Mac Kung Fu, 2nd Edition

Tip 251

Select Text like a Pro

In some built-in Mac apps like TextEdit, as well as in Microsoft Office and Mozilla Firefox, it’s possible to select text in a variety of useful ways above and beyond simply clicking and dragging.

Selecting Noncontiguous Regions

Holding down Command while clicking and dragging lets you select disparate sections of text. You could highlight one sentence at the beginning of a paragraph, for example, and while holding down Command, select another sentence at the end of a paragraph. Hitting Command+C will copy both to the clipboard. If you hit Command+V to paste, the two sentence components will be pasted on two separate lines.

Selecting Square or Rectangular Blocks of Text

Holding down Option will let you select rectangular ...