How to Using the Multi-Touch Trackpad Apple

Tracking

The speed the mouse pointer moves depends on how quickly you move your finger across the trackpad. To fine-tune the tracking speed and set other trackpad options, choose System Preferences from the Apple menu, then Trackpad from the View menu.

Finger position while tracking

For more accurate tracking, navigate the cursor with one finger at a time on the trackpad. For comfort, you can rest your thumb near or along the bottom of the trackpad, much like the thumb position from previous trackpads. If this is your preferred finger position, rest your thumb along the bottom edge of the trackpad. The glass multi-touch trackpad can sense when your thumb is resting on the edge of the pad.

Note: Resting your thumb on the trackpad (above the bottom edge) may result in accidental gestures such as scrolling, zooming or rotating.

• To ensure accurate tracking and gestures, make sure you are not hovering other fingers closely above the tracking surface. This can cause the trackpad to react as if there are multiple fingers being used.
• To ensure accurate finger gesturing response, use fingertips or slightly curled fingers. 

Deleting text

• Forward deleting deletes characters to the right of the insertion point.
• Pressing the Delete key deletes characters to the left of the insertion point.

To forward delete, hold down the Function (fn) key while you press the Delete key.
Tap to click

• Turned off by default.
• Enable by clicking the checkbox.

Tap on the trackpad to select an item (equivalent to clicking on the bottom of the trackpad).


Secondary clicking

• Turned off by default.
• Secondary clicking or “right-clicking” lets you access shortcut menu commands.

To secondary click, enable Tap to Click in Trackpad preferences, and then tap two fingers on the trackpad. Or use Trackpad preferences to set up a secondary click zone in the bottom left or right corner of the trackpad. You can also secondary click by holding down the Control key while you click.

Two finger scrolling

• Two-finger scrolling lets you drag to scroll quickly up, down, or sideways in the active window.
• This option is on by default.

Application-specific gestures
The following trackpad gestures work in certain applications. When you perform these gestures, slide your fingers lightly on the surface of the trackpad.
For more information, see Trackpad preferences or choose Help > Mac Help and search for “trackpad.”

Two-finger rotating


Two-finger rotating lets you rotate photos, pages, and more.

Two-finger pinching


Two-finger pinching lets you zoom in or out on PDFs, images, photos, and more.

Screen Zoom

Magnifies an area of the screen.  Click Options... to customize the behavior of this feature.

Three-finger swiping


Three-finger swiping lets you rapidly page through documents, move to the previous or next photo, and more.

Four-finger swiping

• Four-finger swiping up or down for Exposé.
• Four-finger swiping left or right to Switch Applications.

You can change the default behavior by selecting Options in Trackpad preferences.