In terms of importance, the Dock — the quick-access strip for applications and documents that appears on your MacBook Desktop — ranks right up there with the command center of a modern nuclear submarine. As such, it had better be easy to customize, and naturally, OS X doesn’t let you down.
The Dock is the area the bottom of your screen on the Mac where you can find shortcuts to apps, along with folders and minimised windows of programs you have open. But if I change the Guest Dock, the Leopard default Dock comes back the next login. Here’s a way to set up the Guest account’s Dock however you like, and have it automatically come up at each login — and this doesn’t involve hacking the System folder like some other hints floating around out there. Select the guest account and click. Winstep Nexus Dock is a free, completely customizable dock program for Windows that provides live icon reflections among many other eye candy effects. The drag-and-drop capabilities of Nexus Dock make it easy to manage your applications, files, printers, etc. Use drag-and-drop to move, copy, and rearrange objects on and off the dock.
Adding applications and extras to the Dock
Why be satisfied with just the icons that Apple places on the Dock? You can add your own applications, files, and folders to the Dock as well:
- Adding applications: You can add any application to your Dock by dragging its icon into the area to the left side of the Dock (that’s to the left side of the vertical line on the Dock). You’ll know when you’re in the proper territory because the existing Dock icons obligingly move aside to make a space for it.
- Attempting to place an application directly on the right side of the Dock sends it to the Trash (if the Trash icon is highlighted when you release the button), so beware. Note, however, that you can drop an application icon inside a Stack or a folder that already exists at the right side of the Dock.
- Adding individual files and volumes: Individual files and volume icons can be added to the Dock by dragging the icon into the area to the right side of the Dock. Again, the existing Dock icons move aside to create a space when you’re in the right area.
- To open the Dock item you’ve added in a Finder window, right-click the icon to display a Dock menu, where you can open documents, run applications, and have other assorted fun, depending on the item you choose.
- Adding several files or a folder: El Capitan uses a feature called Stacksto handle multiple files or add an entire folder to the Dock.
- Adding websites: You can drag any URL from Safari directly into the area at the right of the Dock. Clicking that icon automatically opens your browser and displays that page.
To remove an icon from the Dock, just click and drag it off the Dock. Note, however, that the original application, folder, or volume is not deleted — just the Dock icon itself is permanently excused. If you like, you can delete almost any of the default icons that OS X installs on the Dock; only the Finder and Trash icons must remain on the Dock.
Keeping track with Stacks
El Capitan offers Stacks, which are groups of items that you want to place on the Dock for convenience — perhaps the files needed for a project you’re working on, or your favorite game applications.
To create a Stack, just select a folder containing the items and drag the folder to the right side of the Dock. As always, the Dock opens a spot on the right side of the Dock to indicate you’re in the zone.
To display the items in a Stack, just click it:
- If the Stack holds relatively few items, they’re displayed in a really cool-looking arc that Apple calls a fan, and you can click the item you want to open or launch.
- If the Stack is stuffed full of many items, the Stack opens in a grid display, allowing you to scroll through the contents to find what you need.
- Stacks make it easy to access your stuff from the Dock.
Mac Guest Choose Dock Apps 2017
El Capitan provides a number of display and sorting options for a Stack. Right-click the Stack icon, and you can choose to sort the contents by name, date created or added, date modified, or file type. If you’d prefer a grid display, you can choose Grid mode.
Choose List to display the Stack’s contents in much the same way as List view mode in a Finder window. List view mode also allows you to view folders in a Stack as nested menu items. Choose Automatic to return to the default view mode.
When set to Display as Stacks, the Stack icon is displayed using icon images from the contents of the folder; if security is an issue, however, choose Display as Folder from the right-click menu to display the Stack as a plain folder icon instead.
You can remove a Stack from the Dock by right-clicking the Stack icon and choosing Options from the menu that appears. Choose Remove from Dock from the submenu that appears. Alternatively, just drag that sucker right off the Dock.
Turn off the toggle next to Dark theme. If dark mode is enabled on your iPhone running iOS 13 and up, Chrome will turn dark. The dark theme is tied to your. Chrome page as app macos windows 10. Therefore, to remove dark mode from Chrome on iOS, you have to disable it in iPhone settings.To do so, open Settings on your iPhone and go to Display & Brightness.Tap on Light under the Appearance section to turn off dark theme. Disable Dark Mode in Google Chrome on iOSGoogle Chrome doesn’t offer a dedicated theme setting on iPhones.
Jan 14, 2018 With the world’s school kids going back to school after the new year, I thought it would be a good idea to put together a list of apps for Mac using students for the new school year. Many of the apps listed are ones I have listed before in my 15 Mac Based Apps. May 15, 2018 High school and college are periods of ever-expanding responsibility for students. When you were younger you might have had mom and dad’s help to get you up in the morning, tell you where you need. Best mac apps for students.
You can also display the contents of a Stack in a Finder window. Right-click the Stack icon, and choose the Open item at the bottom of the pop-up menu.
If you add a folder full of items, the Stack is named after the folder; otherwise, El Capitan does the best job it can in figuring out what to name the Stack.
Apple provides a Stack already set up for you: The Downloads folder, situated next to the Trash, is the default location for any new files that you download using Safari or receive in your email. El Capitan bounces the Download Stack icon to indicate that you’ve received a new item.
Resizing the Dock
You can change the size of the Dock from the Dock settings in System Preferences — but here’s a simpler way to resize the Dock, right from the Desktop.
Move your pointer over the vertical solid line that separates the left side of the Dock from the right side; the pointer turns into a funky vertical line with arrows pointing up and down. This is your cue to click and drag while moving up and down, which expands and shrinks the Dock, respectively.
You can also right-click when the funky line pointer is visible to display a menu of Dock preferences. This allows you to change your Dock preferences without the hassle of opening System Preferences and displaying the Dock settings.
10.5: Create a custom Dock for the Guest account | 18 comments | Create New Account
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Tried this, but Workgroup Manager doesn’t let you log into your computer if you aren’t running server.. Not sure how you did this.. I have a screen shot …
Mac Guest Choose Dock Apps Online
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Jeffrey Bonacci
ACD, Partner
Manik Grafik
http://www.manikgrafik.com
jeffrey@manikgrafik.com
Once you launch WGM just select Server > View Directories to see the directory services that Mac has access to.
Your local DS will be there.
— -
http://www.afp548.com
Breaking my server to save yours.
use ‘localhost’ as the server and a local admin username and password
I got it to work fine. The fact that it *did* work when I’m not running server was something I never would have expected. I entered 127.0.0.1 for the server address and used an admin name/password, and things worked wonderfully.
Better still, this didn’t overwrite any of the other customizations I had made — Workgroup Manager only adjusts the files it actually needs to change.
(Of course, tinkering with other settings for things like System Preference access is a nice added bonus to this whole process.)
Thanks for the time-saver!
You can customize every aspect of the guest account by setting it up, then copying all the prefs etc. to /System/Library/User Template
When the Guest account is generated, this is where it takes all the prefs from.
This may already be covered in another hint.. but here’s a couple details.
Here’s a quick script to copy all the settings over (after first making a backup)
tar cfz /tmp/user_template_backup.tar.gz ‘/System/Library/User Template’
cp /Users/Guest/.DS_Store ‘/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/.DS_Store’
rm -R ‘/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Pictures’
cp -R /Users/Guest/Pictures ‘/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Pictures’
rm -R ‘/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Library’
cp -R /Users/Guest/Library ‘/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Library’
rm -R ‘/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Desktop’
cp -R /Users/Guest/Desktop ‘/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Desktop’
We’re now using the Guest account on our public machines.
More information is here:
http://www.michaelsmac.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=394
One gotcha is that whenever you create a new regular account on your machine, it also uses the User Template data. So it will also get these defaults. If you are concerned, make a backup of the virgin User Template folder and put that in place when you need to make a normal user account.
Sorry, but editing ‘/System/Library/User Template’ is a REALLY cumbersome solution to the problem, since whenever you add another user, it will be ‘blessed’ with the exact same layout as the guest user.
This is quite intolerable to me — besides, the tip from the original post really works nicely and when you click on the ‘Details’ tab, you can add other plist-files as you please!
(The only thing, that doesn’t work as expected so far is customisation of the mouse settings)
Cheers,
A
I hope someone is still following this thread..
I’ve been using this hint to get a small Library computer lab set up with custom Guest accounts. For the most part, the Workgroup Manager makes it really easy. HOWEVER, I’m struggling with how to get apps like Firefox and the M$oft Office suite to work in this way. Firefox, Word, etc. look for specific folders every time they open in the Guest account and (understandably) act like you’re opening ’em for the first time.
In short, there’s got to be a way to combine the Workgroup Manager technique with actually editing the ‘User Template’ contents, so that the Firefox ‘Profile’ and the ‘Microsoft User Data’ folders can be included in the User Template. Not to mention the fonts, etc. that Office wants installed..
Anyone have any suggestions for this??
Thanks!!
John
Is there a way to do this with a managed user?
I would like to restrict my kid’s access to the network settings, and would like it if they didn’t even see the icon for it.
Try enabling Parental Controls for the kid’s account in the Accounts pref pane.
-Mark
If you have setup the account as ‘Managed with Parental Controls’ then you should be able restrict your child’s access quite easily. System Prefs->Accounts->Parental Controls- then click ‘Only allow selected applications’ then select(or don’t add any of the Utilities or Network apps.
‘ for my guests who have never used a Mac before (most of them)’
Well, Apple already thought of that! Just use ‘Simple Finder’ for the Guest Account, and then enable Parental Controls, and select only FireFox (and whatever other app’s you want your guests to use!)
Wow, yeah the simple finder tip is great, especially if you don’t want to pay the $499 for the Leopard Server Admin Tools!!!
BaldEagle -
Actually, Server Admin Tools are free; click the link posted in the tip.
Well, Mac OS X Server costs $499
But the Server-Admin Tools are available for free on apples site
I’ve found the Workgroup Manager to be tremendously successful in customizing the dock for the guest account. One thing I’ve found is that things will work better if all your account settings for Guest are made entirely in Workgroup Manager. That is, if you’ve customized the dock in Workgroup Manager, any parental controls you set up should also be in Workgroup Manager and not from System Preferences.
Before doing that, I had the guest account set in System Preferences to use Simple Finder and was frustrated when the dock didn’t respond to any of the changes I’ve made in Workgroup Manager. However, when I deleted all the parental controls for Guest in System Preferences and re-applied them in Workgroup Manager, I was able to use both Simple Finder and a customized dock.
One other thing that I ran into was that both Camino and Firefox run erratically in the Guest environment and I’m not sure why. Safari works fine, however.
FYI: there is now a version of the Server Admin Tools specific to 10.5.5:
http://support.apple.com/downloads/Server_Admin_Tools_10_5_5
10.5: Changing the username for the Guest Account?
Does anyone know of a way to rename the Guest account? I want to rename it to ‘Visitor’ for a couple reasons. First, my parents and in-laws are used to it and any confusion is bad confusion when they want to use the computer.
Second, and more to the point, my (regular) username starts with Gu-, and on the login screen listing typing ‘Gu’ selects ‘Guest’. When I’m not paying particularly close attention (which is often), I type ‘Gu,’ hit Return to have it select the user and prompt me for my password, and instead it logs me in as Guest and I have to log back out and then login as myself.
It’s frustrating. I’ve poked and Googled (though not yet tried the Workgroup Server tips in this thread for customizing the dock) and haven’t found anything. Any ideas?
Mac Guest Choose Dock Apps Free
this tip mostly works for Snow Leopard (OSX 10.6), too, but one needs to download the correct version of Server Admin Tools (currently 10.6.3) from http://support.apple.com/downloads/ and then enable the display of the account ‘Guest Account’ (UID 201) via View -> Show System Records
