lost my dock.

[mach42006]

I got my latest MacLife magazine today, and inside are 25 terminal tips. I entered the terminal action to add the Recently Used stack to the dock. I entered the line of code just as it appeared in the magazine: defaults write com.apple.dock persistent-others -array-add '( "tile-data" = ( "list-type" = 1; ); "tile-type" = "recents-tile"; )'; killall Dock.

After entering this line of code, my dock quit, and my computer freezes after about 3-5 minutes after a reboot. I've verified and repaired permissions, reset the pram, I've deleted the com.apple.dock.db file, but despite my best efforts, and several hours of googling, I cannot get my dock back. The Dock.app file does still exist in the system library folder.

I know that messing in the terminal can be dangerous, but I thought something this harmless, especially following exactly the instructions in the magazine, I never thought this would create such a hassle. I'm at a loss and I'm really hoping I don't have to reinstall osx for something so stupid as this.

Thanks for any suggestions you can offer.

 

[Slux]

The only thing my quick google turned up was:

Reset the dock by erasing ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.Dock.plist or pick an older version of it using Time Machine, then doing a killall Dock in Terminal.

and it sounds like you've already tried:

defaults delete com.apple.dock persistent-others

So ... not much help. Best of luck though.

It sounds like this functionality may have been broken by an OS update somewhere along the line.

 

[celticpride678]

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Instead of messing around with system files, I recommend doing an Archive and Install which will fix the issue

 

[dashcs]

A Archive and install wont fix your issue.

Since you modify your dock personal plist inside your user account.

Archive and install reloads the OS,it does not touch your home folder.

You best bet is too log into another account and remove the plists that you changed.
If you dont have a extra account.
You can remove the files from single user mode
Or Enable root account from the install discs and single user mode and log into that account to fix your account.