[Geobunny]

Originally Posted by .Neo 

Maybe it's time you started working with tags? Just a suggestion.

Why? Why on earth should he have to change the way he works just to match Apple's whim?

[Big Mac]

LOL @ tags. I guess we should just go back to a non-hierarchical FS so we don't have to bother with folders at all.

It's a terrible choice on Apple's part to not preserve the old functionality as an option.

[jasonsRX7]

Originally Posted by .Neo 

Maybe it's time you started working with tags? Just a suggestion.

I already do, extensively. Of course, Apple may decide to remove Labels in 10.6, in which case I'll be wrong for having used them, and get to hear other people say how they never used them anyway so it doesn't matter.

[.Neo]

Originally Posted by jasonsRX7 

I already do, extensively. Of course, Apple may decide to remove Labels in 10.6, in which case I'll be wrong for having used them, and get to hear other people say how they never used them anyway so it doesn't matter.

That depends if they get replaced by something else. And I think I already told you, now for the third time, that I can see how people miss this feature. I'm not saying it's OK Apple removed it, I'm just saying I don't think Stacks is all that bad and it works well the way I use it.

Originally Posted by Geobunny 

Why? Why on earth should he have to change the way he works just to match Apple's whim?

No you're right, continue to wallow about your loss is a much better solution rather to cut your losses, look for other options and move on.

That said, no one is forcing you to update to Mac OS X Leopard. By all means stick with Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, it's a fine OS.

[jasonsRX7]

Originally Posted by .Neo 

That depends if they get replaced by something else. And I think I already told you, now for the third time, that I can see how people miss this feature. I'm not saying it's OK Apple removed it, I'm just saying I don't think Stacks is all that bad and it works well the way I use it.

Ignoring the loss of functionality, fanned Stacks look bad against a busy background, and grid Stacks are cluttered and truncate filenames. So they're still poorly implemented.

No you're right, continue to wallow about your loss is a much better solution rather to cut your losses, look for other options and move on.

Except that I'm actively trying to find a way to disable stacks, or use the old Dock.app. If someone knows a way, I'd LOVE to hear it.

[Geobunny]

Originally Posted by .Neo 

That said, no one is forcing you to update to Mac OS X Leopard. By all means stick with Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, it's a fine OS.

Which is precisely what I plan to do until Apple climb down. I've got an ADC Select account and will, by virtue of that, get the GM release, but it's only going on my test machine until such times as the dock gets fixed, be that by Apple or via 3rd party hack.

[Big Mac]

No chance you can just copy the old one in the new one's place, right?

[.Neo]

Originally Posted by jasonsRX7 

Ignoring the loss of functionality, fanned Stacks look bad against a busy background, and grid Stacks are cluttered and truncate filenames. So they're still poorly implemented.

Grid Stacks aren't any different from viewing files as icons in the Finder.

Apple should have applied the same blurring effect behind the transparent grid window though. That would definitely help against busy backgrounds.

Originally Posted by jasonsRX7 

Except that I'm actively trying to find a way to disable stacks, or use the old Dock.app. If someone knows a way, I'd LOVE to hear it.

I'll make sure to post if and when I come across something.

Originally Posted by Geobunny 

Which is precisely what I plan to do until Apple climb down. I've got an ADC Select account and will, by virtue of that, get the GM release, but it's only going on my test machine until such times as the dock gets fixed, be that by Apple or via 3rd party hack.

Great, no problem then!

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Big Mac 

No chance you can just copy the old one in the new one's place, right?

I doubt it. The Dock app is in charge of a lot more than just the Dock.

It probably wouldn't be too hard to rig up a Cocoa app whose Dock menu would display the contents of a folder, though.

[Big Mac]

I'd definitely pay for that, Charles, as long as it could replicate the old Dock's functionality.

[dmcnickle]

Originally Posted by fisherKing 

my documents stack icon is showing a blur of the folders in the docs folder...anyone else? ugly...

What I did was create a new folder within whatever folder I had a stack for. The I renamed it <space>empty. That put the folder at the beginning. I then put whatever icon I wanted on that folder and the stack in the dock always has the same icon, whatever I want it to be.

[.Neo]

There already is an application called Dock Launcher that does the trick. But it's PPC-only according to the site. It still might work though through Rosetta on Intel Macs.

daniele.ch - welcome

[dmcnickle]

Originally Posted by jasonsRX7 

How on earth could you completely misunderstand the entire point of the thread?

Geez, calm down.

I got it just wanted to add my comment to the many comments about whether stacks could be turned off.

[fisherKing]

Originally Posted by dmcnickle 

What I did was create a new folder within whatever folder I had a stack for. The I renamed it <space>empty. That put the folder at the beginning. I then put whatever icon I wanted on that folder and the stack in the dock always has the same icon, whatever I want it to be.

so you're having this problem as well? nice (temp) fix.
but wonder why we're having this problem...

actually, not a good fix: icons still peek up behind that folder, plus...don't really want an empty folder in my docs, or downloads (or ANY folder i might add to the dock...)

[tkmd]

There is a lot of discontentment of being forced to use stacks as opposed to Tigers list view. I guarantee that Apple will never give us an option to go back to the old 10.4 list view, which I found to be very useful! So some developer out there is going to be very rich, very soon....

I am not going near 10.5 as of yet -because of these limitations. "Stacks" what a pile of crap. what used to only require a couple inches of cursor movement (on a 23" or 30")in Tigers list view; now requires more clicks and mouse movement.

[aehaas]

This is a HUGE loss for me. I hope somebody comes up with a fix real fast. I do a lot of work in a lot of fields. I rely on hierarchal folders from the dock.

WOW, a big loss. I will have to wait before upgrading for sure.

aehaas

[aehaas]

Stacks-
Pluses - Eye candy
Losses - TNTC, tremendous loss of productivity.

[fisherKing]

i'm gonna wait for fruitmenu, and make the best of stacks for now (which, hopefully, will grow into something more useful...)

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by tkmd 

There is a lot of discontentment of being forced to use stacks as opposed to Tigers list view. I guarantee that Apple will never give us an option to go back to the old 10.4 list view, which I found to be very useful!

I wouldn't be too sure about that - there's nothing about Stacks which is fundamentally incompatible with a right-click hierarchical menu. The menu you get when right-clicking on a Stack has only four items in it as it is - there's plenty of extra room there to add a listing of the folder's contents.

[Geobunny]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

I wouldn't be too sure about that - there's nothing about Stacks which is fundamentally incompatible with a right-click hierarchical menu. The menu you get when right-clicking on a Stack has only four items in it as it is - there's plenty of extra room there to add a listing of the folder's contents.

I hope you're right, Charles, I really do. Maybe if enough people send feedback it might just work, or how about one of those internet petition thingies?

[smacintush]

These forums are funny. I remember everyone lamenting the loss of spring-loaded folders and truly spatial finder from OS 9 and previous, and then using hierarchal displayed folders in the Dock as a neat "work around". Now it's a "feature" some just can't live without.

A workaround it exactly what it was. It was a way to get some functionality where Apple had implemented very little.

I use it for a few folders and it's OK but it's hardly a make or break feature for me.

Besides, since when does Apple get a new feature right the first time around? Hell, the entire Dock is still not what I think it should be. (Yeah, I remember those threads too, about how useless the Dock is.)

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by smacintush 

These forums are funny. I remember everyone lamenting the loss of spring-loaded folders and truly spatial finder from OS 9 and previous, and then using hierarchal displayed folders in the Dock as a neat "work around". Now it's a "feature" some just can't live without.

You forget that it was also the OS X equivalent of the Apple menu (and, actually, a far better implemented one than OS 9's at that). And as things are right now, there's no longer any substitute for it at all - there's no way that I know of to get a hierarchical menu representing a folder in Leopard.

[Andrew88088]

Originally Posted by fisherKing 

so you're having this problem as well? nice (temp) fix.
but wonder why we're having this problem...

actually, not a good fix: icons still peek up behind that folder, plus...don't really want an empty folder in my docs, or downloads (or ANY folder i might add to the dock...)

As far as I know, it isn't a problem.. That's just how Stacks works.. by using the first icon from the contents of the folder and then displaying about two behind that.. (someone correct me if I'm wrong.. haha)

I'm not so sure I'm keen on this.. I would at least like to have the option to have it be a static icon..

[voodoo]

I am unimpressed with stacks.. I never used the Dock for keeping folders, so I can't say I miss that feature. I tried it, but didn't like it.

It was sort of a replacement for tabbed windows in OS 9, but I never used them either.

Now when Leopard is finally released, I had killed the Dock alltogether on Tiger. I just had enough of it. It sucks. In Leopard. In Tiger... in every iteration.

It is always in the way, either eating up screen realestate or blocking your view - if it isn't accidentally popping up like a retarded jack-in-the-box.

It is a lame appliction launcher and worse application switcher. It is inconsistent and really only marginally useful for utter beginners.

Seeing as I've used computers since 1984 I'm not a beginner. I've used the Mac since 1988. For me the Dock and any of it's 'features' are an annoyance at best.

So I killed it. I use an alternative application switcher, the Apple menu suits me fine for quick launching apps and the Trash is on the Desktop.

Now I'll have to fix Leopard.. but then a responsible cat owner fixes his cats ASAP

V

[CharlesS]

I liked Stacks a lot better when they worked this way:

http://images.apple.com/movies/us/ap...op_672x416.mov

Dragging a small number of files into the Dock created a Stack from them. This worked a lot better than making folders into stacks, because you were pretty much guaranteed not to put so many items in that it overloaded the usefulness of a stack. Plus, you could have a group of applications geared toward a certain purpose, without having to put them in a separate folder. I have no idea why they removed this feature.

[Andrew88088]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

I liked Stacks a lot better when they worked this way:

http://images.apple.com/movies/us/ap...op_672x416.mov

Dragging a small number of files into the Dock created a Stack from them. This worked a lot better than making folders into stacks, because you were pretty much guaranteed not to put so many items in that it overloaded the usefulness of a stack. Plus, you could have a group of applications geared toward a certain purpose, without having to put them in a separate folder. I have no idea why they removed this feature.

I knew there was something different about them!! Wow.. why did they remove that feature?? That would be so much more useful.

[voodoo]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

You forget that it was also the OS X equivalent of the Apple menu (and, actually, a far better implemented one than OS 9's at that). And as things are right now, there's no longer any substitute for it at all - there's no way that I know of to get a hierarchical menu representing a folder in Leopard.

He certainly doesn't 'forget' about anything. The Dock is the OS X crutch for the Apple menu and a lousy one at that.

Made me shut down the Dock permanently and install Fruitmenu just to maintain some sanity. The Dock sucks that much.

It is both an app launcher and switcher. It is average at both, i.e. it does manage to launch and switch, most of the time. It's just that beyond being both switcher/launcher - which are features split conveniently between two menus in OS 9 - it sucks at everything else. Being a pseudo shelf, the thing that holds the Trash (for some inexplicable reason), notifying the user by annoying bounces and generally being in the way.

It is absoloutly non-customizable and utterly over-rated. I guess it must get so much support from Apple zealots who think Apple can do nothing wrong -- well at least that thing they put waaaay at the front of the OS X user experience.

Those things just cant suck.

The Dock.. and the Finder.

V

[jasonsRX7]

Originally Posted by Andrew88088 

I knew there was something different about them!! Wow.. why did they remove that feature?? That would be so much more useful.

Holy crap, I forgot that stacks were supposed to work like that! THAT would have actually been useful. Not that it would replace a hierarchy view, but it would certainly have made stacks useful for SOMETHING.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by voodoo 

It is both an app launcher and switcher. It is average at both, i.e. it does manage to launch and switch, most of the time. It's just that beyond being both switcher/launcher - which are features split conveniently between two menus in OS 9 - it sucks at everything else.

You can't possibly be arguing that the OS 9 Apple menu and application menu were better than the (Tiger) Dock. C'mon, the Apple menu sucked. No one but the most hardcore of users even knew how to put anything in there, and thus it contained its default set of items 99% of the time. And the application menu... that thing that novice users almost never discovered, which provided absolutely no visual clue that an app was open (unless you tore it off via another non-standard interface), with the result that Mac labs always had 3 or 4 apps open in the background, leaving users to wonder why they were getting out of memory errors. It sucked.

And you couldn't drag documents to it either to open them with a currently running app like you can with the Dock, either.

Originally Posted by jasonsRX7 

Holy crap, I forgot that stacks were supposed to work like that! THAT would have actually been useful. Not that it would replace a hierarchy view, but it would certainly have made stacks useful for SOMETHING.

Write to Apple about it. I did. Here's what I got back:

Originally Posted by Apple

After considerable deliberation, the custom stack feature has been removed from Mac OS X Leopard. At this time, we do not anticipate re-adding this feature.

We consider this issue closed. Thank you for taking the time to notify us of this issue.

So clearly they need to hear more complaining about this. If more people write about the same thing, maybe they will change their mind and put the actually useful part of the Stacks feature back in.

[voodoo]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

You can't possibly be arguing that the OS 9 Apple menu and application menu were better than the (Tiger) Dock. C'mon, the Apple menu sucked. No one but the most hardcore of users even knew how to put anything in there, and thus it contained its default set of items 99% of the time. And the application menu... that thing that novice users almost never discovered, which provided absolutely no visual clue that an app was open (unless you tore it off via another non-standard interface), with the result that Mac labs always had 3 or 4 apps open in the background, leaving users wonder why they were getting out of memory errors. It sucked.

Yes yes, intuatively speaking, the Apple menu and app switcher were not 'good'. However it wasn't necessary to rip that feature out of the Mac OS. The ability to customize the Apple menu is fantastically powerful and it is never in the way, yet always visible.

I really hate single clicking an icon in the Dock to switch to that app, missing by a pixel or two and end up starting Azureus. If I'm lucky I only started the Terminal. Otherwise it's straight to force-quit or wait and quit.

Double-clicking to start apps in the Dock should be a standard feature.

Singleclicking for everything is just the lowest common UI denominator. It is for retards (and absolute beginners). In other words, the target audience of the Dock. Which is why I grew tired of it and it's quirks really really fast.

But, nay, I shall not rant more about my vanquished foe.

In my world the Dock is dead and gone.

V

[cgc]

Originally Posted by jasonsRX7 

I especially like that Stacks replaced "Transmission" with "Trans...ission" Replacing that "m" with an ellipsis actually makes it longer.

[MindFad]

Well, it would actually have to replace "mi," but yeah, I agree.

[EricTheRed]

I've three monitors with the Dock at the bottom of the center monitor. Stacks isn't helpful because it wraps off the center display to the right and refuses to be relocated in the dock or to wrap to the left. Grr.

[turnedge762]

Originally Posted by SteveTech 

Then why the heck did that guy above, at the beginning of the thread, say you could turn them off. That's why I asked.

I'm not all that excited about stacks and was hoping there was a way to turn them off. Maybe a terminal command will pop up sometime soon to disable them.

I think the guy at the beginning might have been thinking that you could turn off stacks in the sense that you can switch from fan to grid view.

I personally never used the right click functionality of folders in the dock before. Of course, I never kept folders in the dock before this. I'd always just keep an alias to often used folders on my desktop because then they would have the name beside them. In the dock they'd be too nondescript.

I think that the stacks seem cool for 5 seconds, and then you're like, "Why are my files leaning to the right?" Straight up an down is much more useful.

[jasonsRX7]

Originally Posted by EricTheRed 

I've three monitors with the Dock at the bottom of the center monitor. Stacks isn't helpful because it wraps off the center display to the right and refuses to be relocated in the dock or to wrap to the left. Grr.

I can't believe the same company that made my iPhone released this crap upgrade. They must have outsourced it, that is the only explanation.

[voodoo]

It is standard practice these days and has been for the last few years, to release apps and OSs in beta versions. Just to get them out I suppose with X minor bugs and fix the Y minor bugs that annoy customers the most.. saving themselves the work of fixing the X-Y bugs that remain. (X in this case is always *far* larger than Y)

Works every time.

V

[MOTHERWELL]

Originally Posted by jasonsRX7 

I still can't believe they took this:

And replaced it with this:

I can't believe I didn't know about this:



And now I am stuck with this:

[zro]

Booo Stacks!

The "custom" Stack is what Stacks should be and leave folders alone until you select a make stack option in the dockling.


While I'm at it, booo firewall! What the hell, Apple?

[fisherKing]

so...(again!)
who else is seeing this? my folders in the dock turn into the icons of what's inside them (for example, a .dmg iconin downloads).

really annoying.

no way to go another layer into a stack? yuck. no way to, say, drag multiple items to the trash?

eye candy. hopefully will develop into something useful...soon...

[zro]

Originally Posted by fisherKing 

so...(again!)
who else is seeing this? my folders in the dock turn into the icons of what's inside them (for example, a .dmg iconin downloads).

That's the way they work.

[fisherKing]

Originally Posted by zro 

That's the way they work.

so, when i had a set of folders in my docs folder, each with a custom icon, i got a big mess of a visual in the dock (the icons on top of each other)...yuck!

[EricTheRed]

Originally Posted by jasonsRX7 

I can't believe the same company that made my iPhone released this crap upgrade. They must have outsourced it, that is the only explanation.

I figured out a work-around by hitting the scroll wheel button (option on the keyboard) and dragging to resize the dock so it is smaller thereby allowing stacks to display on my center monitor. Now I've got a pile of mini-me icons. Grr. It's really annoying that I cannot put folders to the left of the divider.

[.Neo]

Originally Posted by EricTheRed 

I've three monitors with the Dock at the bottom of the center monitor. Stacks isn't helpful because it wraps off the center display to the right and refuses to be relocated in the dock or to wrap to the left. Grr.]

I get the same thing on my iMac (only one monitor). That really is an extremely retarded oversight if you'd ask me.

[MartiNZ]

Originally Posted by MOTHERWELL 

I can't believe I didn't know about this:



And now I am stuck with this:

We all make a fantastic advertisement for Leopard, oh yes.

Indeed, the previous functionality was not well publicised, although they did make specific mention of increasing the number of levels deep you could browse in contextual menus, from 5 to some number I never reached ... in Tiger, and as docked folders are the only things that I can think of that that would affect, I took it as promoting that 'feature'.

Stacks as they have turned out really turns that right around; stacks as I had forgotten they were intended, thanks Charles, would have augmented docked folders greatly. That response from Apple is an odd one. The feature now requires quite some work to make good use of .

[Geobunny]

Originally Posted by MartiNZ 

Stacks as they have turned out really turns that right around; stacks as I had forgotten they were intended, thanks Charles, would have augmented docked folders greatly. That response from Apple is an odd one. The feature now requires quite some work to make good use of .

Sadly it's not an odd response; I've had it all too often. They ask for our comments but then refuse to listen when we give them

[Kevin]

jason I surely hope you are trying to say Leopard is a vista copy with your sig.

[Kevin]

[QUOTE=MOTHERWELL;3516272]I can't believe I didn't know about this:


I've been doing that since 10.0
It was my Apple menu replacement. Didn't require any hacks either.

[jasonsRX7]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

jason I surely hope you are trying to say Leopard is a vista copy with your sig.

You know how Vista tried to copy Exposé with their Alt-Tab replacement, but completely ruined the functionality by overlapping the windows? And how Aero effects get thrown around that do nothing to enhance usability? Now we get our version of it with Stacks, 3D docks, and translucent menu bars.

[smacintush]

Originally Posted by Geobunny 

Sadly it's not an odd response; I've had it all too often. They ask for our comments but then refuse to listen when we give them

Do you really think that they should go changing around the OS at the whim of the loudest complainers? What should the response have been?

"Thank you for your comments about SO X Leopard which has been out for a whole several hours. We will get to changing stacks to your liking right away! Love, Apple."

This is not a usability-breaking feature of the OS and they shouldn't have to go all ape-**** changing little things like this at every turn to satisfy everyone. Just like the dock itself, people don't like it because they are trying to use it in a way which it wasn't designed.

And yes, the Crapple menu was crappily implemented and the App switcher was just meh. It's amazing how Apple can replace crap with something marginally better and people still wish they has their crap back.

Stacks are OK. Just merely OK, and that's just as good as ANYTHING that we have seen out of the Dock, the Apple menu or the old App switcher. Ever.

Navigating via hierarchal menus is just meh as well. I won't miss it.

[Geobunny]

Originally Posted by smacintush 

Do you really think that they should go changing around the OS at the whim of the loudest complainers?

Why not? They change it around at the whim of some designer. I'm not saying for one second they shouldn't have done stacks, all I'm saying is they shouldn't have removed existing (and well-used) features on a whim.

"Thank you for your comments about SO X Leopard which has been out for a whole several hours. We will get to changing stacks to your liking right away! Love, Apple."

I'm sure CharlesS knows what I'm getting at.

This is not a usability-breaking feature of the OS...

Actually, it is. They removed previously existing features thereby breaking some usability of the OS.

...and they shouldn't have to go all ape-**** changing little things like this at every turn to satisfy everyone.

If they hadn't changed the "little thing" (which to me and others here is not so little) in the first place, then we wouldn't be screaming about it now and asking them to change it back.

Just like the dock itself, people don't like it because they are trying to use it in a way which it wasn't designed.

Actually, we're trying to use it in exactly the way it was designed. Apple even told us, way back when, that we were to use hierarchical folders in the Dock as a replacement for the Apple menu. It is they who have changed the design, we're not trying to use it any differently.

Navigating via hierarchal menus is just meh as well. I won't miss it.

Fine, that's your opinion and you're entitled to it. Many people will, however, miss them unless we can convince Apple to bring them back and the best way to do that is to shout about it loudly.