In most Mac OS X Finder windows, you can highlight the item that comes first alphabetically by pressing the space bar. In most cases, you can highlight the item that comes last alphabetically by pressing Option+P; in many cases, pressing Option along with any number key works just as well. These tricks stem from the capability to select an item by typing the first part of its name. If the item you select by typing isn't visible in the Finder window before you select it, the window may not automatically scroll to show the item you selected. An update to Mac OS X may make the automatic scrolling more reliable.

If nothing is selected in the active Finder window and it is set to icon view, you can highlight the first or last icon by pressing Tab or Shift+Tab. With an icon highlighted, pressing Tab or Shift+Tab highlights the icon that follows or precedes it alphabetically, and pressing an arrow key highlights the closest icon on the Desktop in the direction of the arrow. In a Finder window set to list view or column view, pressing Tab or Shift+Tab has a different effect.