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Eggyhead @kbin.social

I've actually started making use of Stage Manager on Mac...

I've just been giving it the old college try to see if I can get a proper workflow going with it.

I teach, so I often have a lot of apps open for research/reference, lesson planning/preparation, as well as messaging services and other various apps.

I keep Apple Numbers full-screened in a space to the left, where I maintain a Grade/Schedule/Planner "book". I have Affinity Publisher 2 full-screened to the right, where I make prints/handouts for my classes.

On my desktop in the center, the stages (app sets) I keep are dedicated to...

  • a single instance of Safari for lesson research (and procrastinating on Kbin)
  • all my chat applications (iMessage, WhatsApp, etc)
  • multiple finder windows to find, manage, and organize materials and resources I require to prepare new lessons every week.
  • both my email client (spark) and calendar (FirstSeed).
  • occasionally Spotify, if I need some music to help me focus.

If I didn't have stage manager, I would have been using a similar setup across around 2-3 desktop spaces and some full-screened apps. My "home" desktop in the middle, with reference-based stretching apps leftward, production-based apps stretching rightward, and my entertainment-based apps out on the fringes. This worked really well for me in the past, but stage manager has actually made things smoother for me, since I'm doing a lot less swiping around. (Yes, Mission Control was ideal for reaching more fringier desktop spaces, but when you're in the habit of just quickly swiping between 1-3 key desktops, it gets easy to forget how "far away" some of the other desktops are.)

Currently, my two biggest wishes for Stage Manager are...

  1. that we could save stage presets so I could launch mine quickly with a Siri shortcut, and save a LOT of organization time after a restart.
  2. that there were more comprehensive keyboard shortcuts specifically for navigating stages rather than individual apps. (There might be, but I haven't found a clear guide anywhere since most publications are more interested in the fact that Stage Manager exists than how to make it useful.)
  3. a greater number of stages, with the ability to scroll through them and pin favorites to the top.

(I'm still on Ventura, so if these features were added in the betas, I wouldn't know.)

Question:
Has anyone else been discovering ways in which Stage Manager on Mac as worked out for them?

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1 comments

  • I don't use my Mac much, but I was just recently looking at Stage Manager to help me set up a few app arrangements for some work I was planning to do soon. I thought it was the answer to my prayers but I was, again, disappointed by the lack of options and what I would consider common-sense features.

    I did see something called Moom on the App Store and it was $10. I didn't buy it myself yet but I think it might solve all or most of your problems. I think its sole purpose is to save app and window arrangements and allow you to set up keyboard or trackpad (or mouse I assume) shortcuts to get back to those arrangements. It seems to have options relating to how the apps are handled (are they opened if not already open? do they default to a particular file or action upon the shortcut being used? etc).

    If you do happen to try it out, let me (us) know what you think of it?