OS X Mountain Lion: The Missing Manual

15 Tips for Better Surfing

Safari is filled with shortcuts and tricks for better speed and more pleasant surfing. For example:

The Reading List

The Reading List is a hide-able panel at the left side of the screen that lists Web pages you want to read later (Figure 19-7).

Until Mountain Lion, the Reading List didn’t actually store the pages on the Mac; it basically stored a link to the bookmarked page, just like a bookmark. You couldn’t read it later unless you were actually online.

In Mountain Lion, though, the Reading List actually stores each page you’ve requested. Better than that, actually: It store that page and any other pages necessary to continue reading an article that you’ve flagged.

Meanwhile, the Reading List still has some advantages over bookmarks. For example, it’s faster to flag a Web page you like—you don’t have to make up a name or a location for it, as with a bookmark. Also, the Reading List keeps track of what you’ve read; you can use the All/Unread buttons at the top of the list to view everything, or just what you haven’t yet read. You might treat the Reading List as a list of pages you’ll want to read once later, and use bookmarks for pages you like to revisit frequently.

To make matters even sweeter, iCloud synchronizes your Reading List among your Mac, iPhone, iPad, and so on—as long as you’ve turned on bookmark syncing. It’s as though the Web always keeps your place.

To add a page to the Reading List, use one of these techniques:

• Shift-click a link. That simple ...