So the most dreaded thing happened last week - IT handed me a Windows laptop on my first day. Yep, seriously.
I haven’t touched Windows since friggin’ high school (class of '05 here - still can’t believe our 20-year reunion is coming up). I’ve become totally dependent on my Mac setup at home with all my Keyboard Maestro workflows and Alfred snippets I’ve built up over the years.
Silver lining: this job is basically just Teams meetings and client visits, so I won’t need my full automation arsenal. Still, it feels like I’ve forgotten how to type - I keep hitting cmd+c and wondering why nothing’s happening!
My biggest pain points right now:
I’m dying without a decent clipboard history manager and snippet tool. Copy 'Em and Alfred are basically extensions of my brain at this point.
Mac apps I’m having major withdrawal from:
Keyboard Maestro (obviously)
Alfred (duh)
Moom (yes, I know Windows has some built-in stuff just need to learn it)
Copy 'Em / Paste
CleanShot X (I take LOTS of screen shots)
Things (though I’m not too concerned about this one - I managed to sync Microsoft To Do with Things at my last gig using some Zapier magic)
Not all doom and gloom though:
Outlook’s iPhone app is working fine for work email, so there’s that.
My trusty MX Master 3 + Options+ software actually plays nicer with Windows than I expected.
Teams is shockingly more stable on Windows - who knew?
My CalDigit dock worked straight away - just unplug my Time Machine drive when switching.
And let’s be real, my Mac Studio is right here on my desk for when I need to do actual work!
Any fellow Mac-to-Windows prisoners with advice? Apps, keyboard shortcuts, sanity-preserving tips? What do you wish someone had told you when you got forced onto the dark side?
Help a guy out - I feel like I’ve forgotten how to computer!
PowerToys is about to be your best friend! This is a free Microsoft application that extends Windows in many ways. It includes a clipboard manager, Alfred-like launcher, window manager, and so much more. Is this going to replace all you’ve built on Mac? No, but it will get you enough of the way there for Teams, email, and spreadsheets!
My advice on Windows is just to lean into all of the Microsoft apps, it’s almost always the better experience.
Edit: My biggest challenge when switching is Command vs Control for keyboard shortcuts. I’ve found that swapping keyboard and mouse at my desk when I switch between computers actually helps me a great deal to mentally swap between operating systems.
Well you said you still have a Mac Studio for the real work, so you should be ok. And it never hurts to be literate on multiple platforms.
I’m retired and Mac only for the past 9 years, but I’ve had Macs for 19 years, used DOS/Windows since the mid 1980s until I retired, used UNIX/Linux from 1980 until I retired. I wouldn’t like to go back, but I wouldn’t be that lost if I had to.
I switched to Windows (full time) last year for around a month, and I found alternatives for almost everything.
Windows’ built-in clipboard manager is pretty great. WIN+V
As for snippets, there are multiple tools that I think are sufficient: espanso is the one I use. This syncs between devices by symlinking their config folders through OneDrive, or another sync service that you install on both Windows and macOS.
This is one thing I haven’t found a good replacement for. You can use things like AutoHotKey, but it just isn’t the same.
Honestly just learn the WIN+Arrow key shortcuts. Usually this is sufficient, but PowerToys can handle saved layouts for more complex configurations if needed.
ShareX is great, and you can configure shortcuts and auto-upload to cloud services.
All that said, Keyboard Maestro & Shortcuts is what brought me back to macOS, but Windows has come such a long way.
Windows shift S for screenshot. It goes to the clipboard rather than saving the file like the Mac doees. With Mac you can hold down control with Command shift 4 to put the screenshot in the clipboard.
Often times I’m annotating a screenshot if I’m taking one so I prefer ShareX for that reason. But I believe there’s a way to do that with the Windows Snipping Tool too. Lots of options.
OneNote is great on Windows. I find it less appealing on almost every other device.
I’m pretty sure that you may find a nice collection of screenshots in your “Pictures/Screenshots” folder unless you’ve found a way to set it to something else. They tend to be named “Screenshot <date and timestamp.png”.
Also, be mindful of what the policy is for you installing your own stuff on there. My corporate machine is welded down so tight I am restricted to the bare minimum provided by the company.
You may technically have the permissions to use your machine like you wish, but do make sure it’s OK with the Security team. Their life is hard enough.
I luckily also have a Mac Studio on the desk beside the Windows machine
Whether your Mac and your Windows laptop are both sitting in front of you, or you are off somewhere with one of them, Jump Desktop handles things pretty well. And it doesn’t cost that much. If the computers are side-by-side, just remote the laptop into the Mac, close the lid on your laptop, and forget about it. Devote one full screen Space on your Mac to the laptop, and access the laptop just by flipping over to that Space (Control-Arrow key). I use dual displays, so I can have Windows and Mac side-by-side, but this setup also works well with only one display. I leave the Mac menu bar showing above the Windows screen, but you can hide it if you like. I can’t address the use of many of your Mac apps, since I don’t use them, but CleanShot, for instance works just like it does on the Mac. I would expect that you could find ways to use many of your other Mac apps on Windows with this setup. There are various ways to move files from one computer to another. I usually us Dropbox, but there is a way to more directly copy and paste between the OS’s.
If you are off somewhere with only your Windows laptop, you also can remote in to your Mac, and have a very similar setup.
I haven’t found any security problems with Jump Laptop, but I have both my Mac (M1 mini) and my Windows laptop set to go into lock screen after a few minutes of inactivity.
Also, I second the recommendation for Power Toys. A lot of useful stuff there.
