Spaces… didn’t get it, didn’t try it, til today.
WOW! What a concept!
In a nutshell, OS X has the ability to create virtual screens for you. You create a matrix of screens, assign applications to a specific screen then manage your work by going to specific screens. Yeah, it sounded too complicated to me as well.
Here’s what I did:
1) Created a matrix of 2 wide by 3 deep of screens and added the Spaces element to the menu bar
2) I assigned Safari to screen 1
3) I assigned Transmit, Textmate and CSSEdit to screen 3 (vertically right below screen 1)
4) I assigned XyleScope to screen 5 (vertically down again)
Now I quickly move from screen to screen by clicking on the Spaces menu bar element. Its easier to do then to describe. The reason why I mentioned the vertical aspect is that it seems easier for me to keep track of what is on which screen by thinking of my Web edit environment as three vertical screens. My Final Cut environment could be vastly different.
I also made Preview open documents in Screen 2, this way, I can have eBooks open all the time and switch over to review something very easily.
Try it out, slowly then you’ll start to Spaces in a whole new light!
Simple video
showing what I mean. Watch the cursor as I move between screens, each time the cursor goes to the menu bar, I select another screen.