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Preview Tutorial - Embed Icon into Stack Drawer
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It's Something Like This..
You Only Need Preview..
The drawer above can be easily made with only your Mac OS X Leopard little humble Preview.
Follow this guide and you will know how to do it.
Download Custom Drawer
Original Drawer from Optica Optima
Tweaking the color, I successfully diversify the drawer into ten different drawers.
Note : Click on drawer picture to get the full-sized image.
Place Icon on Clipboard
By highlighting on of your application followed by pressing Cmd-C (Copy), you've finished this step, i.e. your application icon which is highlighted has been recorded in your clipboard.
Load Icon into Preview
Next, open your Preview and then choose File ▸ New From Clipboard or Cmd-N (New). Here your icon should have been loaded in Preview.
Edit Icon with only Preview
You can use several cool Preview tools available :
- Adjust Color : Tools ▸ Adjust Color (Cmd-Option-C)
- Rotate Image : Tools ▸ Rotate Left/Right (Cmd-L or Cmd-R)
- Flip Image : Tools ▸ Flip Horizontal/Vertical
- Crop Image : Tools ▸ Crop (Cmd-K)
- Instant Alpha : Select ▸ Instant Alpha
Embed Icon on top of Drawer Image
Open your drawer image and then hit Cmd-V. Your icon maybe looks larger than your drawer, you can shrink it by clicking circle button on the edge of your icon. Move your icon by dragging it along with your mouse cursor. After finished, hit Cmd-C to copy all of them (the icon and the drawer) into clipboard.
Replace Folder Icon
This is the last step, replace your file/folder icon by opening Get Info, click on small icon on the top-left corner of the info pane and press down Cmd-V. You will see your folder icon changed accordingly.
Stack Manipulation
You should give a particular name to your folder so that it will appear on top of other files, i.e. it appears on top of stack. For example, you can give the name -Coda Drawer-.
Categories:
Icons,
Leopard,
Popular,
Tips and Tricks,
Walkthroughs
Tags:
Icon,
Leopard
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43 Comments
Francisco
Great job! It looks amazing!
Chris
Really nice. Thanks!
Tom
Very nice! I have seen that leaf icon before.. can you tell what program that belongs to?
Wendy
That leaf icon belongs to Coda.
Leon
Wow, these are quite beautiful, i made some black and white ones, but yours seem perfect for the theme im working on next. Would you mind sending me those in an email please.
chys
It's so good! Thank you for using my icon.
Himavanth B
what exactly i have to do i get like that 1 keep the custom made icon in the folder-after doing that it just the icon as what it shows in finder window, even if i added the icon the info window 2 add the icon to the folder n the dock-i doesn't the folder it only shows the items in it please tell me should i do get something like this image in this window
Russell
I copied the drawer image into preview but it is keeping the white background and i cant get rid of it.
chris27
Could not get it to work... Here is what I did. 1. Clicked to get enlarged image of drawer. 2. Copied it and selected New from Clipboard in Preview 3. Then decided not to modify it and pasted it on a folder located in the Home directory. The folder icon changed, and I dragged the folder to the dock. however I did notice that the new draw folder icon does no appear on the dock nor the Coverflow window. Open to suggestions... System: PowerBook G4 1.5Ghz 800 FW and Leopard 10.5.2
Wendy
Russell, you need to replace the icon via Get Info Pane (Command-I).
Chris, you can try this :
1. Create a new folder
2. Put previous folder into that new folder
3. Drag and Drop the new folder into Dock
luke doerge
it leaves a white background for me
Tomer
Yes, I can't get rid of the white background as well. The folder icon (command-i) is transparent, but the -Coda Drawer- file is shown with white border in Finder. In any case, I don't really understand the use of changing the folder icon, since the whole point is to display the dock icon as Stack, and not as Folder. When it's displayed as folder, only the folder icon is shown, i.e. I get an empty drawer even when there are more files in the directory. When it's displayed as stack, I always get the drawer picture as one of the files.
Yaniv Eidelstein
i've been using this system for a while now, and it works great, but i have a question, maybe you know the answer... the downloads stack is only useful when it gives you easy access to your most recently downloaded files. you'll notice it can be sorted three different ways: the usual "date created" and "date modified", but also the new "date added". the drawer icon i've been using has a modification date from the year 2010 so it stays on top when i sort by date modified, but how can i get it to stay constantly on top when i sort by date added? thanks in advance....
Wendy
Yaniv, you can use the following AppleScript to change the date added, with following lines :
--------------------------------
on adding folder items to this_folder after receiving added_items
tell application "Finder"
do shell script "mv /Users/userName/Downloads/Icon/Users/[username]/Desktop/Icon"
do shell script "mv /Users/userName/Desktop/Icon/Users/[username]/Downloads/Icon"
end tell
end adding folder items to
--------------------------------
*change [username] with yours
I got this from comment by BTGunner on one of articles inside TUAW here.
luca
i cant see the things in my drawer on the desktop like in the example, how come??
Max
Yeah.. I cant see the things in my drawer on the desktop like in the example above either. Please help..
Mathias
The icon is changed in the Finder window but it's not changed in my dock? I have tried to log out but it does not work
Wendy
- Create a new folder, let's say Web Browsers
- Drop that folder into your Dock
- Create another new folder inside this folder, just name it -Stack-
- Cmd-C your Stack Drawer image from Preview
- Open Get Info of your -Stack- folder
- Click on the icon on top-left corner of Get Info pane and use Cmd-V to replace the icon
- Choose Sort By Name and you can now have your Stack Drawer ^^
Maybe this can help.
Mary
So, I followed each step exactly but still got a white background on my icon. Like this: http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y171/ViciousBleu/Picture1.png In Preview, the background is transparent and even when I killall Dock, it's got a transparent background for a sec while it loads. It's saved as a png. if that matters at all. I'm a brand new user to Mac (and so have been obsessively reading this site for a week) so is there something I'm missing? Like a setting...or such. Thank you! (For the help and all the great stuff on here!)
Wendy
Hi Mary, thanks for visiting. Maybe this will help you:
1. Open the drawer image with Preview
2. Copy the image (Command-C)
3. Create new folder (Command-Shift-N)
4. Open Get Info pane (Command-I)
5. Click on the original folder icon on the top-left corner and hit Command-V
6. After that, put that folder inside other new folder
7. Finally, put this new folder to your dock. The drawer will show up!
secrice
Thank you for your posting!
jayz
I still can not figure out how to have items in the drawer show up
Gerard
Just like Jayz, I have no clue how to show the folder and the stack items at the same time? As far as I know, you can choose to show either the folder icon or the stacks, but not both. Any suggestions?
Peter
I have been looking for this kind of solutions with the (may I say) somewhat awkward manner Leopard goes around with stocks. And I must say: great! Tomorrow i will play around with this;) For now I just made a simple icon in Illustrator, adjusted it in Photoshop, pasted it in Preview, opened one of your drawers, made sure the icon was transparent, pasted it on the drawer and there it is. What fun! Thanks guys!
Joe Pucci
hey i just made the stack drawer and it looks great, but it only shows the drawer not the documents in it, like in the examples. how do i fix this?
a person
hi it didn't work for me. i have done absolutely everything right but the folder that is inside another folder that has the custom icon just comes up as a normal folder icon any help?
Dave B
Hey I did this but I don't really like it so how do I change it back?
Linux Geek
For "a person" delete the icon for the folder holding the other folders.
Linux Geek
To do that you most show hidden files look for the file named icon and delete it. After that remove the folder from the Dock and put it back on the Dock.
ruthe
I've got the same issue as Joe Pucci. At first, I kept getting the icon with the white background, but I fixed that by having it display as a folder (like this http://screencast.com/t/tE7tlc42) but still use the "fan" effect of stacks. but my drawers are showing as empty. In the example above, is the icon actually a picture of a filled drawer or is that supposed to happen dynamically? Thanks for a great site btw - I'm a newbie to macs so your site is a great resource.
Amanda
I got it I think looks great but I can't see the papers inside the box any idea how to change this?
Dude
click on the folder, all the items in the stack should load behind it
swisherdgr8
You don't put the icon on the folder OF the stack, you put it in a folder in the folder that's the stack. In the example, he used Coda Drawer. put dashes before and after the name so it willl appear on top. Put that folder with the icon inside the folder of the stack. click and drag the stack into the dock so it becomes and actual stack. Then, make sure it is stack view instead of folder view. Then the folder with the icon will appear on top, and everything will look like it's in the bin
Dave
I have followed the directions, I think. My drawer icon looks great, but it does not look like a drawer. It looks like a picture of a drawer on the top half of a piece of paper. White background?
Blaise
how do you have the drawer image apear on top of all the file icons? i gave it the exact title you gave it, and it didn't work and i can't figure it out.... is there anything else i have to do?
Blaise
how do you have the drawer image apear on top of all the file icons? i gave it the exact title you gave it, and it didn't work and i can't figure it out.... is there anything else i have to do?
Blaise
how do you have the drawer image apear on top of all the file icons? i gave it the exact title you gave it, and it didn't work and i can't figure it out.... is there anything else i have to do?
Simon
hey can you send me the completed drawers? i can't seem to do them right. THanks:)
orz.marvin
Nice!!!
Damon
I really want to do it, but I can't connect to the web where you download the drawers.
Brea
I have this working on my personal computer-- yet for some reason on my work computer, no matter which icon I download, as a png or icns, the icon shows with a white background--
I am on a PowerMac G5-- if for whatever reason powerpc makes a difference, but I believe I used it on my G5 at home before I got my mac pro.
I even sent the particular icon files to my MacBook pro, and they worked there-- but not here.. Odd.. (and yes-- they have alpha and transparency)
temho
is not easy
ondrashek
Hi Anyone know where can I find icon of downloads which appears in Toolbar (green one with white arrow)? I would like to make a drawer for downloads with this icon... thx for help =oD
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