Desktop Icons no longer fit in Tiger

I have about 50 items on my desktop and when I shifted to Tiger they no longer fit without overlapping at the beginning. I changed the view options to put the labels on the right and that helped for a while, but only allowed three columns. Now this doesn't work. Now I have the icon size minimized and the files are tightly grouped in two columns widely separated. What can I do to better and more clearly use the space and fit everything?

Hey! I just unexpectedly found the solution for this problem after I played around with the icons on my desktop.
I simply change the text size to anything other than 10, 13 or 16pt and the spacing between columns just close up to one another!
I do not know why but I found this as a bug. Someone better tell Apple about this.
If this doesn't work, please reply!
Good luck.

Similar Messages

Adobe Reader PDF Desktop Icons No Longer Thumbnail Images

Hi...
I am running Windows 7 Home Premium x 64 - and thanks to a fix for this I found somewhere a while ago, it's been working fine for the longest time. In the past week, I see that my Adobe Reader desktop icons are no longer thumbnail images - they are back to the old standard Reader icons. I've tried uninstalling / reinstalling Adobe Reader - unapplying / reapplying this x64 thumbnails fix - and combinations of the two. Nothing has worked thus far.
Does anyone have a suggestion / fix / etc. on how I can get my PDF icons back to the thumbnail images - NOT the standard gray .PDF reader icons?
Thanks so much!
Andy

Hi Jnicholas330,
I need your XFA form file to investigate the issue. I sent a separate mail to you.
Thank you.

Icons no longer fit desktop

Why do icons and shortcuts suddenly no longer stay in their old locations on my desktop. It is as if the keep out zone suddenly got bigger. How do I get them back where I want them?

Finder>View> Show View Options

Desktop size no longer fits screen size after restart

Since restarting my iMac today, I cannot get to a full image of everything on the desktop anymore at the resolution setting I used before (second highest, 1344x840); and when I choose full resolution (1680x1050) the desktop only covers 2/3 of the screen. In the closest setting to filling the 20" screen (1344x840) the desktop is slightly larger than the screen (bottom or top cutoff)
The letter and picture image also seems slightly more blurry in 1388x840 than before, probably because everything is blown up a bit beyond what it should be.
Regardless of what resolution I choose, every time I move the mouse in one direction, the desktop moves slightly in the opposite direction, stopping only when it reaches the border of the screen (like when you use really magnified settings.)
I did not change a thing since shutdown last night, nor have I ever experienced anything like this before.
Any remedies? (I did disk utilities/repair but nothing changed)
Thanks,
PP
null

Hi PP: Try this: System Preferences > Universal Access, and turn Zoom off. Or, hold the Control key and scroll downwards.
Hope this helps
Stedman

Desktop icons are no longer trusted, custom home directory [solved]

I have my home directory on a raid, and have noticed that after switching it the desktop icons no longer work properly (icons are missing/default blank as well and labeled <filename>.desktop. Even if I create a new launcher on the desktop it still won't work.
For example, I click chromium.desktop, and I get the follow message:
Untrusted application launcher
The application launcher "chromium.desktop" has not been marked as trusted. If you do not know the source of this file, launching it may be unsafe.
Marking it as safe does nothing, launching anyway will work. However, the annoyance of no icons and a <filename>.desktop is rather annoying. If I switch back to my original /home/user$ it works fine again. I even tried binding the raid location to /home/user$ and it still has a problem unless I go back to the original home directory path.
Any thoughts?
Last edited by jskier (2010-06-02 00:48:49)

Removing "user" from the fstab line of the raid fixed this.

I deleted my desktop icon - now I can't save things to the desktop!

After a complete meltdown of my computer (and thank GOD I backed everything up!!) ... I'm transferring everything back to my iMac from an external drive ... BUT, I deleted the little "desktop" icon from my finder folder - or more like, I dragged a desktop folder from the external hard drive and "replaced" the desktop icon.
Now I can't save anything to the desktop. When I drag something to the desktop it says "The item cannot be moved because the 'desktop' cannot be modified."
Is there a way to get this back???

No ...
Under "Ownership & Permission" is says "You can - Read & Write", so that's not the issue.
What I did was:
When you open the finder window, there are several icons that appear in the window - usually the Desktop icon, the Home icon, the Applications icon, the Documents icon, the Movies icon, the Music icon and the Pictures icon.
What I did was, I dragged a "Desktop FOLDER" over from an external hard drive and it asked me if I wanted to replace the Desktop. I said "Yes" and now I no longer have the DESKTOP ICON on the left side of the finder window and I can no longer drag and drop things to the desktop.
The desktop icon no longer exists, so I can't access my desktop VIA the finder window.
Does this make sense?

I can no longer access Yahoo from desktop icon; attempt to report this to Firefox fails. Help.

I have always been able to access Yahoo from my desktop icon. In the last few days, this has not worked 90% of the time (once in a while I can get through). I need to access it through my Verizon account. Why is this suddenly happening - for years I have been able to use the Yahoo icon.
And when I tried to send a help message to Firefox it refused to go through - the green line would go over and over and never finish.

What do you mean when you say you "can no longer access these sites?" Does that mean you can't connect to those sites in your web browser, or that they aren't showing up in iWeb?
If the latter, note that your iWeb data is all entirely stored in a hidden file. In the Finder, choose Go -> Go To Folder and paste the following path into the window that opens:
~/Library/Application Support/iWeb
In that folder, you will find a single file, called Domain. That's got all the data for all your iWeb sites. If that file is missing, or if it has become corrupt, you will need to restore it from an earlier backup.
As for replacing iWeb, either Sandvox or RapidWeaver should work. Which works best will depend on your own tastes. Note that neither is capable of fully importing iWeb sites, as those sites will have a lot of content that is copyrighted by Apple. For more information about transitioning to one of these products, see:
http://rapidweaverfaq.org/site/migrating_from_iWeb.html
http://www.karelia.com/sandvox/help/z/Transitioning_from_iWeb.html

Time Capsule Icon No Longer Appears on Desktop

Two weeks ago I had AT&T U-verse cable, internet, & phone installed. As part of that installation they installed an AT&T router/wireless combination. The ethernet cable that was previously connected to Time Capsule is now connected to the AT&T device. There is no longer any ethernet connection to Time Capsule. The Time Capsule icon still appeared on my desktop and I manually performed back-ups from my Windows applications to Time Capsule. Time Capsule went from displaying a constant green light to displaying a flashing yellow light. That worked for several days. After about a week of that there appeared on my screen a 'wizard' of some sort recognizing the status of Time Capsule. It said this 'wizard' would eliminate the flashing yellow light. I followed the steps through the 'wizard' and at one point the flashing yellow light turned to constant green. There were a few more steps in the 'wizard' and when it was finished the flashing yellow light reappeared. The next time I tried saving files from Windows I could not connect to my w: drive, and the Time Capsule icon no longer appeared on my Mac desktop. I went into Airport Utilities and there is a box checked that should display the icon properly. Any ideas what's happening? How do I restore Time Capsule so I can back-up my files. Thank you.

Welcome to the discussions!
I don't have 10.6.1 yet, but have noticed this happens very occasionally on my MacBook Pro, but not on my iMac. Simply resetting Time Machine on my laptop has done the trick.
Open System Preferences
Click on Time Machine
Click your Time Capsule to highlight it
Click Use for Backups
If that does not do it then delete the "com.apple.TimeMachine.plist" file. It's located as follows:
Macintosh HD > Library > Preferences
Restart your computer
Then perform the same steps as above to setup Time Machine again.
The resets will not affect any of your backups.

Display no longer fits correctly on the desktop

I don't know what I did, but the display no longer fits correctly on the desktop.
I have to scroll from side to side or up and down to see the entire desktop.
I went to system preferances Displays and the closest I can get to fitting the desktop to the screen is 1024X680 , but even my desktop pic won't fit on the screen .

Thank You Charlie, I found this first and it worked:System Preferences>Universal Access, Seeing tab and turn off Zoom.
But your information is also helpful.
Thanks for helping

Deleted Desktop Icon - Alias icon no longer works!

Hello everybody I am a recent switcher and I can't express how much I love the switch. The widgets, Expose, ease of iPhoto, Garageband, iTunes, et cetera.
But until recently, just this morning, I deleted an Icon on my desktop (the World of Warcraft) and I the alias Icon, shortcut, in my dock no longer runs.
So after traveling the Macintosh HD/Users/Shared/Blizzard - I cannot find anything that resembles a .exe or boot up file!
I am new to the Mac and I know it isnt that unfamiliar to a PC, Windows. But I have got to ask ... What on earth do I DO?! Where do I go!?
Do I have to reinstall the game? There has got to be an easier way to fix this.
Thanks!
Mitzki

Mitzki,
Congratulations upon making the switch!
If your dock icon no longer works, it most likely means that you deleted the application itself, not just an icon. [In that case you will need to dispose of the dock icon by simply pulling it out of the dock. Insert a new icon after reinstalling the application.] This means that you originally installed the WOW application to your desktop rather than to your Applications folder. In the Applications folder it would be less likely to be accidentally deleted (as you may have apparently done). It is ok, in the future, to install applications to your desktop - you can then simply move them into the Applications folder, just that simple.
However, you can further safeguard from repeating this mistake - after you now install WOW into your Applications folder (or move it after installing to your desktop), select (highlight) the new WOW application icon in that Applications folder, open the "File" pull-down to "Get Info," expand the "General" section so that you can see the "Locked" box, and check off that "Locked" box, which will prevent any further movement of the WOW application without the system's first requesting your password. As a general principle, any time your system's password is requested, you should be able to understand why before you enter it. Your system password is not a nuisance, but your system's lifeguard.
Enjoy!
[Oh, gosh, I'm sooo slow! I'll let it stand in case there's something that might be useful to someone]
Message was edited by: myhighway

My desktop icons are no longer "app related" - no colour!

Hi there. I used a little app called Font Nuke because my Word docs were taking some time to open up and this seems to be font-related. As a result of this, upon the restart, my desktop icons which represent pdf, jpeg, .doc and .xls are all black & white, and the text of all my desktop icons and folders is now looking fuzzy as well as strangely placed. Hmmm. I closed all apps and removed the com.apple.finer.plist doc from my preferences, rebooted, and the problem continues. I see that zooming my desktop icons from 28 (preferred size) to 76 solves the issue, but nobody wants a desktop icon on a laptop screen to be so large. What the......? is going on???? Grateful for any advice on this one! Thanks.

Delete Font Nuke and run this one-line command in the Terminal app, OPTION-click the Finder's Dock icon, and select Relaunch.
*/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/LaunchS ervices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -r -domain local -domain system -domain user*

"Mini Barcode" follows pointer and overlays desktop icons after 10.4.10 upg

I have a G5 (about 4 years old). I recently upgraded to 10.4.10. After the upgrade I noticed a Mini BarCode like feature following the pointer around. In addition all desktop icons and the menu area were overlayed with this Mini BarCode type feature.It does not seem to affect the operation of the computer, but is extreemely annoying.
Any ideas?
Thanks,
JTPass
G5 Mac OS X (10.4.10)

Hey Jim,
Yes a new card fixed my problem but....
After reading your post I searched around on the various forums and noticed that someone else had a similar problem when they upgraded to Tiger from Panther. (not an update they upgraded to Tiger from Panther) Here's the link to the message. You should read this....
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=4555151&#4555151
After I read it dawned on me that when I upgraded to Tiger this past November I started having this problem with the video card. Could be I may have jumped the gun on replacing it. The guy that posted the above thread also posted a link to the driver that he installed that got his monitor working properly again.
http://ati.amd.com/support/drivers/mac/atidisplays4-5-7.html
If you only updated to version 10.4.10 from an earlier version of Tiger then I would go with replacing the card. I replaced mine with a 9800XT w/ 256MB I picked up from OWC for around $230.
http://otherworldcomputing.com/
I really wanted to upgrade to the X800 XT mac addition but it looks like ATI is no longer manufacturing this particular card. Don't believe the wait times you see on some websites regarding shipping dates for that card. I spent many hours searching for this card and finally when I talked to ATI I found out they are no longer manufacturing the X 800XT mac addition. too bad.
If you need to replace your card here's something else you may want to check into.
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=2894453&#2894453
good luck,
dave
G5 dual 2.0, 3.0 GB ram, 2x250 internal Mac OS X (10.4.8) ATI 9800 Pro. FCP 5.0.4 DVDSP 4.0.3 Motion 2.0.1 Soundtrack pro 1.0.3 QT 7.0.4

Where are iPhoto library, iTunes, Safari bookmarks, desktop icons...?

When installing Leopard, my main internal "Macintosh HD" (where all my programs are loaded) didnt show as an option, so I installed on my secondary HD. Leopard runs OK from here, BUT, I cant find my iPhoto library, iTunes, Safari bookmarks, desktop icons, and the programs in the dock no longer show. Any advice?

Sadly, this is still an issue.
I guess plan A would be to find all the settings I am now missing and point the various programs to them. Though not sure how to do either of those things.
If this is difficult, then plan B is to "boot back into ...Tiger drive" and reload Leopard in drive bay 1 as originally intended. Again, not sure how to do that - and why it didnt work the first time.
Pls let me know if you think this is the right plan, and if so, what would the steps required look like.

On wake up the wrong desktop appears with no desktop icons.

Upon waking up computer, a different desktop appears with no icons. I have to shut it down hard and reboot. Doestn't happen all the time but most times it does. Any suggestions on to resolve.

Hi, I had a similar "intermittent" problem. Desktop picture was correct, but no desktop icons after waking up. I found by powering off/on the monitor, seemed to refresh the display and show the icons. However the problem no longer exists, but I haven't changed any settings. I know this probably doesn't help that much, but it may prevent you having to shut down and reboot. Alan.

[Solved] wy i can place xfce4 desktop icons in a "grid" only?

hello archers!
im in love with xfce4 DE, but the annoying thing is that i can place the desktop icons only in a invisible "grid" of tiles.
i changed the display manager to gdm, but it didn't help. i tryed changing the WM, but didn't not find out how to do that.
Yes, i dont understand how DE's working internal, cause there are so many parts, as DM, WM, session-manager, and so on, which confuses me.
So how i can place my icons individually on the desktop?
Thanks in advance!!
Last edited by xfce-tux (2011-09-12 21:13:34)

Another way to adjust the desktop grid size settings and more.
Source: http://git.xfce.org/xfce/xfdesktop/tree/README
HIDDEN CUSTOMISATIONS
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you're using the icon view, and would like to change how the text looks,
you have three things you can change: the opacity (transparency) of the
rounded text background, the color of the rounded text background, and the
color of the text itself.
You'd want to add something like this to your ~/.gtkrc-2.0 file:
style "xfdesktop-icon-view" {
XfdesktopIconView::label-alpha = 75
XfdesktopIconView::selected-label-alpha = 100
XfdesktopIconVIew::ellipsize-icon-labels = 1
XfdesktopIconView::shadow-x-offset = 1
XfdesktopIconView::shadow-y-offset = 1
XfdesktopIconView::shadow-color = "#ff0000"
XfdesktopIconView::selected-shadow-x-offset = 2
XfdesktopIconView::selected-shadow-y-offset = 2
XfdesktopIconView::selected-shadow-color = "#00ff00"
XfdesktopIconVIew::cell-spacing = 6
XfdesktopIconView::cell-padding = 6
XfdesktopIconView::cell-text-width-proportion = 2.5
base[NORMAL] = "#00ff00"
base[SELECTED] = "#5050ff"
base[ACTIVE] = "#0000ff"
fg[NORMAL] = "#ff0000"
fg[SELECTED] = "#ff0000"
fg[ACTIVE] = "#ff0000"
widget_class "*XfdesktopIconView*" style "xfdesktop-icon-view"
The first three entries set the opacity of the rounded text background
(allowed values are from 0 (totally transparent) to 255 (totally opaque),
and whether or not unselected icons get their labels ellipsized
(truncated) to fit on one line. (The 'selected-' version controls the
opacity of icons that have been selected with the mouse.)
The second six entries can be used to enable a text shadow to be painted
with the icon labels. The offsets are in pixels. Setting them to 0 (the
defaults) will disable the shadows entirely. Again, the 'selected-'
versions apply to icons that have been selected with the mouse.
The third four entries set spacing and sizing for individual icons on
the grid. The 'cell-spacing' property specifies the spacing between each
'cell' in the grid of icons. The 'cell-padding' property sets extra
padding placed around each icon+text. The units for these two are in
pixels. The 'cell-text-width-proportion' property specifies the maximum
width of the text label underneat the icon, as a multiplier of the icon
width (so for 30px icons, '2.5' would leave a 75px wide area underneath
for the text).
The fourth three entries set the color of the rounded text background.
* NORMAL sets the color for the regular, unselected state.
* SELECTED sets the color for when the icon is selected, and the desktop has
keyboard/mouse focus.
* ACTIVE sets the color for when the icon is selected, but the desktop does
not have keyboard/mouse focus.
The final three entries set the color of the label text. See above for the
differences between NORMAL, SELECTED, and ACTIVE.

Desktop Icons no longer fit in Tiger

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for