[carney]

I would just like to stop TextEdit from opening a new file when I launch it from the dock. Seems like there should be a checkbox in the preferences, but I could not find it. Anyone know how to stop this annoying behavior?

Thanks.

[Love Calm Quiet]

I agree it's a nuisance. And right in the obvious place for it in "Preferences" - there's no opportunitiy to have a preference.

I've taken to keeping a daily-used Text Edit file as a start-up item so that I've got a USEFUL item open already when I click on TE. Or to selecting a desired doc from "Recent Documents" when possible.

I'm with you: let's make this "always open with a new window" optional.

[jrafter]

My copy of TextEdit (OS v 10.3.2, TextEdit v202) always opens with an empty window.

[Judge_Fire]

Launching a window, if none are present, is default behaviour for OS X.

Many users aren't conscious about advanced concepts such as 'app is running, but there is no window'. Imagine them keeping clicking on the Dock icon, but nothing happens - the app must be broken! I've seen this so often, take it from me.

The preference should of course be made available, but in the absence of it you can work around: using the app switcher ( cmd - tab ) is set not to open new windows.

J

[maxintosh]

Originally posted by Judge_Fire:
Imagine them keeping clicking on the Dock icon, but nothing happens - the app must be broken! I've seen this so often, take it from me.

Yes! Newbies do this ALL the time. They never notice that the menu bar items have changed. Gets them every time.

[Love Calm Quiet]

It's fine to have this be the default for FIRST opening of an app. But for post-newbies an option in the PREFERENCES could allow people to choose which (or no) window to open upon launch.

Seems I heard some guy named Steve say he himself always likes OPTIONS ! Might be worth a try?

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by Love Calm Quiet:
It's fine to have this be the default for FIRST opening of an app. But for post-newbies an option in the PREFERENCES could allow people to choose which (or no) window to open upon launch.

Seems I heard some guy named Steve say he himself always likes OPTIONS ! Might be worth a try?

The guidelines say that a window should appear when you click a dock icon. And newbies do get confused by this every day, so it's a good rule!

[Judge_Fire]

Originally posted by Love Calm Quiet:
It's fine to have this be the default for FIRST opening of an app. But for post-newbies an option in the PREFERENCES could allow people to choose which (or no) window to open upon launch.

Sure, and a lot of apps allow you to. Now that users have their own prefs this is cool.

Enforcing this optionality is not part of Apple's guidelines, though, so giving feedback on this has to be done on app-by-app basis. As always, a polite request to http://www.apple.com/macosx/feedback won't hurt.

Options are good,

J

[cpac]

so TextEdit opens a new document when launched from the dock - so what? This doesn't get in the way of anything: if you choose to open a file, it will automatically close the new document - no extra clicks needed, and of course, it doesn't open a new document if you launch by double-clicking a document anyway...

[carney]

Thanks cpac. How's this for newbie stupidity (and I really don't have the excuse of being a newbie)? I never actually just went ahead and opened a document after launching TextEdit. I always first closed the damned stupid window that I didn't ask for, and then opened the doc I wanted.

Anyway, you're right, now that I realize how it actually is meant to work it is much less annoying. OTOH, now I have this irrational mission to make my machine obey and it is just grating at me that I can't figure out how to control the launch behavior. Oughta be an init file to edit or something...

Ahhh...life's little tragedies.

Oh, see: it really was embarrassing.

Thanks.