Tip: Disable the Caps Lock key
How often do you use the Caps Lock key?
Now, how often do you use it deliberately?
Thought so.
To disable the Caps Lock key on your keyboard so that you never accidentally ENABLE IT AND START TYPING LIKE THIS, do this:
1. Open System Preferences and choose Keyboard & Mouse.
2. Click Modifier Keys….
3. Set Caps Lock Key to No Action, and click OK.
Such a useless key given such a prominent place
Most of the long-time Unix users swap the CAPSLOCK key for the Control key which is also done in this prefpane.
I had no idea this was possible… but it is in (ahem) Windows too. I’ve always added the Accessibility “ding” to it so that if I did hit the dang thing by accident, I at least knew pretty quickly. But this is far better. Cheers!
Awesome, solved two problems with one solution! Switched the caps lock and control (for my unix side) and swapped the command and option keys because the pc keyboard I use in my kvm set up had alt as option and the windows key as the command (backwards from mac kb setup). Best tip I’ve had in a long time.
thank you, thank you, thank you, dammit.
I’ve been famous in my own little world for ripping off CAPS LOCK keys from my Thinkpads for a decade. I just migrated to Mac (with Fusion, and life is wonderful…) and couldn’t bear to molest these gorgeous keyboards. So I was losing seconds every few hours erasing EMPHATIC WRITING.
Thanks for this. Many binary blessings wafting your way…
Actually cap lock key does serve a useful purpose with multiple input methods. If you are using another language input method, enabling the cap lock key will put you back to English input, so you can type in native language and use English for email address, etc. that requires English without having to toggle input methods.