Old (10.5) Exposé in Snow Leopard [Solution]

[Raptor007]

Just chiming in that I am loving this fix! The black Dock menus from SL did look nice... but now that I'm back to the white ones, I realize that they are more consistent with the OS in general (every other menu is white).

No one says you have to upgrade to Lion

True... and frankly I'm not finding much exciting about 10.7 Lion. It looks like Apple's just trying to make OS X more familiar for iPhone/iPad users by porting some features of the iOS interface, like multi-touch gestures. We'll see what happens when it's actually released and a full feature list is published, but so far I doubt it would be worth breaking Exposé again.

Similarly, I'm still running 10.4 Tiger on my old G5 because Apple decided to kill the Classic Environment in Leopard. (I suspect they stripped this feature from Leopard because they wanted to take away the one advantage of having a PowerPC Mac, since Intel Macs can't run Classic Environment.)

 

[matchf]

The new mission control in Lion seems to fix what I hate most about SL exposé :

The relative size of the windows is conserved as it was in Leopard

Additionnally, Mission Control regroups the windows belonging to the same application. I'm not sure that I like that one, but anyway it looks much better than the default Snow Leopard Exposé.

 

[iBookG4user]

Anyone who upgraded to 10.6.7 have success with this?

 

[shijan]

yea, works on 10.6.7

 

[shijan]

it was really beautiful concept in the beginning
http://youtu.be/mAvHMDR1N3U

 

[AnneStuarto238]

Still works with 10.6.8!

Is it possible to use this work-around in Lion (DP)???
Someone here, who did try?

 

[matchf]

Tweaking Lion the same way is most likely impossible (although I have not tried), but you should try Mission Control, which fixes the SL exposé problem : the ratio between windows is conserved again.

 

[Simplicated]

Tweaking Lion the same way is most likely impossible (although I have not tried), but you should try Mission Control, which fixes the SL exposé problem : the ratio between windows is conserved again.

But now, they're stacked, and again it's hard to find windows.

 

[miknos]

I must say I really like Mission Control and I don't see more reason to hack/fix exposé (or Mission Control). Windows now uses a relative size, stack same-app windows, shows the app icon to make it easier to find and put "spaces" on top to show full-screen windows.

I think Apple did a really good job in this feature. I noticed lag tough. It's the same lag as 10.6 but doesn't bother me much. I'm using a Intel GMA X3100 (integrated graphics). Waiting for the new MBA to "fix" it.


I think this thread is not needed anymore.
Best wishes to all.

 

[AnneStuarto238]

Waiting for the new MBA to "fix" it.

nice solution

 

[LJ94]

I want to try this hack, but I need to know if the App Store will still work fine when the old dock is loaded. Anyone?

 

[matchf]

I mentioned earlier :

Indeed the hack still works on 10.6.6, BUT when you buy an application through the Mac AppStore, you will not see the installation progress in the Dock (it consists in a progress bar under the icon of the bought application). Basically you will be blind during application installation. This could be annoying for long installations.

and also the application will NOT be added automatically to your dock once installed. You will need to navigate to your Application folder to find it.


voilà...
Personnally, I can live without that feature in order to keep my beloved exposé.

 

[mrblack927]

This patch is confirmed not working (by me) in the shipping retail version of 10.7. Hopefully someone can come up with a Lion-compatible patch soon. I cannot stand mission control.

 

[matchf]

The chances are very low, since no old version of exposé ever existed in any Lion beta versions.

If you have switched to Lion, you should start to get used to Mission Control, which is actually pretty usable, compared to the snow leopard exposé.

 

[Ledgem]

The chances are very low, since no old version of exposé ever existed in any Lion beta versions.

If you have switched to Lion, you should start to get used to Mission Control, which is actually pretty usable, compared to the snow leopard exposé.

I agree. Used Expose extensively in Leopard, not so much in Snow Leopard, and I find myself using Mission Control about as much in Lion as I did Expose in Leopard. It's well laid out - the windows may be smaller, but they're grouped by application and the application icon sits in front, making it easy to find the application you want to switch to. The windows are also slightly staggered within each application grouping. "Spaces" are more nicely integrated (my opinion - I never used them in 10.5 and 10.6, now I use them regularly). I thought I would hate Mission Control, but it's a huge advance over Expose in 10.6. I consider it about even with Expose in 10.5.

 

[matchf]

Additionally, in mission control, you can :

- scroll up on a group of window to zoom and see the windows better.
- in 10.7.2, you will be able to re-arrange the order of the spaces


I would like to be able to :
- move a window from the space 1 of my main display to the space 2 of my secondary display. This is impossible, for now
- click on the icon of an application, to bring all the windows of the application in front.

 

[mrmister]

As someone on Snow Leopard, and planning to stay here for quite awhile--this is a fantastic hack. Thanks to all who took the time to document it. I had forgotten how much I actually used expose in Leopard, and hardly ever in Snow Leopard...I didn't actually put together that this was the reason.

 

[gumblecosby]

This works fine on my macbook. On my Dell optiplex hackintosh, Dock.app constantly quits with a seg fault. Ive tried to apply the hack in different ways but all lead to the same outcome. Permissions have been set correctly.

Console just shows "com.apple.dock.agent" crashing constantly, even after deleting any plists and caches related to dock,dashboard and spaces.

My only reasoning/theory is that "fakesmc.kext" is causing the problem since it handles the decryption of all the encrypted apple binaries such as loginwindow.app and Dock.app on hackintoshes.

Has anyone else experienced anything similar?

 

[Spectrum]

Still alive in 2012

Amazing! Just reporting in to say that this hack still works on a mid 2011 i7 quad Mac Mini Server (Lion shipping) with 10.6.8 v1.1 shoehorned into it. Great! I love how when you invoke "App Expose", the animation is far more subtle than 10.6 and 10.7 - merely darkening non-app windows rather than clearing the desktop entirely. Much much more pleasing on a large monitor with lots of open windows. I also prefer that after invoking app expose ALL the windows of that app are brought to the front. Indeed I tend to use Expose as both a search tool AND an app switcher in 10.5 because of this.

However, I agree that Lion Mission Control is a substantially improved implementation of "All Windows" Expose - pulling together spaces and virtual desktops - things that I never used in 10.5. And retaining relative sizing of windows and grouping by app. It is much much better in my opinion than organising the windows into a grid ordered by App type or by alphabet. Visual cues work much faster for me as a search tool. However, I understand that heavy Spaces users are disappointed with 10.7 and MC, as it removes a lot of the flexibility. And individual app windows are a often hidden in a stack in MC. SO I can see people who liked 10.6 then not liked 10.7. But people who liked 10.5 may prefer 10.7 to 10.6!

Nevertheless, "Single-App" Expose in 10.7 remains identical to 10.6: Windows are forced into a grid and lose relative sizing. Since I use single Window Expose the most, that is a big reason to remain on SL, even on the newest hardware. Not to mention that the animations are more sluggish in 10.7 than 10.6 (and 10.5 expose is even smoother on the mini - 2560x1440 display)

Hopefully Apple will eventually create an OPTION in Lion for relative sizing for "App Expose" too. But I won't hold my breath. I may just hold out for further improvements in 10.8...

Cheers!

 

[Phechs]

has anyone found a way to get the 10.6 dock or expose/spaces working in 10.7?

 

[reallynotnick]

Dang I just found this as I had given up hope but after almost 2 years of using Snow Leopard I'm finding it incredibly hard to use the old way. Also even if I don't move any windows if I keep triggering expose the windows will show in different places each time. I thought it used to be more consistent than that and it just doesn't feel logical to me being that it changes each time as I recall it being a size and location based system but clearly it can't make up its mind. I think I'm just going to have to go back to the "new" way as it's just been too long...

Thanks a lot for this though!

 

[takahar]

OldExpose for Mountain Lion 10.8

We cannot use this hack with Montain Lion 10.8, but Apple provides standard OldExpose feature.

Open [System Preferences], select [Mission Control], and Uncheck [Group windows by application].

http://takahar.blogspot.jp/2013/05/oldexpose-on-mountain-lion-108-within.html

 

[shijan]

We cannot use this hack with Montain Lion 10.8, but Apple provides standard OldExpose feature.

Open [System Preferences], select [Mission Control], and Uncheck [Group windows by application].

http://takahar.blogspot.jp/2013/05/oldexpose-on-mountain-lion-108-within.html

Image

forget those lions. 10.6.8 with expose hack is a way to go... even after so many years tiger version still looks best of all. also aqua buttons and color sidebar icons are way more user friendly as for me.

 

[shijan]