where is my dock?!

[mdwsta4]

i am such an idiot and i'm sure this is such a simple fix, but...
i was playing around with the 'fn' key so pressing 'fn and f12' for example. a number of the F keys didnt do anything. i must have pressed something incorrectly though because now my dock is missing. the only way to get it to appear is to go to system preferences and unhide it. i prefer it when it's hidden and i can simply move my curser over to it and it will appear.
WTF did i do?!

thanks!

 

[projectle]

I have encountered the same problem a few times so far. In my case, it appeared that the Dock process froze. When the next redraw event occurs, the dock disappears as it is no longer in the offscreen buffer.

The process is still running, though.

When this happens, open your terminal and run "killall Dock".

This will force quit the Dock process and cause it to restart, getting it back for you. I have already filed a bug with Apple providing them with the output of Console as well as a Sample Process run on the Dock while it was not working.

Hopefully they will get this fixed in 10.5.1 as it is definitely a MAJOR issue.

 

[mdwsta4]

i'll have to try that when i get home. thanks.
odd, i've never once had that happen in 4 years of being a mac owner.

 

[kkat69]

I have encountered the same problem a few times so far. In my case, it appeared that the Dock process froze. When the next redraw event occurs, the dock disappears as it is no longer in the offscreen buffer.

The process is still running, though.

When this happens, open your terminal and run "killall Dock".

This will force quit the Dock process and cause it to restart, getting it back for you. I have already filed a bug with Apple providing them with the output of Console as well as a Sample Process run on the Dock while it was not working.

Hopefully they will get this fixed in 10.5.1 as it is definitely a MAJOR issue.

I just now got this exact thing, however, system preferences does nothing and when I try to killall it tells me "No matching processes belonging...."

Anyone else got any ideas?

:::EDIT:::

Just starting looking around and the dock process is starting and stopping constantly. Now sometimes the dock shows and then it doesn't show almost like it's auto-hiding but it's not. The process is starting and stopping (or crashing whichever).

 

[Blubbert]

I just now got this exact thing, however, system preferences does nothing and when I try to killall it tells me "No matching processes belonging...."

Anyone else got any ideas?

the killall command is case sensitive so you do have to write Dock, typing in dock will return the error you got.

 

[kkat69]

the killall command is case sensitive so you do have to write Dock, typing in dock will return the error you got.

Yes Im aware of that, have been for a while. As I said, it's returning that error, also it only returns that error when the dock service isn't running, I can see the activity monitor showing the dock service run, stop, run, stop, etc.

Also spaces isn't working.

 

[stevietheb]

Cry "Hallelejuah!" You've found a way to get rid of the Dock!

Unfortunately, the process is still running. Ahh well...maybe one day we'll have an option to turn off the Dock.

 

[AlexisV]

But the dock's the single bestest thing about OS X!!!!

 

[Xcolored]

Option + Command + D

Try that, it hides and unhides the dock. It's helped doing it 2-3 times to get it working.

Zack

 

[kkat69]

Option + Command + D

Try that, it hides and unhides the dock. It's helped doing it 2-3 times to get it working.

Zack

I'll try to remember that. I did a restore from TimeMachine to last night (since it only started doing it sometime after I got off work tonight) and all is well.

What was wierd is not only did the dock just start/stop/start/stop etc, but my spaces number didn't show up, I couldn't turn spaces on, etc.

Oh well. Thx for the tip on hiding the dock. I'm still learning all the shortcuts on osx.

 

[Xcolored]

Spaces / Expose / Dashboard is all connected to the dock. If the dock is screwed up, those will be next. However, Opening and Closing it fixed the one kink I had. Time Machine isn't a bad idea however

Zack

 

[mdwsta4]

i ended up shutting down and it worked properly when i logged back in.