My Services Menu Click to see a larger image

Services are tools that let you perform actions from other applications inside of the application you are currently working in. That may not make alot of sense, so bear with me and I think the examples below will help make Services make more sense.

You access Services from the Services menu in the application menu of most applications. Services are highly context specific so it may seem that all the choices are greyed out. All that means is that you haven't selected anything that that Service can act on.

Most Services act on selected text and some only on specific kinds of text as you will see in the examples. Any application can add tools to the Services menu, so your list of Services might well be different from that of another Mac user.

Here are some of the basic Services that all users should have and how they work:

• Speech / Start speaking text. Select any amount of text and your Mac will read it to you aloud.
• Mail / Send To. Select an email address in any text and a new Mail message will be created to that address.
• Mail / Send Selection. Select any amount of text and a new Mail message will be created with the selected text inserted into the body of the message. (I chose this example because there is a much easier way to do this using drag and drop. Not every Service is the most efficient way to accomplish a task.)
• Look Up in Dictionary. Select a single word and the Dictionary application will open with the definition of that word.
• Search With Google. Select a word or phrase and a Google search will be performed in Safari. (See the link in the third example for an easier way to do this.)

Try experimenting with the other Services you have and see what you get.