I am constantly having to look up how to capture screen grabs on the Mac lately, so I thought a post on it might not be a bad idea, because at least then I’ll have something on-site to use as a reference. These commands are useful for those times when you are trying to get a picture of something from a website, and the right-click function doesn’t allow you to just copy the image (if they’re using Flash, for example), or when you want to take a snapshot of your screen for a Photoshop tutorial (or something like that), or if there’s something on a website that you want to photograph because you’re not sure it will be there later when you want to go look at it (a status update from a Twitter stream, for example). Enjoy!
- Capture entire desktop as a .png
To take a picture of your entire desktop, hold down the command key, the shift key, and the 3 key. This will take a picture of your whole desktop as it currently appears and save it as a .png file on your desktop (or a PDF file in OX 10.3 or earlier).
- Copy entire desktop to clipboard.
To take a picture of your entire desktop like the example above and copy it to your clipboard (for pasting later), hold down the control key, the shift key, the command key, and the 3 key. This will take a picture of your whole desktop as it currently appears and save it in your clipboard; you can then paste it into other files later.
- Capture a portion of your desktop as a .png.
To take a picture of a portion of your desktop, press the command key, the shift key, and the 4 key. A cross-hair icon will appear; to use it, click on the top left corner of where you want to capture and drag it out as far as you want the picture to go. This feature works in much the same way as does the crop funciton in PhotoShop. When you release the mouse, a screen shot will be saved to your desktop as a .png (or a PDF file in OX 10.3 or earlier). Note: this method excludes things like cursors or open menus.
- Copy a portion of your desktop to clipboard.
To take a picture of a portion of your desktop and save it to the clipboard (for pasting later), press the command key, the shift key, the control key, and the 4 key. A cross-hair icon will appear; to use it, click on the top left corner of where you want to capture and drag it out as far as you want the picture to go. This feature works in much the same way as does the crop function in PhotoShop. When you release the mouse, a screen shot will be saved to the clipboard, and you can paste it into files later.
- Capture the window of one application.
If you want to capture a picture of one application’s window — say, Photoshop –, press the command key, the shift key, the 4 key, and then the spacebar. Doing this will change the curser into a camera, and as you move over the application windows, they will highlight. When the application you want to capture is highlighted, click on the mouse. Please note that it doesn’t matter if the whole application window is visible when you do this: it will work anyway. The image will be saved as a .png to your desktop.
People, I’m very excited today to introduce you to a new member of the ABDPBT family: ABDPBT Tech Services. That’s right: for my first stab at deploying the Copyblogger model for monetizing online content, I thought I’d try a really basic tech services product launch for people who are interested in setting up a WordPress blog but are not so sure they’re ready to do it on their own. And the best part is that — from now through February 28, 2010 — it’s free!
Who in the what now? Don’t I have eleventy billion blogs to write? How do I have time to take on other people’s tech headaches? Here’s the deal: I can do this because in exchange for me configuring all of the initial WordPress setup crap you don’t want to deal with, I’m going to ask that you use my affiliate link to purchase the web hosting services that you’ll need to buy anyway in order to complete your WordPress blog install. That way, you get your blog set up for no extra cost, I get reimbursed for the time setting up your blog by the hosting company for directing business their way, and I live to blog another day because I get to start turning a profit on all the time I spend dicking around on the computer.
In short, everybody wins.
Interested? Here’s how it works.
- Obtain A Domain Name.
First, you will need to purchase a domain name for your new site (e.g. like mine, abdpbt.com, rather than something hosted on another company’s server, like abdpbt.blogspot.com). You can do this through a variety of services, including the one I use, which is Godaddy.com. That’s an affiliate link, by the way, but if you’d like to use a different domain name source, there are tons of them out there, and from what I can tell they are all mostly the same in quality and service, so the choice is up to you. I would, however, recommend paying for the service that allows you to have a private registration, so that people cannot easily look up your address and personal information. Go Daddy charges a little bit extra for this service, but I have found that it’s worth it.
- Obtain Web Hosting Services.
You will also need a web hosting account (actual space on a webserver somewhere for your blog to live). If you are willing to sign up for web space with LiquidWeb and use my affiliate link to purchase your hosting, I will get paid a commission from LiquidWeb, but the price to you is exactly the same. By the way, LiquidWeb is the hosting company that I use myself, and I’ve written extensively about how great they are, and how excellent their customer service is, so I can assure you that they are a top-notch choice for web hosting. LiquidWeb is slightly more expensive than some of the deeply discounted webhosting providers out there, but paying for quality now will save you headaches later. Trust me on this: it’s worth the extra money to get good service and not be crammed onto an overloaded server with all of the spammers who abuse cheap web hosting. Unless you anticipate having a very heavily trafficked site right out of the gate, which is unlikely, you will probably only need to go for the Shared Hosting Plan with LiquidWeb, by the way. That is more than enough to handle the traffic associated with most blogs.
- Pick Out A WordPress Theme.
There are tons of free WordPress themes out there to choose from, but here is a good place to start your search.
- Submit a request form.
Fill out the form below to submit your request to me.
- And done!
Within 48 hours, I will have your blog set up and will send you an email with all of the information you need in order to start posting to your brand new blog!
FAQ
What’s included in this ABDPBT Tech Free WordPress Blog Setup Offer?
With the purchase of web hosting from LiquidWeb via my affiliate link, I will log into your LiquidWeb cPanel and install WordPress, install your free theme, and set up some very basic WordPress plugins that I think are necessary for every WordPress blog (nothing fancy). These plugins include Akismet for spam control and the Google XML Sitemap plugin, to make it easier for Google to index your site and include you in searches.
But . . . I already have hosting setup. Will you still set up my blog for me?
I will still set up your WordPress blog for free if you already have a domain name, provided you use the LiquidWeb link to set up hosting. If you already have web hosting, though, I cannot do it for free. If you are still interested in having me do it, please see the ABDPBT Tech Services page for pricing on services without the purchase of web hosting.)
What if I have another blog and need it transferred to a WordPress blog?
I can setup the new WordPress blog for free (with the purchase of a LiquidWeb hosting package), but the exporting and importing to transfer your blog entries is something you’ll either have to do yourself, or you can pay me to do that (please see the purchase it from the ABDPBT Tech Services page for pricing on importing/exporting from other blogs.
I like this deal and am ready to get my LiquidWeb hosting, but I want to use the Thesis Theme for WordPress, not a free WordPress theme. Can you do that for me?
Sure. I will set up Thesis on your new WordPress blog if you purchase it through my Thesis affiliate link. Please make sure to include this info in the theme area of the request form.
When you set up my WordPress blog with the Thesis Theme, can you also customize it for me? Can you make it look like your blog, for example?
This free setup deal just includes a super basic install of a theme, not any customization. I am willing to work with you on customizing stuff for an extra fee. Please see the ABDPBT Tech Services page for more information on pricing for Thesis customization.
After my blog is up, can you help me with that?
Yes. Please check out the ABDPBT Tech Services page for pricing on help with tech issues after install.
More questions? Please feel free to email me at anna at abdpbt dot com.
Interested? Email the following information to me at anna at abdpbt dot com:
Name
Email Address
Liquidweb Information
Please include the link to your web hosting account with LiquidWeb, including your login and password information to cPanel (or you can just copy and paste the whole email that LiquidWeb sent you after you
signed up). When I’m done with the setup, you can change your password to ensure security.
Domain Name Information
Please include all of your domain name information here, including your GoDaddy.com account login and password, so that I can make sure all of your traffic goes to the right place. If you just signed up for a domain name, go ahead and paste the whole email you got from GoDaddy.com here.
Theme Information
Please include the link and name of the theme you would like me to install. The Free WordPress setup includes any free theme you can find for WordPress. If you’d like Thesis, I will install that for free with a purchase of the theme through my affiliate link.
Other Questions
Please put any other details here including any additional plug-ins you’d like installed, etc.
TWEET THIS
