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there are lot’s of odd leftovers inside OS X that can actually be useful. take Single App Mode for example. useability studies showed that new users were often confused as to what window was what when using a Mac for the first time. and out of that study came a feature that made it less confusing. the solution was that as you switched from App to App the old app would automatically hide uncluttering the screen allowing you to totally focus on your task. but Mac users are a picky lot meaning that long time users complained about app hiding as default behavior meaning it didn’t make the 1.o cut. for whatever reason the feature can be turned on using a command line incantation. it turns out to be useful! and it’s very easy to turn on allowing you to try it for yourself.

you need to open the Terminal then copy/paste these two CLI incantations to turn on Single App Mode

defaults write com.apple.dock single-app -bool true
killall Dock

if you decide you can’t take it anymore use these to commands to change it back.

defaults delete com.apple.dock single-app
killall Dock

here’s the Tidbit’s article.

the other tool that Kenji talked about is called Hyperspaces. it let’s you choose the background image for each one of your spaces. this is a can help you recognize what space is up more quickly.