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OS X Dock vs. Windows Taskbar

M

MikeyTree

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 5, 2007
295
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I switched from Windows to Mac this summer, and like almost everything in OSX better. I've even gotten used to non-maximized windows, which surprised the heck out of me.

The one thing I still much prefer is the Windows bottom bar that lists all the windows that are open. OSX's Dock, in comparison, seems cludgy. I want to be able to easily switch to another window (even one in the same program) without having to use expose and spend time searching through the windows to find the right one. Is there any way to do this in OSX, or 3rd party programs that would enable something like this?
 
Apple-` cycles through open windows of the forefront application. Expose can show all open windows as thumbnails with the press of one function button or show thumbnails of all open windows of the forefront application.

Did you know about these? Or is there some functionality available in Windows that these OS X features don't fulfill, which I don't understand yet?
 
motulist said:
Apple-` cycles through open windows of the forefront application. Expose can show all open windows as thumbnails with the press of one function button or show thumbnails of all open windows of the forefront application.

Did you know about these? Or is there some functionality available in Windows that these OS X features don't fulfill, which I don't understand yet?
Click to expand...
I think he just wants to point and click over something (like the taskbar) that brings a specific window up, not the entire app.

Personally I find expose 10 times faster and more productive. But hey, to each his own.
 
QuarterSwede said:
I think he just wants to point and click over something (like the taskbar) that brings a specific window up, not the entire app.
Click to expand...
Basically, yes. Plus, a way to see all the windows are at a glance. I find expose fairly useless for that, since I need to spend time searching through all the windows

I have downloaded and installed Witch, which works very well. It makes option-tab work a bit like the command-tab, but switches through all the windows, not just through programs.
 
I want to be able to easily switch to another window (even one in the same program) without having to use expose and spend time searching through the windows to find the right one.
Click to expand...

You know you can select the program you want in the dock, use Expose button 1 to show all the windows in that program, and button 2 to show all windows?
 
i have a M$ "FTW" friend. he argues that the the dock and :apple +tab s the lamest piece of crap that there is. and that having a task bar is the best idea because you can see eerything open.
so i explain to him that i have my dock hidden, and by showing it all the time it will show you the open applications, but not the open windows. then he's all "i still cant see individual windows". arrrggh hu cares apple doesnt have to follow M$, why do you think they made expose!?!! it completely overrides the purpose to have the disgusting task bar.
 
I much prefer the dock.

It scales better
Height is adjustable
Rearrange icons
Badge notifications (how many unread mail, bit torrent speed etc)
Extra functionality (iTunes skip, pause, Mail compose message)
Drag n Drop (drop a file onto Mail icon and it will attach to a new message. Drag any text to the Mail icon to compose a message with the text as a body)
Put folders into the dock - right click to give tree menu access (spring loaded in Leopard)
 
Once you have 20+ windows open, 10 pictures in Photoshop, 2 documents in InDesign etc. the taskbar is pretty much useless in my opinion.* Try finding the window you need, good luck! All a matter of what you are used to.


* then again... windows can't handle that many opened programs anyway without crashing. (joking)
 
You could press F9 or F10 and then tab to cycle through all the app windows. Also, if you don't care so much about seeing the windows, you can get the list by right clicking on the dock icon for the app.
 
MikeyTree said:
Basically, yes. Plus, a way to see all the windows are at a glance. I find expose fairly useless for that, since I need to spend time searching through all the windows
Click to expand...

I agree. I'm not going to say I like the Windows task bar any better, but Exposé has this issue. Especially if you've got a lot of open windows, Exposé does not make the one you want particularly easy to find. You may even have to remember the title of the open document or window because the thumbnail might be too small to recognize. Exposé is a good concept, but I don't think it's an entirely polished concept. Maybe the new "Spaces" feature in Leopard will help.
 
IJ Reilly said:
I agree. I'm not going to say I like the Windows task bar any better, but Exposé has this issue. Especially if you've got a lot of open windows, Exposé does not make the one you want particularly easy to find. You may even have to remember the title of the open document or window because the thumbnail might be too small to recognize. Exposé is a good concept, but I don't think it's an entirely polished concept. Maybe the new "Spaces" feature in Leopard will help.
Click to expand...

What could be useful to you is using F10 instead of F9 and then tabbing between applications. It's a great way to find the window you want. Try it!

MikeyTree said:
I switched from Windows to Mac this summer, and like almost everything in OSX better. I've even gotten used to non-maximized windows, which surprised the heck out of me.

The one thing I still much prefer is the Windows bottom bar that lists all the windows that are open. OSX's Dock, in comparison, seems cludgy. I want to be able to easily switch to another window (even one in the same program) without having to use expose and spend time searching through the windows to find the right one. Is there any way to do this in OSX, or 3rd party programs that would enable something like this?
Click to expand...

You can try right clicking the icon in the dock to get a list of open windows. Or use F10 as others have pointed out.
 
chaosbunny said:
Once you have 20+ windows open, 10 pictures in Photoshop, 2 documents in InDesign etc. the taskbar is pretty much useless in my opinion.* Try finding the window you need, good luck! All a matter of what you are used to.


* then again... windows can't handle that many opened programs anyway without crashing. (joking)
Click to expand...

I actually prefer Exposé in this manner, too. I can see exactly what is in each window.

In Windows, yes, I can see how many windows are open for each application, but they're all (by default), stacked into one group for the application anyway, so I can't tell what they are. I hate that.
 
dock ftw!

the taskbar gets too cluttered too fast, imo.
i use hot corners and command + Tab to select apps, command + ` for multiple windows in apps or expose again. so much easier imo.
 
If you have a Mighty Mouse, you can click the scroll wheel, button, whatever, the thing on top to give you a list of all open applications. I'm sure if you have a different mouse you can probably map the click of the scroll wheel to do the same, but I have no experience of that.

Cheers.
 
TBi said:
What could be useful to you is using F10 instead of F9 and then tabbing between applications. It's a great way to find the window you want. Try it!
Click to expand...

That method is a bit of an improvement in terms of presentation, but it kind of lack intuitiveness, don't you think? It can also require a lot of keystrokes and clicks before you get where you need to go. It also doesn't improve much on the basic issue with Exposé, which is that it tiles windows randomly and can create thumbnails so tiny that you need to remember the document titles, which somewhat defeats the point.
 
I think a lot of you are forgetting that when Leopard arrives there will be stacking which should perhaps improve things for you who think windows get cluttered. I personally prefer the dock to the taskbar because it's minimalistic and elegant as is pretty much everything compared to Windows and the F9 and F10 keys do the trick.
 
I would either find a 3rd party app the does the trick or clasify it as someting that you like better in windows.

I myself got use to using expose with the mighty mouse. Squeeze choose window click. I found that it is a lot faster for me then using the windows taskbar because it requires less fine mouse movement just click the big box. But when using different platforms I try to take advantage of their strong points and not complain to much about their week points. I usually just feel better at the end of the day.
 
I LOVE my mac, but I sort of agree.


Sometimes I'll have 10, 15 finder windows open at any one point. This is just how I tend to do things (for instance I have 23 tabs currently open in firefox, many of them on the same page).

Using expose (either all applications or just current application) I normally can't tell which finder window is which, so I find myself expose, click on the window I think is correct, epose, try again, until I get lucky.

This is annoying, but not terrible. And it doesn't happen ALL that often.
 
now may i say at this point...those of you who run 20+ windows at the same time on what appears to be less than a 20" screen (cos i'm running 20 windows on mine now as an experiment) are fools.

if i am doing work i never need that many windows open...a few photoshop/maybe illustrator/iPhoto/safari

am i missing something?

if i'm just mucking about...iTunes/a few safari/adium/mail/maybe chess




why do you need 4 times the amount i do?...or are you just lazy and don't close the windows you're not using?
 
odinsride said:
Command-Tab and Command-` are all you need to know.
Click to expand...

Yep. This is far faster than expose or the taskbar. Not that you couldn't use expose and apple+tab and apple+` in conjunction. Which I do sometimes.

The dock does not really equal the taskbar in most ways. They do very different things. You could almost as easily say 'dock vs. start menu'. Very different animals.
 
In a way, there are docks you can get for Windows which try to offer same functionality as Expose.
 
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