Mac Basics: Modify your windows

There are lots of ways to customize your Finder windows.

Change window element colors and functionality

1. From the Apple () menu, choose System Preferences.
2. Choose View > General.

• To change the colors of the window elements from the default blue appearance, you can choose Graphite from the Appearance pop-up menu to make OS X take on a cool, monochromatic graphite color.
• To change the highlight color, choose any color from the Highlight color pop-up menu. Or, use a custom color by choosing Other from the Highlight color pop-up menu, then selecting a color in the resulting Colors window.
• To change the size of the sidebar icon from the default Medium size, you can choose Small or Large from the Sidebar icon size pop-up menu. See below for more sidebar options.
• If you'd rather have the scroll bars always visible or always visible when scrolling, click the "When scrolling" or "Always" radio button, respectively, next to "Show scroll bars."
• You can change how many items are displayed in your Recent Items list in the Go menu, how to handle font smoothing and window closing, and more.

Modify the sidebar

Your commonly used folders are listed in the sidebar in the Favorites section.

• To add a folder to the Finder window's sidebar, drag the folder to the Favorites section in the sidebar—a horizontal line displays to indicate the tentative position—and drop it.
• To remove a folder from the sidebar, simply Command-click the folder and drag it out of the sidebar—the folder disappears in a puff of smoke. You can also right-click the selected folder and choose Remove from Sidebar. The original will remain intact on your Mac.
• If you want to rearrange the order of items in your sidebar Favorites, just select an item and drag it to the desired position.
• You can hide the sidebar by dragging the vertical bar—the one that separates the sidebar from the rest of the window—all the way to the left of the window. If you want the sidebar back, simply drag the left side of the Finder window to the right to reveal the sidebar.

You can also modify your Finder window's sidebar preferences.

1. From the Finder menu, choose Preferences to open Finder preferences.
2. Click Sidebar to display its preferences.
3. Select the checkbox next to the items that you want to see displayed in your sidebar Favorites, Shared, and Devices lists.
   

Customize the toolbar

You can customize the commands available in your toolbar.

• To change the contents in the Finder window toolbar, choose Customize Toolbar from the View menu.
• In the dialog sheet that appears, drag whatever items you want to add onto the toolbar (such as Burn, Eject, Get Info, and more).
• To remove a toolbar item, simply drag it off the toolbar.
• To rearrange stuff in the toolbar, just drag an item to the desired location.
• To group items so that they appear separated from others, drag a "Space" or "Flexible Space" item to the toolbar to create a separation.
• You can have the toolbar display only icons, show icons and text, or display text only. From the Show pop-up menu at the bottom of the dialog, choose your preference.
• When finished, click Done.
• You can also add items, such as files, folders, and applications, to the toolbar by clicking and dragging the item to the location where you want it in the Finder window toolbar. Your cursor turns to a green (+) to indicate that the item will be added to the toolbar. To remove an item from the Finder window toolbar, command-click the item and drag it off the toolbar and let it go into a puff of smoke.
• Drag and drop a file to open it in a specific application. For example, you can drag a text document onto Textedit in the toolbar to open it.
  

   

Change the view and view options

• Depending on your window's view, you can modify how it displays its contents.
• To change a Finder window's view, click the appropriate button in the toolbar, or choose as Icons, as List, as Columns, or as Cover Flow from the View menu. (For more information on Finder window views, see The Finder.)
• To customize the window further by view, choose View > Show View Options.
• If you choose List, Icons, Columns, or Cover Flow view, you can choose whether to apply your settings to only the current window or to all windows. Select the appropriate checkbox at the top of the View options window.
• In each view option you can modify what displayed and viewable. For example, with Columns view you can modify the text size, and icon and preview column visibility. In List view, you can modify the icon and text size, select what file information to display in columns, and more.

Label Finder items with color

For visual organization, use color labels to separate one categorical group of folders and files from others. You can make any application, file, or folder stand out from the rest by giving it a color label. To do this:

1. Select an item in Finder.
2. From the File menu, choose a color under Label, or choose a color from the Finder window's Action menu.

You can also change the name of the label to further distinguish each color in the Finder window.

1. From the Finder menu, choose Preferences to open Finder preferences.
2. Click Labels to display the label name fields.
3. Enter the label name you want to designate for each color.
   

Put color and pictures in windows

You can add a background or paint windows with color. If you display a Finder window in Icons view, you can display a picture as the window backdrop or change its color.

1. Select a folder whose contents you'd like to see all spruced up and double-click it to open it.
2. From the View menu, choose as Icons if the window isn't already in Icons view.
3. From the View menu, choose Show View Options.
4. To put an image in the window, under the Background header, select the Picture radio button, then skip to step 6. To change the background color, select the Color radio button.
5. To select a color, click the color swatch that appears next to the Color radio button, and select a color in the resulting Colors window.
6. Drag a picture to the image box that appears next to the Picture radio button.