The old rainbow Apple menu had a function that let you find recent documents, along with the ability to place folders in it for quick and easy access. This was replaced in Mac OS X with stacks, a visual way to do a similar thing, but from the Dock. You can drag a folder into the right hand side of the Dock and have it open as a Stack, of course, but did you know you could get a list of Recent Apps, Documents, or Servers, as well as Favorite Volumes or Items as a Stack, as well?
You can, with a little Terminal magic. Here’s how.
To make this magic happen, simply launch your Terminal app, and then type or paste the following command in:
defaults write com.apple.dock persistent-others -array-add '{ "tile-data" = { "list-type" = 1; }; "tile-type" = "recents-tile"; }'
Then restart the Dock with the following:
killall Dock
When you issue those commands, you’ll end up with a Recent Applications stack. A simple Control-Click (or right-click if you have a two button mouse) on that stack, however, will give you the option to show recent Applications, Documents, and Servers, or favorite Volumes and favorite Items. This should give you access to all sorts of things in a handy and visual way, right from the Dock. Hooray!
Source: Macworld Hints
Rob LeFebvre is an Anchorage, Alaska-based writer and editor who has contributed to various tech, gaming and iOS sites, including 148Apps, Creative Screenwriting, Shelf-Awareness, VentureBeat, and Paste Magazine. Feel free to find Rob on Twitter @roblef, and send him a cookie once in a while; he’ll really appreciate it.
One response to “Add Recent Or Favorite Items Stack To The Dock [OS X Tips]”
Just stumbled across this tip. May be old but wish I had seen it before! Still works in Yosemite! Nice.