There's way more to your Mac than the Dock

The Dock is a sort of launch-bar. I imagine Windows has something like it.

The Dock just contains links to actual items in the default OS X Applications folder. This should be no news to experienced Mac users, especially those aware of the concept of aliases from Mac operating systems prior to OS X (of course, X also supports aliases).

But I occasionally get distressed people contacting me saying they've "lost Word", or Mail or whatever. They haven't - they've just mistakenly moved them out of the Dock, which is yours for the customising (Apple menu>Dock ...).

This happens more, I have noticed, with new computer users who are maybe not differentiating between the way mouse button-presses work. They are moving the mouse while inadvertently holding down the button, and so - poof! - the item is dragged and disappears from the Dock.

A couple of instances of this lately made me also realise that people aren't differentiating between a lot of things on their Macs. For example, not only do they not know the Dock does not hold all the items available on their Macs, they also don't realise the Applications folder holds a lot more.

I don't know whether this lack of what might be considered fairly basic knowledge is because more people are switching to Macs, and are not used to accessing data in computers, or because more people than ever are getting their first computers and choosing Macs.

Anyway, Apple populates the Dock with what it assumes most people will use: Safari the web browser, Mail, iCal, Address Book, GarageBand, iPhoto ... but you can easily remove what you never use, just as you can add things you would like to use.

When I'm helping people with their Macs, for example, I always advise people to put Apple's Calculator application in the Dock. Lots of people, by the way, use the quick calculator in the Widgets, but this is not very good. At all. Whereas the calculator in the Applications folder is marvellous.

If you don't know how to do this, allow me to instruct you:

1/ Open your Hard Drive by double-clicking on it (by default it's called Macintosh HD, but you may have changed the name).

2/ Open the Applications' folder.

3/ You should see Calculator - if the folder is in icon view, press Command and '2' to change the view to List, which is alphabetical A-Z. Calculator, therefore, should appear near the top.

4/ Add this to the Dock.

How? There are two easy ways to add an application to the Dock. One is to just drag the application called Calculator straight from the Applications' folder to the Dock, making sure you let go when it's between the left of the Dock and the dashed divider between the Dock's applications and the Trash. (The area to the right of the divider and beside the trash is also customisable, but only takes files and folders.)

Note that dragging the Calculator icon to the Dock does not move the Calculator to the Dock - effectively, OS X creates an alias of Calculator and places this in the Dock, while leaving the actual Calculator application in the Applications' folder.

When you click the Calculator icon in the dock, OS X opens the Calculator application (aka 'program') in the Applications folder, as per all Dock items.

The other way is to double-click on the Calculator application to launch it from the Applications' folder. Automatically, as a running application, it will take its place in the Dock, but its icon will disappear when you quit it.

To make sure it does not disappear, simply click and hold on the Calculator icon in the Dock and choose Keep In Dock from the pop-out menu that appears. Now, when you quit, it will remain for you to boot at will directly from the Dock, for convenience.

Oh, why do I love the Calculator app? Because it mirrors the Numeric keypad on Apple's extended keyboards, so it's easy to bang numbers into; you can Copy the result and paste it into documents and emails; and it has Show Paper Tape available from its Window menu meaning you can check back through your data input (and you can print this tape out).

You can turn on Speak Button Pressed and Speak Result (good for those who like an aural check on their progress); and, best of all, it has a Convert menu which covers weights, masses, speeds and more and, most importantly for me, currency, which gets exchange rates off the 'net.

The five last-used conversions get appended to the Recent Conversions pop-out (at the top of the Convert menu) to save delving through the menus for repetitive conversions.
Oh yeah - it also has a Scientific and a Programmer mode, if the basic calc is too simple for you. They are available from the View menu, or from the Command 2 and Command 3 shortcuts. Awesome.

While we're at it, have a look through the rest of the Applications folder. Notice the cool-looking, free Chess game? Notice Automator, with the little robot icon, which you can use to build easy-to-run Macros? It includes some prebuilt ones you may well love.

Notice Photo Booth? It lets you take pictures instantly from your built-in iSight camera, put effects on them, shoot instant movies and email them all right out of the application.

Check out Font Book for regulating your typefaces and for building collections.
And I haven't even mentioned the Utilities folder, which resides in turn inside the Applications folder. This has all sort sof interesting items in it.

All this has led to shameless self-promotion of the new service I'm launching this month on my retooled mac-nz.com site: Five Tip Friday. Every Friday from now on, I aim to give Mac users five good tips, ranging from very basic to pretty nifty.

- Mark Webster mac.nz