Customizing Your MacBook Pro's Touch Bar: A Comprehensive Guide

When it comes to customization options on your MacBook Pro, one feature that often gets overlooked is the touch bar. The touch bar, located above the keyboard, can be tailored to fit your specific needs and preferences. As mentioned earlier, you can customize your apps by tapping on the app section of the touch bar. This allows you to personalize your experience with the touch bar, making it an extension of your personal style.

Another key feature of the touch bar is its ability to stay active even when not in use. After a certain period of inactivity, the touch bar will dim and go to sleep, waiting for you to wake it up again. This can be achieved by tapping on the touch bar itself, or pressing a physical key on your keyboard. Additionally, the touch bar can also be woken up by tapping on the trackpad. This feature is especially useful for those who prefer to type instead of use gestures.

One of the most impressive features of the MacBook Pro's touch bar is its ability to take screenshots. As part of the latest Mac OS 10.12.2 public beta, you can now capture a screenshot of your touch bar using a simple keyboard shortcut: Command + Shift + 6. This feature allows you to save a snapshot of your touch bar configuration, making it easy to share with friends or colleagues.

The touch bar also includes a dedicated Siri button, allowing you to access the virtual assistant directly from the touch bar. With this feature, you can perform various tasks without having to reach for your keyboard or trackpad. This makes it an ideal solution for those who prefer hands-free operation or want to keep their workspace organized.

Another useful feature of the touch bar is its persistent media scrubber. When watching videos in iTunes or Safari, or listening to music, this feature provides a convenient way to navigate through content without having to leave your current app. The media scrubber remains active even when another app takes focus, allowing you to seamlessly switch between tasks.

The control strip of the touch bar can also be customized, providing users with more flexibility and control over their workflow. By tapping on the control strip section, you can make adjustments to your configuration as needed. This feature is particularly useful for those who work extensively in multiple apps or require a specific layout to suit their needs.

When using a MacBook Pro with a touch bar and a Boot Camp partition running Windows, some key controls are still available, including brightness settings, media controls, and volume adjustments. The function keys can also be accessed by holding down the Function key on your keyboard's bottom left-hand corner. This ensures that users can still access essential functions even when switching between operating systems.

In conclusion, the MacBook Pro's touch bar offers a wealth of customization options, allowing you to tailor your experience to suit your specific needs and preferences. From customizing apps to accessing media controls and taking screenshots, these features make it an indispensable part of any MacBook Pro setup. Whether you're a power user or simply looking to enhance your productivity, the touch bar is sure to become an integral part of your daily routine.

A Persistent Media Scrubber: A Game-Changer for Video Enthusiasts

For those who spend hours watching videos in iTunes or Safari, the persistent media scrubber is a game-changer. This feature allows you to navigate through content without having to leave your current app, making it an ideal solution for video enthusiasts. The media scrubber remains active even when another app takes focus, ensuring that you can seamlessly switch between tasks.

One of the most impressive aspects of this feature is its accuracy. When using the media scrubber, you can precisely control the playback of videos, allowing for a more immersive experience. This is particularly useful for those who prefer to watch full-screen videos or need precise control over video playback.

The persistent media scrubber also allows you to access your media controls in multiple apps simultaneously. For example, if you have iTunes open while watching a video on Safari, you can still access the media controls for both apps using the touch bar. This feature is especially useful for those who work with multiple applications or require simultaneous access to different media sources.

In addition to its accuracy and accessibility, the persistent media scrubber also provides a convenient way to adjust playback settings without having to leave your current app. By tapping on the media controls in the control strip, you can adjust settings such as volume, brightness, and playback speed, all from within your current application.

The touch bar's ability to provide a persistent media scrubber is just one of the many features that make it an indispensable tool for video enthusiasts. Whether you're watching full-screen videos or adjusting playback settings, this feature ensures that you can access the control you need without interruption.

Waking Up the Touch Bar: A Convenient Solution

When using your MacBook Pro's touch bar, there are several ways to wake it up again after it has gone to sleep. One of the most convenient methods is to tap on the touch bar itself. This simple gesture wakes the touch bar and allows you to access its functions once more.

Another way to wake up the touch bar is by pressing a physical key on your keyboard. This method can be particularly useful for those who prefer to type instead of use gestures. By using this method, you can quickly access the touch bar's functions without having to navigate through menus or perform additional actions.

The trackpad also provides an alternative way to wake up the touch bar. By tapping on the trackpad, you can bring the touch bar back to life and access its functions once more. This feature is especially useful for those who prefer hands-free operation or want to keep their workspace organized.

Overall, waking up the touch bar is a convenient solution that allows you to quickly access its features without having to navigate through menus or perform additional actions. Whether you tap on the touch bar, press a physical key, or use the trackpad, this feature ensures that you can get back to work quickly and efficiently.

A Dedicated Siri Button: Hands-Free Operation at Your Fingertips

One of the most impressive features of the MacBook Pro's touch bar is its dedicated Siri button. This allows you to access the virtual assistant directly from the touch bar, making it an ideal solution for those who prefer hands-free operation or want to keep their workspace organized.

With this feature, you can perform various tasks without having to reach for your keyboard or trackpad. Whether you need to send a message, make a call, or ask a question, the Siri button provides a convenient and accessible way to do so. This makes it an indispensable tool for those who want to stay productive while minimizing distractions.

The dedicated Siri button also provides a sense of immersion and engagement, making it easier to interact with your virtual assistant. By having access to Siri at your fingertips, you can quickly respond to messages or complete tasks without having to leave your current app.

In addition to its convenience and accessibility, the dedicated Siri button also provides a sleek and modern design aesthetic. The touch bar's compact size and streamlined interface make it an ideal solution for those who want to integrate their virtual assistant seamlessly into their workflow.

Taking Screenshot of Touch Bar: A Simple yet Powerful Feature

As part of the latest Mac OS 10.12.2 public beta, taking a screenshot of your touch bar has become a simple yet powerful feature. With just two keyboard shortcuts – Command + Shift + 6 – you can capture a snapshot of your touch bar configuration, making it easy to share with friends or colleagues.

This feature is especially useful for those who want to showcase their custom touch bar setup or provide detailed instructions to others. By taking a screenshot of the touch bar, you can instantly share your configuration with anyone, without having to manually type out instructions or explain settings.

The ability to take screenshots of the touch bar has also opened up new possibilities for creative workflows and project documentation. For example, graphic designers and artists can use this feature to capture their custom touch bar layouts and collaborate with colleagues in real-time.

In conclusion, taking a screenshot of your touch bar is a simple yet powerful feature that offers a wealth of benefits and applications. Whether you want to share your configuration with others or use it for creative workflows, this feature provides an easy and convenient way to do so.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enin this video we discuss 15 touch bar tips and tricks the first tip is an obvious one how to show your function keys on the touch bar to do so all you need to do is hold the function key in the bottom left hand corner of the hardware keyboard and that will reveal the function keys in the touch bar now what if you always want to display function keys for a particular app just go to system preferences keyboard shortcuts and then click the function key section and then click the plus button to add an app and once you select your app you're going to notice that the function keys are displayed in the touch bar instead of anything else all right so we're going to select terminal here and then click add and now we'll open up the terminal app and watch what happens you see that it displays the 12 function keys in the touch bar and if you hold the function key on your keyboard the touch bar will display system functions from the the control strip one of the cool things about the touch bar is it allows you to quickly adjust your volume and brightness by using sliders but you don't need to tap and then use a slider you can actually do it in one F swoop one gesture just tap and slide and then you will notice that a slider automatically appears so again let me show you how it works just tap and slide instantly like that super simple super easy one more time tap slide you got it now the control strip is that section on the right side of the touch bar and you can actually customize that by opening up system preferences going to keyboard and then clicking where it says customize control strip once you do that you'll see this little menu here and this allows you to customize the control strip let me show you how it's done so first of all you're going to notice that your icons are wiggling in the control strip indicating that they're ready to be edited so you just drag down like this any new keys that you wish to appear in the control strip now you can only have four items in the control strip at once so if you put more than four Keys it will replace it but you don't have to have four Keys you can actually remove all of the keys from the control strip if you wish to do so now the control strip isn't just limited to these four keys right here but if you tap the Chevron key it'll reveal the expanded control strip with many more options to choose from so it really should be no surprise that you can customize the expanded control strip as well so when you're in edit mode here simply tap the Chevron to reveal the expanded control strip and you'll see the full gamut of customization options available to you but customization doesn't end with a control strip if you go to view and go to customize touch Bar for a supported app you can customize the touch bar in relation to that individual app so in this case I'm using pixel Mater and as you can see there's tons of different ways to customize pixel Mater so I'm going to remove one of these key options here just going to drag that out and I'm going to replace it with this just like that so again the point is you can customize your apps as you see fit now you can also customize the control strip while you're in the middle of customizing an app all you need to do is tap the control strip section of the touch bar just like that you can go back and start customizing the app again by touching the app section just like that you probably notice that the Escape key in the touch bar isn't aligned with the physical keys on the keyboard however you don't necessarily have to touch the Escape key exactly right on the key itself you can actually touch a little bit to the left of the key which is great for touch typist because you don't have to be perfect to hit the Escape key now the touch bar will go to sleep after 75 seconds of no activity after 60 seconds you'll notice it dim like this like this like this there we go okay so it dimmed so you have 15 additional set seconds before the touch bar goes to sleep completely and turns off but the nice thing is you can wake it back up in three different ways you can tap the touch bar itself which I'm going to show you right now go to sleep there we go so tap the touch bar it wakes up or you can tap a key on your keyboard and it'll wake up or you can tap the trackpad and it wakes up speaking of trackpad you can move the touch bar individually or the trackpad individually or you can use both simultaneously like this and if you're running the latest Mac OS 10.12.2 public beta 3 or later which is available like I said as a public beta then you'll be able to take screenshots of the touch bar using a handy keyboard shortcut let me show you how so just open up system preferences go to the keyboard section under shortcuts and then you're going to see those two keyboard shortcuts command command shift 6 will allow you to take a screenshot of the touch bar and it will save it onto your desktop so command shift 6 like that and there is the screenshot of the touch bar pretty nifty wouldn't you agree you know how on your iPhone you can hold the home button to make Siri listen to your entire command well you can do the same thing on Mac OS now that there is a dedicated Siri button on the touch bar so once we're finished with our Command release the Siri key and Siri takes over from there this is a really cool feature a persistent media scrubber that stays available no matter what app you're in so you know how the touch bar dynamically switches and changes whenever you switch apps well one thing that always stays constant is the media scrubber that you'll find when you're playing videos and iTunes or videos on uh Safari or listening to music on iTunes you have this nice scrubber and the nice thing about this scrubber is that it's very accurate you can scrub to like the exact time of your favorite YouTube videos hopefully you're subscribed to 95 Max YouTube channel but the point I'm really trying to make here is that these media controls are persistent across all apps so even when something takes Focus like say I opened up system preferences and put it on top of the Safari window like this ah you do see the media scrubber go away but it is still there it's just hidden in the control strip yes the control strip actually gets an extra button for accessing your media controls and you'll see an app icon of the app that is currently linked to those controls so in this case Safari I can close out like that but what if I have two apps with media content well it's actually pretty simple there's just another button to access the media controls for the other app so in this case iTunes just tap the iTunes button and I can easily control my music playback just like that and I can go back and switch to Safari if I wish to do so really handy and lastly what happens if you're using a touch bar enabled MacBook Pro and you have a boot camp partition and you're running Windows what do you see then well you still do get some key controls but they're basically just system functions like brightness for your screen and for the keyboard buttons there's media controls there and there's volume controls as well of course you also have an Escape key and you can still access your function keys by holding the function key on the keyboard in the bottom left hand corner so ladies and gentlemen that has been a look at some of our favorite tips and tricks for the touch bar on the latest MacBook Pro let me know what you guys think Down Below in the comments section also make sure you subscribe and also give us a thumbs up if you appreciated this video or if you learned something in the meantime I'll be hanging down here in the comments section this is Jeff with 9o5 Macin this video we discuss 15 touch bar tips and tricks the first tip is an obvious one how to show your function keys on the touch bar to do so all you need to do is hold the function key in the bottom left hand corner of the hardware keyboard and that will reveal the function keys in the touch bar now what if you always want to display function keys for a particular app just go to system preferences keyboard shortcuts and then click the function key section and then click the plus button to add an app and once you select your app you're going to notice that the function keys are displayed in the touch bar instead of anything else all right so we're going to select terminal here and then click add and now we'll open up the terminal app and watch what happens you see that it displays the 12 function keys in the touch bar and if you hold the function key on your keyboard the touch bar will display system functions from the the control strip one of the cool things about the touch bar is it allows you to quickly adjust your volume and brightness by using sliders but you don't need to tap and then use a slider you can actually do it in one F swoop one gesture just tap and slide and then you will notice that a slider automatically appears so again let me show you how it works just tap and slide instantly like that super simple super easy one more time tap slide you got it now the control strip is that section on the right side of the touch bar and you can actually customize that by opening up system preferences going to keyboard and then clicking where it says customize control strip once you do that you'll see this little menu here and this allows you to customize the control strip let me show you how it's done so first of all you're going to notice that your icons are wiggling in the control strip indicating that they're ready to be edited so you just drag down like this any new keys that you wish to appear in the control strip now you can only have four items in the control strip at once so if you put more than four Keys it will replace it but you don't have to have four Keys you can actually remove all of the keys from the control strip if you wish to do so now the control strip isn't just limited to these four keys right here but if you tap the Chevron key it'll reveal the expanded control strip with many more options to choose from so it really should be no surprise that you can customize the expanded control strip as well so when you're in edit mode here simply tap the Chevron to reveal the expanded control strip and you'll see the full gamut of customization options available to you but customization doesn't end with a control strip if you go to view and go to customize touch Bar for a supported app you can customize the touch bar in relation to that individual app so in this case I'm using pixel Mater and as you can see there's tons of different ways to customize pixel Mater so I'm going to remove one of these key options here just going to drag that out and I'm going to replace it with this just like that so again the point is you can customize your apps as you see fit now you can also customize the control strip while you're in the middle of customizing an app all you need to do is tap the control strip section of the touch bar just like that you can go back and start customizing the app again by touching the app section just like that you probably notice that the Escape key in the touch bar isn't aligned with the physical keys on the keyboard however you don't necessarily have to touch the Escape key exactly right on the key itself you can actually touch a little bit to the left of the key which is great for touch typist because you don't have to be perfect to hit the Escape key now the touch bar will go to sleep after 75 seconds of no activity after 60 seconds you'll notice it dim like this like this like this there we go okay so it dimmed so you have 15 additional set seconds before the touch bar goes to sleep completely and turns off but the nice thing is you can wake it back up in three different ways you can tap the touch bar itself which I'm going to show you right now go to sleep there we go so tap the touch bar it wakes up or you can tap a key on your keyboard and it'll wake up or you can tap the trackpad and it wakes up speaking of trackpad you can move the touch bar individually or the trackpad individually or you can use both simultaneously like this and if you're running the latest Mac OS 10.12.2 public beta 3 or later which is available like I said as a public beta then you'll be able to take screenshots of the touch bar using a handy keyboard shortcut let me show you how so just open up system preferences go to the keyboard section under shortcuts and then you're going to see those two keyboard shortcuts command command shift 6 will allow you to take a screenshot of the touch bar and it will save it onto your desktop so command shift 6 like that and there is the screenshot of the touch bar pretty nifty wouldn't you agree you know how on your iPhone you can hold the home button to make Siri listen to your entire command well you can do the same thing on Mac OS now that there is a dedicated Siri button on the touch bar so once we're finished with our Command release the Siri key and Siri takes over from there this is a really cool feature a persistent media scrubber that stays available no matter what app you're in so you know how the touch bar dynamically switches and changes whenever you switch apps well one thing that always stays constant is the media scrubber that you'll find when you're playing videos and iTunes or videos on uh Safari or listening to music on iTunes you have this nice scrubber and the nice thing about this scrubber is that it's very accurate you can scrub to like the exact time of your favorite YouTube videos hopefully you're subscribed to 95 Max YouTube channel but the point I'm really trying to make here is that these media controls are persistent across all apps so even when something takes Focus like say I opened up system preferences and put it on top of the Safari window like this ah you do see the media scrubber go away but it is still there it's just hidden in the control strip yes the control strip actually gets an extra button for accessing your media controls and you'll see an app icon of the app that is currently linked to those controls so in this case Safari I can close out like that but what if I have two apps with media content well it's actually pretty simple there's just another button to access the media controls for the other app so in this case iTunes just tap the iTunes button and I can easily control my music playback just like that and I can go back and switch to Safari if I wish to do so really handy and lastly what happens if you're using a touch bar enabled MacBook Pro and you have a boot camp partition and you're running Windows what do you see then well you still do get some key controls but they're basically just system functions like brightness for your screen and for the keyboard buttons there's media controls there and there's volume controls as well of course you also have an Escape key and you can still access your function keys by holding the function key on the keyboard in the bottom left hand corner so ladies and gentlemen that has been a look at some of our favorite tips and tricks for the touch bar on the latest MacBook Pro let me know what you guys think Down Below in the comments section also make sure you subscribe and also give us a thumbs up if you appreciated this video or if you learned something in the meantime I'll be hanging down here in the comments section this is Jeff with 9o5 Mac\n"