I don't want this to turn into a discussion of how much RAM / CPU cycles it uses. I did a search for this, and I found that. Is it possible to disable Dashboard in Tiger? I would like to do this.
-Kevin
-Kevin
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How to disable Dashboard
- Thread starter spaceballl
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Ouch. Snappy today are we? No, that's the thread I found. It turned out to be more of a discussion of Quartz 2D extreme, whether or not Dashboard is part of Finder, etc etc... I wanted this thread to be limited to the disabling of Dashboard.
-Kevin
-Kevin
I thought the thread was pretty clear. At the current moment, there is no way to disable Dashboard. Maybe someone will find a file to edit or something to disable it, but not right now. If you don't activate any widgets, remove dashboard from the dock, and disable the hotkey, its pretty much like deactivating it. Hope this is what you want.
It cannot be disabled, end of story. It is part of Dock.app, so in order to stop it you'll have to give up your dock too -
Besides, I don't see why you'd want to disable dashboard... It's like buying a brand new car and ripping the tape player/radio/cd player out...
Besides, I don't see why you'd want to disable dashboard... It's like buying a brand new car and ripping the tape player/radio/cd player out...
tekmoe said:
Ummm.... I think Spotlight is the key component.
Dashboard is cute, but not really necessary.
wordmunger said:
The under-the-hood fixes, more optimized code, Core Image, Firewall Stealth Mode, Certificate Assistant, and everything else to make it run faster and more secure are the key components. Dashboard, Spotlight, Automator, are just features.
tekmoe said:
it isn't a key component. it isn't "REQUIRED" by any stretch of the means. there's a dashboard server that runs on top of aqua. you can kill it from the commandline but it just restarts itself almost instantly, it doesn't use a lot of ram at all. the widgets might but the server itself does not.
spotlight pretty much is required though. they put in filesystem hooks so that when a file is written, deleted, etc, then spotlight updates. i'm not so sure you can just disable it either. i'd say it's pretty much a requirement to be running spotlight.
You could just not assign it to any key. Obviously it would still be running, but in effect it'd be disabled.
Agree
So far I like Spotlight, but Dashboard is so far just some pretty fluff. Now Mail.app is ugly and less easy to use than the Panther version. I always had my maiboxes to the right of the screen, now you can only have them on the left side - and the menu buttons - I've already changed mine, but if you go back to the Panther version you go ah! what nice menu buttons.
I'll keep Panther on a few machines a little longer than I thought . . .
grapes911 said:
So far I like Spotlight, but Dashboard is so far just some pretty fluff. Now Mail.app is ugly and less easy to use than the Panther version. I always had my maiboxes to the right of the screen, now you can only have them on the left side - and the menu buttons - I've already changed mine, but if you go back to the Panther version you go ah! what nice menu buttons.
I'll keep Panther on a few machines a little longer than I thought . . .
Drag the Dashboard icon out of the Dock, and remove the F-12 keyboard shortcut from the Exposé prefs panel. Also delete all widgets from the /Library folder. I think that's the closest you'll get to disabling Dashboard. As to why you want to disable it, thats for another thread.
MacEyeDoc said:
the mail issue is just your own personal preference. i like the new layout myself. the buttons could use some work but the layout i like a lot more. i hated the drawer crap so this is a welcome change for me. just remember, not everyone works like you do. i've always had my mailboxes on the left side not the right.
Hey guys,
Thanks for the responses. So it is for sure part of dock.app? Oh well i'm hoping that there is a way to permanently disable it from the command line. I know the server takes little to no CPU cycles and no RAM is used unless there are widgets out there, but in an effort to optimize my system as much as possible, why not get rid of a feature that I'd never use. The most interesting widgets for me are the Gmail notifier as well as the weather forecast but I have firefox extensions for those.
As far as it being a key component, I'd say it is one of the key flashy parts of the OS... but not a major technology. Thanks for all the responses!
Thanks for the responses. So it is for sure part of dock.app? Oh well i'm hoping that there is a way to permanently disable it from the command line. I know the server takes little to no CPU cycles and no RAM is used unless there are widgets out there, but in an effort to optimize my system as much as possible, why not get rid of a feature that I'd never use. The most interesting widgets for me are the Gmail notifier as well as the weather forecast but I have firefox extensions for those.
As far as it being a key component, I'd say it is one of the key flashy parts of the OS... but not a major technology. Thanks for all the responses!
Turning off Dashboard
Dear Grapes911,
Maybe YOU should have searched a little harder. Dashboard does take up RAM, even when you're not using it, and you can turn it off. Here's how to get rid of that annoying little app:
Go to /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.
Open Terminal, and then type this command, followed by the Return key:
defaults write com.apple.dashboard mcx-disabled -boolean YES
This tells the system that you no longer wish to have Dashboard available. However, the Dashboard task is actually owned by the Dock, so to make your changes take effect, you need to restart the Dock. The easiest way to do that is to type this command into the Terminal (and press Return when done):
killall Dock
After the Dock restarts, hit F12 and youll see. . .nothing at all. If you run Activity Monitor, you also wont find any Dashboard widgets in the list of tasks, even if you had several open when you ran the above command. Dashboard has been eliminated from your system, and wont return until you tell it to do so. You can do just that by opening Terminal again, and typing this command:
defaults write com.apple.dashboard mcx-disabled -boolean NO
Once again, youll have to use the killall Dock command to make the changes take effect. Once you do, though, youll find that Dashboard is back as usualand any widgets you had opened on the Dashboard will still be open.
Dear Grapes911,
Maybe YOU should have searched a little harder. Dashboard does take up RAM, even when you're not using it, and you can turn it off. Here's how to get rid of that annoying little app:
Go to /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.
Open Terminal, and then type this command, followed by the Return key:
defaults write com.apple.dashboard mcx-disabled -boolean YES
This tells the system that you no longer wish to have Dashboard available. However, the Dashboard task is actually owned by the Dock, so to make your changes take effect, you need to restart the Dock. The easiest way to do that is to type this command into the Terminal (and press Return when done):
killall Dock
After the Dock restarts, hit F12 and youll see. . .nothing at all. If you run Activity Monitor, you also wont find any Dashboard widgets in the list of tasks, even if you had several open when you ran the above command. Dashboard has been eliminated from your system, and wont return until you tell it to do so. You can do just that by opening Terminal again, and typing this command:
defaults write com.apple.dashboard mcx-disabled -boolean NO
Once again, youll have to use the killall Dock command to make the changes take effect. Once you do, though, youll find that Dashboard is back as usualand any widgets you had opened on the Dashboard will still be open.
What's stuck up your ass? What should I have searched for? Did I say that it didn't use any memory when not in use? I surely don't remember saying that. And at the time of that post, there was no known way to disable dashboard. Things have changed over the last 7 months.hahaworld said:
