The all-mighty Dock!

[taisto]

I've used OS X since it was beta. Many things have gone better, and many things have not!
At this very moment the all-mighty Dock sucks 25% off my 733mHz G4's cpu power. Maybe it has something to do with that I have taken full use of it. Maybe I've stretched the Dock to it's limits.
But I've done nothing special. To keep Dock organized I use folders in it. Only apps I use frequently are lying there at their own. Yet I keep my Dock tiny as possible, having all annoying little features turned off. I try to make Dock useful. I try to make it show it's promised powers.
Still after year of everyday use and commitment to OS X, I can't tell that Dock is intuitive nor efficient. Maybe it's just my problem and few others.
Or maybe the Dock just sucks!
I am a power user, professional using Macintosh as a tool. After trying, and trying to get used to Dock and other quirky elements of Aqua, I finally have to say that the graphical user interface of OS X cannot be described to be a tool, but a toy. Toy to play with. Neat thing to show friends what a great rendering engine Quartz can do.
This is frustrating, OS 9 has simple, yet efficient GUI. KDE and Gnome in other *nix platforms are efficient and intuitive as well. I'm not going to say anything about M$ products, because that's a world I rarely visit. But Aqua isn't in the same league, it's just an interactive circus on my desktop, directed by the all-mighty Dock.

-ts
Luckily there's still Terminal.

[griffman]

I just loaded up my dock with 100+ objects, just to see what would happen. What happened? Nothing. The thing is taking 0.00% of CPU in "top" unless I pop up a menu; then it sucks a bit of CPU for a half-second or so. Here's the line from "top" on my machine:

355 Dock         0.0%  0:33.78   3   123   227  3.16M  16.2M  12.5M+ 72.6M

And here's an image of my microdock in case you don't believe me.

The only thing that could be making the dock take that much CPU is if you're minimizing windows (like a "top" display in the Terminal) which continue to update while they're in the dock. But just holding static objects, the dock shouldn't take any CPU.

If you have magnification on, of course, the dock (actually the Window Manager) will take CPU time when you scroll over objects, but you imply CPU utilization with it just sitting there.

What kinds of minimized windows are in your dock? It seems quite reasonable that it would be taking a bunch of your CPU time if you've minimized windows which are updating their content in the dock. Personally, I'm a big fan of "hide" over "minimize".

-rob.

[xchanyazy]

I like the dock, I find it much easier to use than the classic style application switcher. I also only see spikes of CPU power while mousing over it, ususally between 8 and 10%, only noticeable for a second or two.

[tarmaque]

Yes, either you hate the dock, or love it and very little in between. I almost love it, and haven't had any of the problems that some people have mentioned. It's handy (far handier than that M$ "start" menu) and I think those people who don't like it are trying to over-use it. My dock is usually hidden, and I don't try to use it for all the bells and whistles that are available for it. (Yeah, like I need to see the updated weather all day long in my dock!) If you use it as an application and window switcher it's great. And FAR more customizeable than the M$ "start" doohicky. My recommendation: Get on with your bad self.

[Phil St. Romain]

Not sure what's the difference between a Hallelu and Seen the Light, but they're both pretty positive, I guess.

It took me a couple of weeks to get used to the Dock, but I like using it more than Apple Menu/GoMac, etc. In fact, if I have a choice between using a Dock menu and one on the top, I use the Dock menu (e.g., Snard). Mine is stretched out on the right side, transparent, taking up absolutely no processor power, and only spiking a little when I make a call to it--same as happens for the old Apple menu, I'm sure.

I don't really understand some of the dockaphobia that gets expressed on other forums. I don't understand people saying the "dock gets in the way" when it can be completely hidden. If I didn't like the Dock, I'd hide it or disable it and use Fruit menu, Drag Thing, or whatever seemed to please me. We do have choices about this issue--much more than we used to.

[Thundarr]

I agree Phil, the options for the dock are more than sufficient to remove it from the working space.

I have Quitling on the top right menu to substitute for the old application switcher and FruitMenu to add things back to the Apple menu. And I do use them for the occasional thing because I still have some old OS9 tendencies. But the more I use OSX, the more I use the Dock and the more those other ways become obsolete. I have the choice to use them all, but the Dock just seems to feel right and better. Using the word of many an OSX detractor, it just feels more intuitive to me.

Don't get me wrong, there are some additional customizations and optimizations I would like to see, but the Dock works better for everything it was supposed to replace, for me at least.

[Craig R. Arko]

I like my dock so much I've named it Howard. (ouch!)

The main improvement for me would be an increase in the nesting depth (>5) and even more contextual menus.

PS - plus all the stuff TinkerTool front ends for the dock.

[davida@telocity.]

I have to say, that I too, had problems with making effective use of the
dock, until I ran across dockswap. This small utility allows you to have
as many copies of the dock as you wish. I have organized my docks into
functionalities, such as browsers, default dock, editors, video, audio, and
more. I keep 18 different docks, and can access them with a control-escape
sequence, which brings up the list, and allows you to move to another
dock very quickly.

There are an endless number of ways to organize, and make access to
the dock very easy. You can keep a folder in the dock which holds all the
aliases to the different docks, and choose on of the numerous docks from
a directory. I find new things to do to organize and make my dock effective.
all the time.

Try it, it is from piDog software, www.pidog.com.


David B. Alford

[AHunter3]

I know not what "Sure in purgatory they us it" might mean, but it was the selection farthest away from "hallelujah" so I went with it.

I did not throw away the Dock and then empty the trash. I did keep it, disabled, moved from Core Services to its own folder, "Disabled OS X Dock", and if I ever wanted or needed a Dock while running OS X I could launch it like any other app.

That hasn't happened yet.

Give me a DockMenu instead, a drop-down list from an icon in the menu bar, and that I would use.

[Phil St. Romain]

Give me a DockMenu instead, a drop-down list from an icon in the menu bar, and that I would use.

Fruit Menu or Snard ought to get you most of the way there, and ASM or Xassist ought to complete the process. You can find them both on versiontracker.com

[DSHwrd]

Quote: Originally posted by Craig R. Arko I like my dock so much I've named it Howard. (ouch!)

Hrm, I resent that! Howard is my last name, thank you very much.

No worries, I didn't know if you meant that in a bad way or a good one, I took it bad.

Also, I personally like my dock a lot more, now that I have 'Danified it.' If you would like to see what my dock, and my desktop for that matter, looks like, go : www.digitaldh.com/MyDesktop.jpg

I still wish Go Mac would come out for OS X. If the dock would fill up the whole bottom of the screen, such as the MenuBar does, I would love it even more!

Later,

[tarmaque]

So, apparently someone didn't get the "Howard the Dock" joke. No offense to "Howard the Poster", He probably just didn't ever read comic books. (Now that could be either good.... or bad!)




Tarmaque the Magnificent.

[DSHwrd]

Hrm, I didn't know Howard The Duck was a comic book. I knew it was a movie.

Nope, didn't get the joke, it's a lot funnier now though.

[dschep]

i separate my dock with transparent icons for often used apps then made an apple menu folder in it.

Here is a screen shot

daniel

[Craig R. Arko]

Quote: Originally posted by DSHwrd Hrm, I didn't know Howard The Duck was a comic book. I knew it was a movie. Nope, didn't get the joke, it's a lot funnier now though.

Yes, indeed. Howard the Duck, Master of Quack-Foo.