there. You can also go to the Apple menu and choose Force Quit to see a list of running apps that you can force close.

Please do not respond again until you have done these things, you're not helping yourself.
 
Xenc

Xenc

macrumors 65816
May 8, 2010
1,043
290
London, England
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-gb) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

I'm pretty certain kienfred01 is referring to the menu bar items changing.
 
K

kienfred01

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 14, 2011
9
0
KnightWRX said:
There is no such thing in OS X. Check your dock for blue lights under the icons and CMD+TAB like has already been suggested. You'll find your apps there. You can also go to the Apple menu and choose Force Quit to see a list of running apps that you can force close.

Please do not respond again until you have done these things, you're not helping yourself.
Click to expand...

The programs are running but I am not able to see more then 1 on the screen at any one time. I know how to see what is running. I do not know how to have more then one application visible on the screen at the same time.

Cheers,
Fred
 
simsaladimbamba

simsaladimbamba

Guest
Nov 28, 2010
22,670
31
located
kienfred01 said:
The programs are running but I am not able to see more then 1 on the screen at any one time. I know how to see what is running. I do not know how to have more then one application visible on the screen at the same time.

Cheers,
Fred
Click to expand...

How do switch between them then? Via CMD+TAB? Can you be please more specific or use QT X (as mentioned before and linked to an explanation how to) to make a screen recording and either attach it here (zipped) or use DropBox and its Public Link or any file hosting service you can think of or YouTube to show it to us, as as of now, it sounds confusing. Maybe you are using Mac OS X wrong?
Btw, does this happen since you first used it?
 
KnightWRX

KnightWRX

macrumors Pentium
Jan 28, 2009
15,046
4
Quebec, Canada
kienfred01 said:
The programs are running but I am not able to see more then 1 on the screen at any one time. I know how to see what is running. I do not know how to have more then one application visible on the screen at the same time.

Cheers,
Fred
Click to expand...

Resize the windows. Lower right corner. There you go.

Oh and stop using command+H to hide the windows.
 
K

kienfred01

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 14, 2011
9
0
simsaladimbamba said:
How do switch between them then? Via CMD+TAB? Can you be please more specific or use QT X (as mentioned before and linked to an explanation how to) to make a screen recording and either attach it here (zipped) or use DropBox and its Public Link or any file hosting service you can think of or YouTube to show it to us, as as of now, it sounds confusing. Maybe you are using Mac OS X wrong?
Btw, does this happen since you first used it?
Click to expand...

I hope I am using it wrong! It is not that difficult. I have my window seized to cover only the left top quarter of my screen for Mail application. Now I start firefox I adjust the size to again 1 quarter of my screen and locate the same to the right hand side of my screen and now I switch between applications with CMD + TAB and I will have one or the other exactly where I placed them but I can not see both. Only one on the screen at any one time

Fred
 
simsaladimbamba

simsaladimbamba

Guest
Nov 28, 2010
22,670
31
located
Do you have any add ons installed, something that could set to hide other applications when switching to another one?
There is one, maybe Hyperdock or Warp or something else, but I don't remember exactly. Take a look at System Preferences > Accounts >> your account >>> Login Items and report what items are in there.
 
K

kienfred01

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 14, 2011
9
0
simsaladimbamba said:
As Mac OS X only has one Menu Bar and almost all applications use that Menu Bar, you will only be able to see the menus of the active application. As Safari is selected, you will still be able to see the Skype window, if it is not hidden behind another window (Safari or Finder or ...), but you have to click the Skype window (or change to Skype via CMD+TAB or clicking the Dock icon or using Exposé via the F3 key) to see its menus.

Or can you be more elaborative what actually happens? Do you experience application shutdowns when you open other applications?

Helpful Information for Any Mac User
Click to expand...


...and this exactly what is not happening, it is not hidden behind each other but it is still not visible. It not closed I can go back and finish what I was doing. CMD+TAP and all the other will show me the running application but on the screen is only one at anyone time at any size.

Thanks heaps,
Fred
 
simsaladimbamba

simsaladimbamba

Guest
Nov 28, 2010
22,670
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located
Do you have set up Spaces? Take a look at System Preferences > Exposé & Spaces >> Spaces >>> Application Assignments.

And what about using QT X to record the screen?
 
K

kienfred01

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 14, 2011
9
0
simsaladimbamba said:
Do you have any add ons installed, something that could set to hide other applications when switching to another one?
There is one, maybe Hyperdock or Warp or something else, but I don't remember exactly. Take a look at System Preferences > Accounts >> your account >>> Login Items and report what items are in there.
Click to expand...

That has done the it! It is called ASM and has a setting for hidding windows. Untick and now it works! Thanks heaps to you all!

Fred
 
HLdan

HLdan

macrumors 603
Aug 22, 2007
6,383
0
kienfred01 said:
That has done the it! It is called ASM and has a setting for hidding windows. Untick and now it works! Thanks heaps to you all!

Fred
Click to expand...

Glad you got your issue solved. One word of advice, since you're new to Mac don't install any haxies to modify the look and feel or the behavior of the system until you really know the system well. :)
 
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