Taking screen shots with Mac OSX

I seem to always forget these short cuts even though i use them frequently. With windows, it is simply “print screen” button to capture the desktop and alt-”print screen” to capture the active window.  This puts the image in the clip board.

The apple commands for capturing the screen aren’t as intuitive as the Windows version.

To capture the desktop, Command-Shift-3

To capture a portion of the screen, Command-Shift-4.

To capture a specific windows, Command-Shift-4 followed by space bar.

The Mac version will create PNG files on the desktop with these commands.  If you hold down the control key while pressing these combinations, it will put the image in the clipboard.