Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual, El Capitan Edition

Mouse

This pane (Figure 17-15) looks different depending on what kind of mouse (if any) is attached to your Mac.

You might have the wireless, Bluetooth Magic Mouse (version 1 or 2), whose flat, broad top surface is also a trackpad. You might have the wired or wireless Apple Mouse, formerly called the Mighty Mouse, which has a domed top surface. And, of course, you can plug in any old USB mouse, from a Windows PC or whatever.

Note

On a laptop without any mouse attached, the Mouse pane still appears in System Preferences—but its sole function is to help you “pair” your Mac with a wireless Bluetooth mouse. At that point, the Mouse pane looks just as it does on a desktop Mac.

Secondary Click

Just by looking, you’d never know that an Apple mouse has both a right button and a left button. Once you turn on the two-button feature in System Preferences (Figure 17-15), though, each side clicks independently.

Figure 17-15. This huge photographic display shows up if you have the Magic Mouse, one of Apple’s secretly “two-button” mice. The controls here let you program the right and left buttons. This is also where you can turn the right-clicking feature on (just choose Secondary Button from the appropriate pop-up menu)—or swap the right- and left-click buttons’ functions.

Tracking Speed

It may surprise you that the cursor on the screen doesn’t move five inches when you move the mouse five inches on the ...