TUAW Tip: Take control of your sidebar

Today's tip is all about your Finder sidebar. I've altered mine a bit from the default setup to better accommodate the way I work. The first thing I do is to remove the Movies, Music and Pictures folders. They're really only a single click away from my home folder, plus I use iTunes to manage my music and videos, and iPhoto handles my photos. So I rarely need to go poking around those folders manually. To remove a folder or other item from your sidebar, simply click and drag it out of the list, then let go and it's gone.

Next, I've brought in my current projects. To add an item to the sidebar, simply click and drag it into place. A thin, blue line appears between existing items. Drop it in and you're all set.The four folders you see below my "Documents" folder contain the files that are currently receiving all of my attention. Now they're only a click away, no matter where I've navigated to in the Finder.

The "Trash" is actually a super simple Apple Script that reads:

on open
tell the application "Finder"
move the selection to the trash
end tell
end open

I saved my script as an application, moved it to my "Documents" folder, gave it a sweet icon from The Iconfactory and dragged it into my sidebar. Anything dropped onto it will be moved to the trash. Finally, my Quickdrop folder is where I store all the junk that I accumulate during the day (I like a clean desktop). At the end of the day, I decide what I want to keep from in there, move those items to their proper locations and send the rest to the trash.
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