Stamp: 24 October 2008 | 21 Comments | Back to Previous Page
ADVERTISEMENTS
We know that Dock is one of the most essential features on your Mac, without your Dock, I can say that you will lose roughly half of your productivity. Even folks at Windows are imitating the Dock, as can be seen here, here and here also.
As a big fan of tweaking, I love to play around with the system files of the Dock. And more importantly, I've found out several tweaks that I believe will give you an extra boost in productivity and self proud.
But before we started…
Disclaimer
We won't take any responsibilities for damages or data loss due to practicing the content of this article. Please kindly backup your files involved in the tweaking before you proceed.
Now, I've shouted it out, let's begin our tweaking!
Tweaking Dock Menu
Sometimes, I just want to have fun and change the menu name for my Dock, like changing "Empty Trash" into "Remove Junk". But we can use this creativity to tweak around whole contextual menu of your Mac, to increase your convenience while navigating around with Dock.
It's really simple. Just follow the steps and do the backup beforehand than you will do no harm to your Mac.
- Go to Your Hard Drive, e.g. Macintosh HD and then open folder System → Library → CoreServices
- Look for Dock, Control-Click on it and choose Show Package Contents
- Move inside Contents → Resources → English.lproj
- Copy DockMenus.strings to your Desktop followed by deleting the original DockMenus.strings inside English.lproj
- Open copied DockMenus.strings, search for EMPTY_TRASH = "Empty Trash"; and replace the whole line with EMPTY_TRASH = "Remove Junk";
You can also search for QUIT = "Quit"; and change it to QUIT = "Quit %@"; - Save the file as DockMenus.strings and move it back to English.lproj folder
- Restart your Dock with command line killall Dock
Now your menu will change from simply stating "Quit" (don't know what to quit) to "Quit" followed by the Application name.
Changing Trash Name
If you feel bored with your old Trash Name, i.e. Trash, you can change it anytime you want. But bear in mind that, I never force you to do the tweak.
- Go to Your Hard Drive, e.g. Macintosh HD and open System → Library → CoreServices
- Look for Dock, Control-Click on it and choose Show Package Contents
- Move inside Contents → Resources → English.lproj
- Copy InfoPlist.strings to your Desktop and delete original InfoPlist.strings inside English.lproj
- Open copied InfoPlist.strings
- Search for the line of text: TrashName = "Trash"; and change it to TrashName = "Recycle Bin";. Save it
- Throw it back to folder English.lproj
- Restart your Dock with killall Dock
Anyway, if you don't like the name "Recycle Bin", you can change to other name.
Fixing Grid View
Default view:
After the tweak:
The Leopard behavior to hide the text in the middle is quite unconvenient for me. Since I can't change this behavior, I will just cut down the length of the text, so it can be displayed as whole.
Here are the steps to do the tweak.
- Go to Your Hard Drive, e.g. Macintosh HD. Open System → Library → CoreServices
- Look for Dock, Control-Click on it and choose Show Package Contents
- Move inside Contents → Resources → English.lproj
- Copy Localizable.strings to your Desktop. Delete the original Localizable.strings inside English.lproj
- Open copied Localizable.strings
- Search for "MORE_IN_FINDER" = "%d More in Finder";. Replace the whole line with "MORE_IN_FINDER" = "More...";
- Save the file as Localizable.strings and move it back to English.lproj folder
- Restart your Dock with command line killall Dock
And you will get the same result as mine (hopefully).
Metallic Gradient Effect on Mouse Over
Handling bunch of Applications at once, it will be really nice if we have a sort of indicator other than our tiny mouse pointer…
- Open your Finder
- Go inside Applications → Utilities
- Open Terminal
- Execute command line: defaults write com.apple.dock mouse-over-hilte-stack -boolean YES
- Restart your Dock by executing command line: killall Dock
- Change your Dock folder to Grid View, sit back and enjoy the gradient effect
- If you want to disable it (but I don't think you want to), repeat from step 4, but change the value of -boolean YES to -boolean NO
Reveal Stack of Recent Items
- Open your Terminal
- Execute command line: defaults write com.apple.dock persistent-others -array-add '{ "tile-data" = { "list-type" = 1; }; "tile-type" = "recents-tile"; }'
- Restart your Dock by using commnad line: killall Dock
- You can select to view several kind of hidden features here, such as showing Recent Servers
- You can add many more stacks of recent items by executing step 2 many times
- Simply drag the stack out of your Dock to remove the folder
Make Hidden Applications Less Opaque
By default, you won't be able to distinguish between hidden applications and shown applications, after running this tweak, you will.
- Open your Terminal (Now you should know how to find your Terminal)
- Execute this command line: defaults write com.apple.Dock showhidden -bool YES
- Restart Dock with killall Dock
- Try to hide one of your applications and see the effect
- If you want to revert back, execute the command line from step 2 again, but now by changing -bool YES to -bool NO
Split your Dock with Spacer
When sometimes you want to categorize your Dock into several parts, you will want to put a blank space between Applications. Lucky for you, today you will now how to do the tweak.
- Open your Terminal
- Execute command line: defaults write com.apple.dock persistent-apps -array-add '{"tile-type"="spacer-tile";}'
- Repeat as many times as you want for creating several spacers
- Restart your Dock with killall Dock
- You can drag around the spacers. And you can also drag it out of your Dock to remove it
Categories: Leopard , Tips and Tricks | Post Comment | Back to Top
Related Entries:













21 Comments
Stuart
I love the opaque apps trick. Thanks.
Reply | Back to Top
Frank
I love it! Now my Trash is called Crap Jar lol
Reply | Back to Top
Leandro
Great, thanks! How did you do to show the base of the Dock dark (or black) ?
Reply | Back to Top
SebKom
I tried the last tweak, to add empty spaces but I can't move them. I can't even rearrange the application icons now. Any ideas on how I can bring my last dock back? :P P.S: Keep up the good work, great site!
Reply | Back to Top
Jared
How did you change your dock's color?
Reply | Back to Top
Me, David
Very nice post, I've had the opaque tweak for some while now but I really appreciate the gradient effect on mouse over thank you ! David btw: nice theme, I always read your post through RSS so this layout was new to me.
Reply | Back to Top
iGeek_FTW
i guess he changed the dock base using an application called "super dock" i've tried it once .. but now there 're spaces between each applications and i don't know how to rearrange the dock back again :( nice site , truly u r heroes keep it up gents :D i've been tracking this site since last august
Reply | Back to Top
Wendy
Thanks for all the comments. Anyway, I change my Dock color by going inside Macintosh HD → System → Library → CoreServices → Dock (Show Package Contents) → Contents → Resources and look for 4 files : scurve-l.png, scurve-m.png, scurve-sm.png and scurve-xl.png.
For better understanding how it works, you can refer back to my previous article Leopard - Transparent Dock and Black Dock.
Reply | Back to Top
Jim
Most of these hacks can be done with a single click using Onyx, a great freeware tool that does a whole lot more as well. However, the first couple of tricks (changing trash names, etc.) are very cool. Thanks for the tips!
Reply | Back to Top
Jordan
I changed my trash to toilet and I also changed everything in the finder/dock content resources to match it. Eg: instead of empty trash it is flush toilet which is seen in the dock trash bin and in the finder view.
Reply | Back to Top
Beau
Can you post a link to an article on how you changed your dock to be glossy AND a different color like that?
Reply | Back to Top
Jordan
To change the Dock theme, visit http://leoparddocks.com/Browse_Leopard_Docks_Designs.php and follow the instructions. It is so easy to do, you just open the Dock contents and navigate to resources and replace a few png files labeled scurve-l.png, scurve-m.png, scurve-sm.png, scurve-xl.png with the new ones and you can also change the indicator called indicator_large.png and indicator_medium.png and/or divider too which is called separator.png. Also, if you are also one of the people like me that hates the little white line at the bottom of the Dock, delete the file called 'frontline.png'.
Reply | Back to Top
Eddie
They are there, I had trouble with this too, they are almost like really small icons. So when you are trying to move or remove them, click at the farthest point to the bottom you can on the dock while still being on it. You should have the 'space' selected.
Reply | Back to Top
kevin
Can you upload your 4 images for your dock? those ones look so nice!
Reply | Back to Top
super revo
http://www.usingmac.com/2007/11/8/leopard-invisible-dock-and-black-dock on this post
Reply | Back to Top
Bryan
hey how do you change the gradient color on the whole folder?
Reply | Back to Top
matt
I just use an application called Docker. I mainly got it to change the color of the dock. I like it black also.
Reply | Back to Top
Mark
I've tried to do some of these tips, but I'm getting access privilege errors when trying to modify the "nfoPlist.strings" file. I'm logged in as an Administrator on this Mac. When I look at the file info, I have read/write access, yet I'm unable to make the change. Any help is appreciated. Do I have to do a chmod first?
Reply | Back to Top
Matt
Mark, google "Docker for Mac" It can do a lot (if not all) of these same things, and you don't need to enter terminal. Its much easier, and you can always restore defaults with the click of a button...
Reply | Back to Top
Mac Lova
Now my trash is called dangling Junk
Reply | Back to Top
Matthew Miller
What about changing the name of the trash so Finder recognizes it?
Reply | Back to Top
Post a Comment
You can't be anonymous
C'mon, I'm sure you've got something to say.