Part 2. Working with Disks, Folders, and Files
The tasks in this part might not be glamorous or exciting, but they’re the foundation of everything you do on your Mac. It’s all about files, folders, and the disks that hold them. Every time you create a new document or receive an email attachment, that information is stored in a file on your hard drive, and the file is in turn stored within a folder. Mac OS X provides many ways for you to view and modify folder contents and file attributes, so you’re in control of your Mac.
The tasks in this part teach you how to create new folders and view their contents in different ways, how to move and copy files, how to organize your hard drive and keep it uncluttered, and how to use Apple’s .Mac online service to perform regular backups of your important files and synchronize your vital information across multiple computers.
You might notice that windows on your Mac OS X desktop have two distinct guises—a “plain” dress that looks like any document window and a “fancy” version that includes racks of buttons down the side and across the top. These are, respectively, multi-window mode and single-window mode. Don’t be deceived, though—you can have windows of both types open at the same time. This important aspect of Mac OS X is covered in the first task in this part.
Exploring the OS X File System
Using Single-Window Mode
Traditionally, the Mac spawned a new window for each folder or disk you opened. Mac OS X introduced single-window mode, in which the contents of each folder or disk appear in the same window, like each successive page in a web browser displays in the same window. It took a little getting used to, but it’s a better way of working.
If you’re using multi-window mode, click the transparent button in the upper-right corner of the window to switch to single-window mode and display the toolbar and sidebar.
Double-click folders in the main window to see their contents.
Click a folder or disk in the Places sidebar to see its contents.
Click the left and right arrows to go back and forward in the series of windows you’ve viewed (similar to the Back and Forward buttons in a web browser window).
Tip: Single Versus Multi
Single-window mode is at its most useful when you need to see the contents of only one window. If you’re copying or moving files from one folder to another, you’ll probably find good old-fashioned multi-window mode a better bet. Don’t forget that you can switch window views in single-window mode by clicking the Icon, List, and Column view buttons at the top of the window. A special button with a picture of a gear next to these three summons up a contextual menu for any selected file in the window.
Using Multi-Window Mode
Sometimes you need to see the contents of two windows at once, and it’s easier to focus on what you need to look at without the sidebar and toolbar in single-window mode. Multi-window mode makes copying or moving files from one folder or disk to another easier.
If you’re using single-window mode, click the transparent button in the upper-right corner of the window to switch to multi-window mode.
Double-click folders in the window to open a new window showing their contents.
Tip: Quick Switch
Even without the single-window mode toolbar, you can switch quickly from one window view to another. Click in a window and press
-1 for icon view,
-2 for list view, and
-3 for column view.
Using the Toolbar
In single-window mode, each window contains a toolbar that provides shortcuts to common tasks in the Finder, such as switching folder views and searching for files. After you get to know the toolbar, it quickly becomes your best friend. You can even customize it with your favorite buttons, too—see the next task.
Click the Back and Forward buttons to see the contents of folders you’ve looked at before in this window.
Click the Icon View, List View, or Column View button to change your folder view.
Select an option from the Action menu to perform one of several common tasks.
Type in the Search field to search for files and folders by name.
Note: Where to Look
The toolbar’s Search field automatically starts out by searching your entire system. But as soon as the search begins, a toolbar pops up giving you a choice of other locations. If you can narrow down the search location the search will go faster.
Tip: Action Figures
The commands available in the Action menu vary depending on what’s selected. For example, if you click a disk icon, the Action menu adds an Eject command. Be sure to explore your Action menu options.
Customizing the Toolbar
The row of buttons across the top of a window when you’re in single-window mode is called the toolbar. These buttons offer you quick access to the most common functions in the Finder, such as changing window views and creating new folders. You can choose the buttons you want to display.
Choose View, Customize Toolbar.
Drag buttons onto the toolbar to add them.
Choose an option from the Show pop-up menu.
Click Done.
Tip: Back Where You Started
When you’re customizing your toolbar, you can restore the default set of buttons by dragging the whole set from the bottom of the Customize dialog box up to the toolbar.
Tip: Cutting Back
To remove buttons from the toolbar, choose View, Customize Toolbar and drag the buttons you don’t want off the toolbar.
Using Different Folder Views
You can view Finder windows in four ways. Icon view is convenient when a folder contains just a few files and you want to be able to tell them apart quickly. List view enables you to sort the contents of a window, and Column view provides a quick way of burrowing down into a series of nested folders. The glamorous Cover Flow view is new to Mac OS X 10.5 and is covered in the next task.
Tip: Wide Angle View
To adjust column widths in column view, drag the small double line at the bottom of the column divider. It’s only visible if the column contains a list of files and folders; you can’t adjust empty columns.
To switch to Icon view, choose View, as Icons.
If the icons are stacked on top of each other, choose View, Clean Up to space them out so you can see them all.
To switch to Column view, choose View, as Columns.
Drag the bar between two columns to adjust the columns’ width.
To switch to List view, choose View, as List.
Drag the right edge of a list column header to change that column’s width, or drag a column header to a different position to change the order of the columns.
Choose View, Show View Options to select which list columns are visible.
Check boxes to choose which columns are visible in the active window.
Tip: Getting There via Buttons
In single-window mode, you can click the buttons in the upper-left corner of the window to switch window views. Turn to the task “Using Single-Window Mode,” earlier in this part, to learn more about using single-window mode.
Tip: Switch Hitting
Lists can be sorted in ascending or descending order. Click the active column header to switch from ascending to descending order or vice versa. An arrow in the list column header indicates which way the list is sorted.
Choosing Files in Cover Flow View
Leopard brings you a new way of flipping through folder contents in the Finder, courtesy of iTunes. In Cover Flow view, your files are lined up like discs in a jukebox, so that you can see a large preview of each one. You can scan through them slowly with a slider, or you can skip from one to another as you please.
To switch to Cover Flow view, choose View, as Cover Flow.
Drag the slider to move back and forth through the “covers.”
Click a “cover” in the window or an item in the list to select that file.
Double-click a “cover” or a list item to open the file.
Note: All the Same to Me
Cover Flow is another way to look at the files in a folder. Drag files from a Cover Flow view window onto the Dock, into the sidebar, or into other folders, just like files in any other view.
Note: Play Me
If the file you’re looking at in Cover Flow is a movie or music file, you can click it to bring up a Play button. Click that button, and the file will play. You can also play the file full-screen in Quick Look view.
Using the Go Menu
To make getting around your system easier, the Go menu contains commands that instantly take you to specific locations, including any of the special folders Mac OS X creates for your programs and documents. The Go menu also keeps track of the last several folders you’ve opened so you can return to any of them with a single click.
To go to one of Mac OS X’s special folders, click Go and choose Computer, Home, Applications, or Utilities.
To go to one of the folders you’ve opened recently, choose Go, Recent Folders and choose a folder.
Tip: Using the Keyboard
You can also go to the special folders with keyboard commands. Press
-Shift-C to see the Computer window; press
-Shift-H to open your home folder; press
-Shift-A to open the Applications folder; and press
-Shift-U to open the Utilities folder.
Selecting Files
It might seem obvious, but before you can do anything with a file, folder, or disk in the Finder, you must select it so that the Finder knows which object(s) you want it to act on. A couple of selection methods enable you to select more than one item at a time while leaving out those you don’t want to use at the moment.
In any folder view, click a file or folder to select it.
Shift-click another file or folder to select it along with all the items between it and the first object you selected.
-click to select noncontiguous items.
In icon view, click and drag to select a group of icons.
Tip: Selecting Everything at One Time
To select all the items in a folder (or on the desktop), click the folder’s title bar to make sure it is the active folder; then either press
-A or choose Edit, Select All.
Moving and Copying Files and Folders
Keeping your computer tidy is mostly a matter of putting things where they belong. That means moving and copying files and folders to different locations. These operations can be tricky in Mac OS X because it requires you to be authorized to open folders to which you’re copying items.
To move an item to another folder on the same disk, drag and drop it into the folder’s window.
To copy an item to a location on a different disk, drag and drop it into the folder’s window.
To copy an item to a different location on the same disk, press Option while you drag and drop it into the folder’s window.
Tip: Another Way to Copy
To make a copy of an item in the same place, press Option and drag the icon a little away from its current location or choose File, Duplicate.
Tip: Using Copy and Paste to Copy Files
Control-click the file you want to copy and choose Copy from the menu. Control-click in an open area of the folder’s window where you want to copy the item and choose Paste Item.
Making a Stack
Folders are great but the more organized you are, the more folders you use and the more time you spend digging through them. With Leopard, Mac OS X has a new way to show you the contents of a folder: stacks. Stacking files in your Dock is like stacking them up on top of your desk, only better, because you can see them all with just a click.
In the Finder, select the folder you want to make into a stack.
Drag the folder to the right side of the Dock.
To add an object to the stack, drag it onto the stack icon in the Dock.
Tip: What’s Your Name?
Each stack is named after the folder it’s made from. To rename a stack something more useful, Control-click its icon on the Dock and choose Rename Stack.
Tip: Begone!
When you no longer need quick access to the files in a stack, it’s time to get rid of it and make more room in your Dock for stuff you do need. Deleting a stack is as simple as dragging it off the Dock.
Viewing Stacked Files
So now that you have your files neatly organized into stacks on the Dock, what can you do with them? First, take a minute to savor the satisfaction of being so organized. Then, start working! Stacks are that simple; there’s no learning curve.
To see the files in the stack, click the stack icon.
To open a stacked file, click its icon in the stack.
To delete an object from the stack, drag it to the side of the stack.
To restack the files without opening one, click the arrow in the Dock.
Note: Arc or No Arc?
If a stack contains more items than will fit in a neat arc above the Dock, clicking the stack icon reveals the files in a grid rather than an arc.
Making a New Folder
This is one task that often trips up long-time Mac users, who are used to pressing
-N to create a new folder. That keyboard shortcut brings up a new Finder window instead of creating a new folder. You’ll get used to the change, and you’ll find that being able to create new Finder windows this way is pretty useful, too.
To create a new folder, choose File, New Folder (or press
-Shift-N).
Type a name for the untitled folder; to change the name, see the next task.
Tip: You Don’t Have to Start from Scratch
If you need several folders with the same name and, perhaps, a different number tacked onto the end of each, create the first one and create copies of it as described earlier in the task “Moving and Copying Files and Folders.” Then replace “copy” in the folder name with the numbers or text you want.
Renaming Folders and Files
Some people like to include dates and similar information in filenames so anyone can tell what’s inside; others don’t care if anyone else can make sense of their filenames. Whichever camp you fall into, you’ll need to know how to change the names of files and folders.
Click to select the item whose name you want to change and keep the mouse cursor positioned over the name.
When the item’s name becomes highlighted, type to replace the old name with the new one. Press Enter when you’re done.
Tip: Adding Extensions
Hate documents with blank, white icons? You can’t open them by double-clicking because your Mac doesn’t know which program to use. If you know which kind of document it is, add the correct filename extension.
Caution: Extended Filenames
Each filename has two components: the name and the extension, such as .pdf or .doc. Mac OS X uses extensions to determine which program can open which files, so don’t change an extension unless you know what you’re doing.
Viewing File Information
Each file or folder on your computer has a lot of information associated with it—not just the data it contains, such as recipes or pictures or programming code, but data about the file, such as when it was created, the last time it was modified, and which program made it.
Click a file to select it.
Choose File, Get Info.
The Info window opens to the General pane; to see the contents of another pane, click the gray triangle next to its name.
Click the red Close button to close the Info window when you’re done.
Tip: Avoiding a Trip to the Menu Bar
You can also press
-I or use a contextual menu to get information about an item.
Note: Getting Info
Some file information can be changed in the Info window, if you’re the owner of a file. You can change the name and extension, the program that opens a document, and the file’s ownership (if you’re an admin user), and you can add comments.
Previewing a File
If you’re looking through a lot of files at one time, the filenames and preview icons may not be enough to help you figure out exactly what’s in each document. Say hello to Quick Look, a Leopard feature that enables you to see the contents of a file without having to open it. You can flip through each page, and you can even switch to full-screen mode to get a really good look.
Click a file to select it.
Choose File, Quick Look “filename".
To view the document in full-screen mode, click the double arrows at the bottom of the window.
To close the Quick Look window, click the X button.
Tip: Quick Navigation
To enlarge the preview image, drag the corner of the window to make it bigger—the image will expand to fill the window. Use the scroll bar on the window’s right side to move through the document’s pages.
Opening a File
When you’re looking at a file’s icon in the Finder, you can open that file in the correct program without having to first start up the program. Conversely, if you’re already using that program, you can open more files without having to return to the Finder to locate them.
In the Finder, double-click the file’s icon. The file opens in the program that created it.
Or, to open a file from within a running program, choose File, Open.
Navigate to the file in the pick list and double-click it or click the Open button.
The file opens in the program window.
Tip: Programs
Some programs are picky about which types of files they’ll open, so your file might be unavailable in an Open dialog box. If a pop-up menu below the pick list has an option such as Show All Files, choose this option to make your file available.
Note: It’s a Drag
A third method of opening a file is to drag it on top of a program icon, either in the Finder or in the Dock. The program starts up, if it wasn’t already running, and opens the file if it can. If it can’t, its icon won’t darken.
Choosing a Program to Open a File
Sometimes you disagree with your Mac about which program it should use to open a file. For example, perhaps you want to open PDF files in Adobe Reader instead of Preview, or RTF word processor files in Microsoft Word instead of TextEdit. You have the power to make the change, just follow these steps.
Click to select the file and press
-I to see its Info window.
Click the gray triangle next to Open with in the Info window.
Choose an application from the pop-up menu, or choose Other to navigate to the program you want if it’s not listed.
Click Change All if you want to make the same change for all documents with the same extension. If you see a confirmation dialog box, click Continue.
Tip: There’s More than One Way
The directions here enable you to open a file in the right program by double-clicking its Finder icon. But if you’re in a hurry, you can just start the program, choose File, Open as described earlier in the task “Opening a File."
Handling Files with Automator
Remember how computers were supposed to make our lives simpler? Well, Automator really does that. With Automator, you can set up a series of steps once, save them as a workflow, and then set that task in motion any time with a mere double-click or drag and drop. Here’s how to create a workflow that backs up selected files.
Tip: Running Workflows
Saving a workflow as an application enables you to run it without starting Automator. While it’s running, you see a message to that effect in the menu bar; click the red stop sign button to cancel the series of actions.
Double-click to start Automator (located in the Applications folder).
Click Files & Folders to start creating your workflow.
Choose Ask for files & folders when my workflow runs from the pop-up menu, and click Choose.
In the Prompt field, type Choose the files to back up and check the box marked Allow Multiple Selection.
Drag the New Folder action into the work area from the Files & Folders section of the Library.
In the Name field, type My backup files, and then choose the location where you want the backup folder to be created.
Choose File, Save.
Choose a name and location for your workflow, choose Application from the File Format pop-up menu, and click Save.
Tip: The Endless Possibilities
You can add other steps to make this workflow more useful. For example, you might add an Archive action to compress the backup folder after the files are copied into it. Another possibility is a Copy action to back up the files to another disk or server.
Tip: Making It Happen
To run this workflow, just double-click its icon—you can put it in the Dock for quick access if you like—then select the files you want to back up in the dialog box.
Recording Tasks
Automator is easy to use, but it still takes a little more technical thought than you may have available before you’ve had your coffee. If you want to create workflows in the most intuitive way possible, set Automator to record your actions and then go to town! When you’re done, you’ll be able to repeat your actions any time by running the workflow you’ve just created.
Note: What Will You Automate?
There are two main categories of tasks to consider automating: repetitive tasks—ones that you do exactly the same way repeatedly—and ones that you want to happen without your intervention. For example, if you’re spending hours each week converting PDF files to TIFFs, create a drag-and-drop workflow to do the job for you. Or, if you want your Mac’s volume muted every night at 7 p.m., that’s another great candidate for a workflow. Record it, save it, and link it to an iCal appointment set for 7 p.m. each evening.
Double-click to start Automator (located in the Applications folder).
Click Custom to create an empty workflow with no steps automatically inserted.
Click Choose to start creating your workflow.
Choose Workflow, Record to begin recording.
Perform the actions you want to record, then click Stop.
Make any adjustments to the steps recorded, such as deleting extraneous steps.
Choose File, Save.
Set the workflow’s name and location, then click Save.
Caution: Be Warned
Automator’s recording feature is very, very literal-minded. For example, if you record yourself clicking the Safari icon in the Dock to start up your web browser, Automator won’t just record “Start Safari"—it will record “Click the Safari icon in the Dock.” Then, if you go on a decluttering binge and remove the Safari icon from your Dock at some point in the future, that workflow will no longer execute.
Finding Files with Spotlight
Spotlight is a powerful and speedy search utility. Built into the Finder, it’s always waiting for you in the upper-right corner of the screen. After it finds what you’re looking for, Spotlight doesn’t stop there; it organizes its results into categories and sorts them any way you like.
Tip: Talking Your Language
Spotlight is even smarter than it looks. Try adding natural–language search terms, such as “yesterday” (for files modified yesterday) or “image” (for image files), to narrow your searches.
Click the Spotlight menu to display the search field.
Enter search terms in the field.
Click a document in the results to open it.
Click Show All to see more results.
Use the menus at the top of the window to filter the search results by time, location, or other criteria.
Click a column head to sort the results differently.
Double-click an item in the list to open the file.
Tip: What’s It Look Like?
When you group search results by Kind, you might notice that the headers for graphics files (such as PDF files) include buttons for different views. Click the Icon View button to see the files’ preview icons rather than just their names.
Note: Flat Line
The Flat List grouping option eliminates the categories in your search results. In effect, it enables you to throw all the found documents into one pot, so to speak, and then sort them in any order you want.
Creating a Smart Folder
A smart folder collects related files into a single folder without moving the files from their original locations. One way to use a smart folder is to collect all the text documents modified in the last week so you can keep track of the files you’re currently working on.
Tip: On-the-Fly Smarts
The system adds files to the smart folder as soon as you start setting search criteria. Don’t worry about ending up with the wrong files in your smart folder, though; as you change the criteria, the folder’s contents are updated to reflect the new criteria.
Choose File, New Smart Folder.
Click to specify a location for the files you want to track in this folder.
Select a search criteria category and make a setting within that category.
Click Add to add another search criterion, or click Remove to remove one.
Enter a name and select a location for the folder.
Check Add To Sidebar if you want the folder to appear in the sidebar when you’re using single-window mode.
Click Save.
Tip: Narrowing It Down
In addition to a file’s attributes, you can filter files for a smart folder based on text search terms. For example, to include files that contain the word Apple in the folder, enter that text in the search field at the top of the folder’s window.
Tip: For Geeks Only (Not!)
To get really specific about the kinds of files in your smart folder, select Other from any search attribute pop-up menu. In the dialog box, choose attributes. To add the selected attribute to the pop-up menu, check Add to Favorites.
Creating a Burn Folder
Burn folders provide a way to collect files for burning later without having to actually move them. Dragging files into a burn folder earmarks them for burning later. When you’re ready to burn, click and go! Meanwhile, the files stay in their original folders so you don’t have to put them away after burning the disc.
Note: But What’s It For?
Burn folders are useful for keeping track of files you regularly transfer to another person or location. Because the file you see in the burnable folder is really just a marker for the real file, you can edit the file in its original location and the changed version is burned to the disc. The burn folder sticks around after you burn the disc, so you can use it to create regular backups of the same set of files.
Choose File, New Burn Folder.
Type a new name for the folder; this name is also given to the disc you burn from this folder.
Drag files and folders into the burn folder’s window to add them to the disc.
Insert a blank CD.
Click Burn.
Tip: Better Backups
You can use a smart folder in combination with a burnable folder to make weekly backups. First, create a smart folder with the parameters Last Modified and This Week. Then create a burnable folder and drag the smart folder into it. Every Friday afternoon, open the burnable folder, click Burn, and insert a CD—and presto! Your week’s work is backed up.
Accessing Your Favorite Files and Places
Mac OS X offers a way to store and access your favorites. They’re visible in a column called the Places sidebar at the left side of every window when you’re using single-window mode. The top section of the Places list contains disks attached to your Mac, and the lower section contains anything you want.
If you don’t see the Places sidebar, click the transparent button at the upper-right corner of the window to enter single-window mode.
Click a disk or folder to view its contents in the window.
Drag files or folders into or out of the lower section of the Places sidebar to customize it.
Note: Quick Copy, Quick Move
You can move or copy files to disks or folders in the Places sidebar by dragging them from the main section of the window over a disk or folder icon in the sidebar.
Tip: Customizing the Custom List
To change the order of items in the bottom half of the Places sidebar, just drag and drop them into the order you prefer. Drag folders out of the lower section of the Places sidebar to remove them from the list.
Deleting a File
Mac OS X stores files you don’t want any more in a trash can. You can rummage through the Trash to retrieve files you didn’t mean to discard, just as you can in the real world. But—again, just like the real world—the Trash doesn’t empty itself; you have to remember to empty it to truly delete the discarded files.
Drag the file to the Trash icon on the Dock and drop it when the Trash icon is highlighted.
To delete all the objects in the Trash, choose Finder, Empty Trash.
Click OK in the confirmation dialog box or Cancel to keep the items in the Trash.
Note: Here a File, There a File
Applications leave files all over the place, so if you want to uninstall a program, you may need to do more than just drag the program’s icon to the Trash. Consider using a clean-up utility such as AppTrap—(konstochvanligasaker.se/apptrap/).
Tip: Deleting Files Securely
To make sure your files are removed from your hard drive, choose File, Secure Empty Trash. Secure Empty Trash writes gibberish data over the files so they can never be found, even by “computer detectives."
Setting Up a Backup Drive
If you were to learn only one thing from this book, that thing should be how to back up your files. Fortunately, Leopard’s new Time Machine utility makes it utterly simple to back up and retrieve files on your Mac. It keeps copies of all the versions of each file, so you can see exactly how your Mac looked in the past and retrieve files from that date.
Tip: Better Safe Than Sorry
If at all possible, use a drive for Time Machine that doesn’t have any files stored on it. For one thing, you want the maximum amount of room available for backup files. For another, it’s a remote possibility that Time Machine might overwrite your files.
Choose Apple menu, System Preferences.
Click the Time Machine button to see your backup settings.
Click Choose Backup Disk to choose a hard drive where Time Machine can store backed up files.
Click Use for Backup.
Click Options to to exclude disks from the backup.
Click the plus and minus buttons to add or delete disks, then click Done.
Tip: Skipping Along
Check Skip system files in the Time Machine preferences if you haven’t customized your Mac OS X system with a lot of add-ons. That will save a lot of space on your backup drive.
Tip: I Said No
Another way to save space on your backup drive is to add disks or folders to the Do not back up list in the Time Machine preferences. These items will be ignored when Time Machine backs up the rest of your files.
Restoring Backed Up Files
You know right where the file was. You’re sure of it. You even know when and why you deleted it—but now you need it back. Fortunately for you, Leopard brings a Time Machine to your Mac. All you have to do is take a look at past versions of your hard drive and choose the files you want to resurrect.
Open the folder where the file you want was previously located, then click Time Machine.
Click back and forth through the previous versions of that folder to find a backup in which the file still exists.
Click to select the file you want.
Click Restore to return the file to your present-day Mac.
Tip: Take Me There
If you know exactly what date you’re looking for in Time Machine, click the bars on the right side of the screen to choose a specific backup date. You’ll zoom right to the state of your Mac on that date.
Using Your iDisk
Apple’s special online services for Mac users, referred to collectively as .Mac (dot-Mac), include the use of an iDisk—an online storage area. You can mount your iDisk right on your desktop, where it appears along with your hard drive and any removable disks you insert (thumb drives, DVDs, or CDs).
In the Finder, either choose Go, iDisk, My iDisk or press -Shift-I.
If you haven’t entered your .Mac username and password in System Preferences, type that information into the dialog box that appears and click Connect.
Double-click the iDisk’s icon to view its contents.
Drag files into the iDisk’s folders to copy them to the iDisk.
Tip: Keeping Your iDisk at Home
For easy access to your iDisk, go to the .Mac pane in System Preferences. Click iDisk and click the Create a local copy of your iDisk check box. The iDisk copy appears on your desktop all the time; changes you make to it are automatically made to the real iDisk.