The handy utility Dash – Offline access to documentation is sadly only available for MacOS, but there are compatible alternatives available to let you browse documentation offline on Linux.

Zeal – offline documentation browser

Open the App Store from the menu bar. Then search for Dashlane and install it. The Dashlane application is always free on the Mac App Store, even when reinstalling or updating. If you see a Buy button instead of Install or Get, click it and it will install or update Dashlane for free. IZip is a free powerful archiving utility designed specifically for Mac. Easily manage ZIP and RAR files directly from the OS X Finder. Open and securely share ZIP, encrypted ZIP and RAR plus other compressed file formats.

Dash being a MacOS only Application uses a documentation format called “docset”. The alternative program for Linux uses the same format for the documentation, allowing you to use the growing selection of documentation that already exists for Dash.

Zeal is an offline documentation browser for software developers providing very similar functionality to Dash for MacOS. Zeal is available for Windows as well as for different Linux distributions. To install Zeal on an Ubuntu based system, I would suggest following the approach to use the PPA repository as it seems to be more up-to-date with the latest Zeal versions.

A list of supported Linux distributions and the related commands to install Zeal can be found on the developer’s homepage.

Geometry Dash Mac Os X

1. Dashcode was a software application created by Apple Inc. That was included with Mac OS X Leopard and facilitates the development of widgets for Dashboard. It was first included on new MacBooks shipping around the time of May 24, 2006, as part of the Xcode developer tools.
2. Dash is an API Documentation Browser and Code Snippet Manager. Dash instantly searches offline documentation sets for 200+ APIs, 100+ cheat sheets and more. You can even generate your own docsets or request docsets to be included.
3. At the end, Dash is a great tool to get more productive and even work offline with documentation. Zeal and AutoKey together provide the same functionality and productivity for Linux as Dash for Mac. The fact that Zeal uses the same docset documentation format makes it even better.

With Zeal installed, docsets can be installed and used in a similar way as in Dash. The different docsets can be searched and navigated conveniently. If you are familiar with Dash already, you will see little difference in using Zeal.

Dash For Mac Os

AutoKey – Text expander

There are some features of Dash that Zeal does not cover. As well as offline documentation, Dash provides an auto-type functionality. The auto-type functionality is usually triggered by typing a trigger word. Zeal does not provide this kind of functionality.

AutoKey is a text expander that provides similar functionality to Dash’s text expansion. AutoKey can be installed directly from the default repositories in Ubuntu based systems.

The UI is not as nicely polished as the Dash UI, but the functionality is very similar. Except for when you want to add new text expansion patterns, the AutoKey’s UI is mostly hidden. When a trigger text is entered, AutoKey will replace the text with the expanded version of the text. All this is done without even noticing AutoKey or navigating to its UI.

Geometry Dash For Mac Os X

Compared to Dash for Mac, AutoKey provides a few more options to control the automatic text expansion. This makes it a bit more flexible then Dash.

Final Words

At the end, Dash is a great tool to get more productive and even work offline with documentation. Zeal and AutoKey together provide the same functionality and productivity for Linux as Dash for Mac. The fact that Zeal uses the same docset documentation format makes it even better. Sharing the documentation format allows the amount of docsets to grow faster, providing a better collection of docsets for both the Mac and the Linux applications.

Read more of my posts on my blog at https://blog.tinned-software.net/.

First introduced with OS X Tiger in 2005, Dashboard organizes Mac widgets — program shortcuts and precursors to apps that we are all more familiar with. Many of these widgets still come as part of the standard package with every Mac and new operating system.

Dashboard is useful to keep close at hand. Mac widgets include contacts (which you can sync with iOS contacts), to calculators, flight trackers to stock market information, the weather app, games, and a wide range of extra tools you can add when you tap the + icon in the lower left of the Apple dashboard.

If you want to take a look at what you can access via the Dashboard, here is the complete list of 1703 Widgets currently available and supported. Now, here is how you use the macOS Dashboard to improve your productivity.

Mac Dashboard shortcuts

Since MacOS Yosemite was launched, Dashboard is something you may have to enable to use. On Macs using an older operating system it is something that automatically sits in the Dock.

To enable Dashboard:

1. Go to System Preferences > Mission Control

2. Click the Dashboard pop-up menu

Here it gives you options for how Dashboard appears:

• As Space: Dashboard can inhabit its own area of your Desktop. Get to it when you press the keyboard shortcut for Dashboard, or move between spaces. There are a few other ways you can use space on your Desktop which we will outline below.
• As Overlay: Dashboard occupies a permanent space on your Desktop (which you can switch off via Mission Control).

Now that Dashboard is enabled, there are several ways you can access it (and set shortcut to give you access quicker). Access Dashboard through one of the following shortcuts:

• Use Launchpad > Open > Dashboard.

• Using Siri. Open Siri in the Menu bar and ask “Open Dashboard”, or something similar.

• If you have set Dashboard as a space, use a Trackpad to access. Simply swipe right with three fingers.

• In Mission Control Preferences, set a Mouse or keyboard shortcut; then use that to access Dashboard.

Now you can use any of the widgets you need, and add any as needed using the Add button ‘+’ in the lower-left corner of the screen. Remove them using the ‘-‘ minus symbol.

Dash Macos

How to use Dashboard as a web monitor

1. Go to the website(s) you want to monitor. Choose File > Open in Dashboard.
2. The page or website will grey out, opening a purple border around part of the page you want to monitor.
3. Now you can adjust the size of the border around the web source.
4. Tap ‘Add’ and it will take you to the Dashboard with the source website pulling the information through to your Mac, making a shortcut to a specific website for quicker monitoring.

How to close Dashboard on Mac

Boulder Dash Mac Os X

When you want to close dashboard, either click anywhere on the screen and the widgets will fade, or press the escape key, or use the mouse, trackpad or keyboard shortcut to close.

Dashboard is also incredibly useful for monitoring website you want to keep an eye on. Whether this is the status of a delivery or recent Amazon order, or a news outlet you read often.

Monitor your Mac with CleanMyMac X

There are always things that would be really useful if you could keep an eye on that don't come in a widget format. Such as your network connection speed and health status of vital functions (disk space, battery, etc.) For those, CleanMyMac X comes with a Menu monitoring feature.

The CleanMyMac X Menu comes with the ability to monitor RAM and how full your trash is, so if you experience a performance drop it can quickly isolate and clean the problem. The Menu even shows real-time statuses and health indicators of your hard drive, memory, battery, and CPU. You can also connect your Dropbox to see how much space is remaining. Plus it monitors several other vital functions, keeping your Mac running smoother straight from your status bar.

Download CleanMyMac X (for free).Everyday, CleanMyMac cleans 614TB of data for Mac users, and we have customers scanning and cleaning their Macs in 185 countries. CleanMyMac X comes with dozens of useful and smart features — a powerful app that your Mac needs.

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