Every document or file that you save on your Mac is associated with a specific application in such a way that, when you try to open it, you always do it with that app, and not with another, when you double-click on the icon of that file in the Finder. However, it is possible to change the default app that opens a file. For example, for presentations made with PowerPoint always open with Keynote. Jun 19, 2018 How to Change a File Type's Default App in macOS. Reason for changing which app your Mac automatically launches when you open a common file type – when a newly installed app assumes control. Aug 08, 2013 From the OS X Finder, right-click (or Control+Click) on the file to change the default app for and hold down the OPTION key so that the “Open With” menu becomes “Always Open With” Continue to hold OPTION and select the application you want to set as the default for this file.
- How To Change Default App To Open File Mac Shortcut
- How To Change Default App To Open File Mac Download
Learn how to make Adobe Photoshop your default image viewer and editor for popular file formats like JPEG, PNG and TIFF, as well as Photoshop's own PSD format, in Mac OS X.
Even though every copy of Photoshop, whether it's a standalone version or part of a Creative Cloud subscription, includes a free and powerful file management program called Adobe Bridge, many Mac users still prefer the Finder for locating and opening their images.
While there's nothing technically wrong with that, there is one annoying problem; Mac OS X, at least by default, ignores Photoshop when we open images directly from within a Finder window. Instead, it prefers to open them in Apple's own Preview app with its basic and very limited set of image editing features. Since Photoshop is obviously our editor of choice, let's learn how to easily configure Mac OS X so that our images will automatically open for us in Photoshop every time.
Note that this tutorial is specifically for Mac users. For the PC version, see Make Photoshop Your Default Image Editor in Windows 10.
This is lesson 2 of 10 in Chapter 2 - Opening Images into Photoshop.
![Open Open](/uploads/1/3/3/9/133913927/198912971.jpg)
Turning On File Name Extensions
First, navigate to a folder on your Mac that contains one or more images. Here, I've opened a folder that's sitting on my Desktop. Inside the folder are four image files. Starting from the left, we have a PNG file, a JPEG file, a Photoshop PSD file, and a TIFF file. How do we know which file type we're looking at? We know because of the three letter extension at the end of each name:
A Finder window showing four image files.
If you're not seeing the extensions at the end of your file names, go up to the Finder menu in the top left of your screen and choose Preferences:
This opens the Finder Preferences dialog box. Click the Advanced tab at the top, then select Show all filename extensions by clicking inside its checkbox. Close the dialog box when you're done. You should now see the file extensions listed at the end of your file names:
Click the Advanced tab, then check 'Show all filename extensions'.
The Default Image Viewer
Let's try opening one of the images to see what happens. I'll double-click on my JPEG image ('fashion.jpg') to open it:
Opening a photo by double-clicking on its thumbnail.
Even though I have the latest version of Photoshop installed, and even though Photoshop just happens to be the world's most powerful image editor, Mac OS X completely ignores it and instead opens my photo in its own Preview app (fashion photo from Adobe Stock):
Preview has a few image editing features, but it's no Photoshop.
That's obviously not what I wanted so I'll close out of the Preview app by going up to the Preview menu at the top of the screen and choosing Quit Preview:
Making Photoshop The Default Image Viewer And Editor
So how do we tell Mac OS X to open this image in Photoshop instead of in Preview? And more importantly, how to we tell it to use Photoshop not just for this one image this one time but for every JPEG image we open in the future? It's actually very easy to do. First, Control-click on a JPEG image you want to open:
Control-clicking on the JPEG photo's thumbnail.
Then choose Get Info from the menu that appears:
A long, narrow Info dialog box will open full of details about the image. Look for the section that says Open with. You may need to click the small arrow to the left of the section's name to twirl it open. This section tells us which program Mac OS X is currently using to open JPEG files. By default, it's set to Preview:
Preview is currently our default image editor.
Click on 'Preview.app' to open a list of other apps currently installed on your system and choose Adobe Photoshop from the list. If you have more than one version of Photoshop installed, choose the most recent version. Again, at the time I'm writing this, the most recent version is CC 2015.5:
There's just one step remaining. Poweramp app spotify. To set Photoshop as the new default app for opening all JPEG files, not just this one, click the Change All button:
Clicking 'Change All'.
You'll be asked if you're sure you want to open all JPEG files (that is, all files with a '.jpg' extension) with Photoshop. Click Continue to confirm it:
You can close out of the Info dialog box at this point, and that's all there is to it! Photoshop is now set to open all of your JPEG files. I'll double-click once again on my JPEG image in the Finder window:
Opening the same photo again.
And sure enough, instead of opening in the Preview app as it did before, this time the photo opens for me in my latest version of Photoshop:
Photoshop is now my default image editor for JPEG files.
PNG Files
So far, so good. We've set Photoshop as the default app for opening JPEG files. But we still need to set Photoshop as the default app for opening the other file types as well, so let's run through the steps quickly. I'll return to my Finder window, then I'll Control-click on my PNG file ('butterfly.png') and choose Get Info from the menu:
Control-clicking on the PNG file and choosing 'Get Info'.
This opens the Info dialog box where we see that Preview, not Photoshop, is currently set as the default app for opening PNG files:
I'll click on 'Preview.app' and select my latest version of Photoshop from the list. Then, to set Photoshop as the default app for all PNG files, I'll click Change All:
Changing 'Open with' to Photoshop, then clicking 'Change All'.
I'll confirm that I want all PNG files to open in Photoshop by clicking Continue:
Then I'll close out of the Info dialog box. And now, when I open my PNG file from my Finder window by double-clicking on its thumbnail, the image opens in Photoshop, as will all PNG files from now on (butterfly design from Adobe Stock):
The PNG file opens in Photoshop. Image credit: Adobe Stock.
TIFF Files
Let's do the same thing for TIFF files. I'll return once again to my Finder window where I'll Control-click on my TIFF image ('portrait.tif'). Then, I'll choose Get Info from the menu:
Control-clicking on the TIFF file and choosing 'Get Info'.
In the Info dialog box, we see that just like with the JPEG and PNG files, Mac OS X is using Preview to open TIFF files. It's possible that your system may have a different app selected so don't worry if it does. All that matters is that we change it to Photoshop:
I'll once again click on 'Preview.app' and select my latest version of Photoshop from the list. Then I'll make the change apply to all TIFF files by clicking Change All:
Changing 'Open with' to Photoshop, then clicking 'Change All', this time for TIFF files.
I'll click Continue to confirm the change:
Then I'll close out of the Info dialog box. And now when I double-click on my TIFF file to open it in the Finder window, we see that it opens automatically in Photoshop (portrait photo from Adobe Stock):
The TIFF file opens in Photoshop. Image credit: Adobe Stock.
PSD Files
Finally, while Mac OS X will usually set Photoshop as the default app for opening PSD files (since PSD is Photoshop’s native file format), it still never hurts to check. Plus, if you have multiple versions of Photoshop installed on your computer, it’s worth making sure that your PSD files will open in the newest version, as we're about to see.
I'll return one last time to my Finder window where I'll Control-click on my PSD file ('performer.psd') and choose Get Info: https://partnerheavy.weebly.com/blog/tinkertool-system-497-torrent.
Control-clicking on the PSD file and choosing 'Get Info'.
In the Info dialog box, we see that sure enough, Mac OS X is using Photoshop to open PSD files. But, there's a problem. I still have older versions of Photoshop installed on my system, and Mac OS X has chosen one of the older versions, not the newest version. Here we see that it's set to use Photoshop CC 2014, while the newest version (at the time I'm writing this) is CC 2015.5:
Photoshop is set to open PSD files, but it's the wrong version of Photoshop.
I'll click on 'Adobe Photoshop CC 2014.app' and choose the latest version of Photoshop from the list:
![File File](/uploads/1/3/3/9/133913927/482296905.jpeg)
Then, as I've done with the other file types, I'll make the change apply to all PSD files by clicking Change All:
Clicking 'Change All'.
I'll click Continue to confirm the change:
Then I'll close out of the Info dialog box. And now when I double-click on my PSD file in the Finder window, it opens automatically in my latest version of Photoshop (performer photo from Adobe Stock):
The PSD file opens in Photoshop. Image credit: Adobe Stock.
Where to go next.
And there we have it! That's how to make Photoshop your default image editor in Mac OS X! If you're also a Windows user, learn how to make Photoshop your default image editor in Windows 10.
In the next lesson in this chapter, we'll learn how to create a new document in Photoshop using the redesigned New Document dialog box!
Or check out any of the other lessons in this chapter:
- 02. Make Photoshop your default image editor in Mac OS X
For more chapters and for our latest tutorials, visit our Photoshop Basics section!
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How To Change Default App To Open File Mac Shortcut
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When you install Windows 7 or get a new PC with Windows 7 installed, by default, there are programs setup to do certain things. Whether it’s editing text, viewing images, listening to music or some other common task Windows has a default program to get you going.
The programs that come set as the default might not be your favorite tool. For example, you may want to edit a picture in Adobe Photoshop instead of using Windows Live Photo Gallery. The following features and functionality, Default Programs, Open With and Always Open With can help you do that.
Default Programs
Say you have 3 or more programs that do the same thing on your computer, but you prefer to use one all the time when you trigger a task relating to that particular program. A common example of this would be clicking a link that starts your email program. Of course, the email program that starts might not be the one you want to use. With Default Programs, you can change that.
Click Start, then click Default Programs
This opens the Default Programs Control Panel items Here you can choose the programs that Windows uses by default.
Click the Set your default program link.
Wait while it loads the list of Programs available.
Here you can see a list of programs I have installed that I can set default options for, whether its email, web browsing, listening to music, viewing pictures, disc burning etc. For this example, I am going to set my default email program.
Because I use Microsoft Outlook a lot and all my emails are stored in it along with contact information and accounts, I want to set this as my default email program. I also have Windows Live Mail installed, but I don’t use it so often. To set it as the default email program, click Set this program as default
By default, I have Microsoft Outlook set to handle all emails, for example, when I click an email address on a web page or in a Microsoft Word document, it automatically launches Microsoft Outlook. Suppose I prefer to use another program instead such as Windows Live Mail? Scanner software for mac reviews. https://sideclever778.weebly.com/blog/adblock-app-store-mac. You can do that by using Associate a file type or protocol with a program
Whenever I Control + Click an address, it will automatically open Microsoft Outlook
With Associate a file type or protocol with a program you can change that behavior.
On the Default Programs page, click Associate a file type or protocol with a program
Scroll down to the Protocol or File type you want to change a default program for, then click Change program, in this case, it’s the MAILTO protocol that handles that association.
Ms office for mac free download 2008. The Open with dialog will display a list of suitable programs, in my case, I will select Windows Live Mail since it opens faster than Outlook.
So whenever I click on an email address in a document or web page, it will open Windows Live Mail instead of Microsoft Outlook. Other scenarios you can use this for, you could set Apple iTunes to open .mp4 files instead of Windows Media Player.
Email addresses now automatically launch Windows Live Mail.
Open With and Always Open With
Say you have a bunch of files you use from time to time, but instead of setting a default program, you would like to use different programs on the fly from time to time. Here is an example.
I have Microsoft Word set as the default program to open .rtf files, although this is great for rich editing, when I just want to review the document or make minor edits, I would prefer a program that opens much quicker such as WordPad.
To do that:
Select the file, on the Command bar, click in the Open list box and select the program I want, Windows will automatically display a list of the most suitable programs installed that can handle that file. If I want to set a default, program, on the same menu, click Choose default program…
Then check the box that says Always use the selected program to open this kind of file.
Click OK.
The file will in future automatically open in that particular program.
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