News, info, and opinion by Mac users, for Mac users.

August 8, 2008

tips

A squeaky-clean Desktop

Posted Aug. 8, ’08, 11:29 AM PT by Kate Marshall
Category | Tips

MacHDshot.jpgHiding the hard disk icon on a Mac’s Desktop is one of those tricks that I feel could go both ways: either so many people know about it that it’s not worth mentioning, or only a handful of people stumbled across it while doing something else in the Finder.

The premise is simple though. When in the Finder, open the Finder’s preferences (I’m a fan of pressing Command + the comma key, but Finder -> Preferences is perfectly valid too) and click on the “General” button that resembles a light switch. For super neat-freaks who hate having anything on their Desktop whatsoever, decluttered nirvana is as simple as unchecking the boxes under “Show these items on the Dekstop.”

Files already stored on the Desktop will still remain there, which would throw a wrench into the whole “I have the cleanest Desktop ever!!!” thing. There are also options for what new Finder windows should open (the Home folder, hard drive, etc.), and options for playing with spring-loaded folders (Which. Are. Fun). Sadly, there are no options for cleaning my physical desktops which, depending on where I am, contain eyeglass-spray and sunglasses, or a heart-shaped paperweight and old Administrative Assistant’s Day greeting cards.


4 Comments

Brian said:

Use Camouflage to hide and display all folders on your desktop with the touch of a hot key (briksoftware.com). Use Volumizer to get access to your volumes via the menubar, then you won't mind not having the hard drive icon on your desktop. Both work great and are donationwares.

August 8, 2008 12:28 PM
Smoking Chimpanzees! said:

I use Deskshade. Very nice core animation effects and also some screen locking action. Nice.

August 8, 2008 2:27 PM
stef said:

a clean desktop is what keeps me sane. When I have a heavy workload, the desktop is totally cluttered with useless junk. Right now it has one or two apps Im testing (quick access and easy deletion) and a screen capture of some train times.

Having the HDD there isnt necessary for me as I usually click on the finder icon in the dock (opens at Macintosh HD's root level, not user home). However, I do allow mounted drives and optical disks, as this affords me the ability to have all of my primary access points on the desktop without duplication.

good hint though, and it was worth pointing it out for sure.

August 8, 2008 5:46 PM
Dave said:

+1 for DeskShade

August 10, 2008 2:02 PM

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