Geeky Tricks to Get The Most From Your Mac

Dock Tricks

Recent Items Stack

Stacks are quite the handy addition to your Mac’s dock and the good people at Mac OS X Hints figured out a way to make them even more useful by creating a stack that automatically contains your most recent applications.

These can of course be found under the Apple menu as well but it’s much more convenient to have them right in the dock.

To accomplish this feat, simply copy and paste the line below into Terminal.

defaults write com.apple.dock persistent-others -array-add '{ "tile-data" = { "list-type" = 1; }; "tile-type" = "recents-tile"; }'

Once you’ve completed that command, type “killall Dock” to relaunch your dock with the new stack.

Stacks List View

Use the snippet below in Terminal to activate a really nice looking list view in stacks complete with icons and a scroll bar.

defaults write com.apple.dock use-new-list-stack -bool YES

As with the previous example, use “killall Dock” to make the change take effect.

Resizing Your Dock

If you click and drag the little divider bar in your dock, you can resize the entire dock without going to System Preferences. Hold down option to make proportional changes.

Force Magnify Dock

If you’re like me and have dock magnification permanently turned off, you can temporarily activate it by holding down ⌃⇧ while hovering over the dock.

Desktop & Finder

Show Hidden Files

One of the most well known and widely used terminal commands. Use the snippet below to make hidden files visible in the Finder.

defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles YES

Set it back to “NO” to re-hide the files.

Hide Your Desktop Debris

If you find yourself constantly embarrassed or distracted by your messy desktop habits, download Camouflage, a free app that quickly hides everything on your desktop.

Choose a New Library

There are several applications in OS X that allow you to choose or create a different library on startup. Simply hold down the option key when you click on an app in the dock to see a window similar to the one below

Sync Application Libraries Across Macs

Use the previous tip to create a new library for an application and place that library in your Dropbox folder. Then choose this library with the same application on any other Macs that you own and all the application data will remain synced between the two Macs!

This trick is completely free, just be sure to watch the size of the libraries you are syncing as it’s really easy to eat up all your Dropbox space.

Finder Window Shortcuts

It’s easy to miss that you can actually add item shortcuts to the top of your Finder windows. Simply drag the application into the space to the left of the Spotlight field.

Pimp Your Desktop

You may have caught a glimpse of my desktop in one of the images above and wondered how I could display weather, time and date as a part of my background. Using GeekTool you can add all sorts of functionality to your desktop. It’s everything Dashboard should’ve been.

Check out our recent GeekTool tutorial to get started.

If it’s all a bit too technical for you, check out Yahoo Widgets instead. They’re just like Dashboard widgets only you have the option to display them right on your desktop.

Stationery Pad

If you have files that you often use as templates but want to prevent accidental replacement of the original file, you can use the “stationery pad” option. Enabling this on a specific file makes it so that when you try to open that file, the Finder creates a duplicate and opens that instead.

To find this option, get info on a file with ⌘+I and click the “Stationery pad” checkbox under the labels in the “General” section.

Quick Look Zoom

While Quick Look is launched, hold down the option key to turn your cursor into a magnifying glass. Then click to zoom in. Hold shift and option to zoom out.

Screensaver

Screensaver Wallpaper

Have you ever wanted to set a screensaver as your desktop background? Well that’s a horrible idea for more reasons than I care to list. However, it turns out that it’s perfectly possible. Just use the following command in Terminal:

/System/Library/Frameworks/ScreenSaver.framework/Resources/ScreenSaverEngine.app/Contents/MacOS/ScreenSaverEngine -background

When you’ve had enough fun, hit Control+C to return things back to normal.