Filed under: Tips and tricks
Force Snow Leopard's Dictionary.app to reuse definition window
The Dictionary.app in Snow Leopard has been driving me nuts. If you use LaunchBar or Spotlight (or probably any other method of sending a word to Dictionary.app), it opens a new window. And then another. And then another. This might be handy if the window bar was updated to show the word that you had looked up, but it doesn't, meaning that the extra windows are just clutter.
Before 10.6, Dictionary.app reused the same window for each new definition. If you wanted to go back to a previous word, you could simply use the "Back" button. As we've heard countless times, Snow Leopard has been about subtle refinements, but this was a step backwards to me. I was surprised that there isn't a Preference setting to reuse the same window or open a new one.
In a fit of frustration yesterday, I posted a bounty on Twitter and asked Rob Griffiths to see if he knew of an answer. Rob is the proprietor of MacOSXHints.com which I consider essential reading for Mac users (I have even submitted a few tips of my own over the years). I knew if anyone could find an answer, it was Rob.
Well, it turns out they don't call him Rob "The Hints Guru" Griffiths for nothing. Not long after my cry for help, Rob figured out how to Force Dictionary to show definitions in one window. As you might expect, it involves entering a command in Terminal.app while Dictionary.app is not running:
defaults write com.apple.Dictionary ProhibitNewWindowForRequest -bool TRUE
Voilà! Dictionary will now revert back to the 10.5 and earlier behavior of using one window for all definitions.
Rob must truly be credited for discovering this gem, because (as of this writing) Google comes up 100% empty when looking for 'ProhibitNewWindowForRequest'. When was the last time you tried to Google something and came up completely empty? That doesn't happen often anymore!
Turns out that Rob used another tip from his site to find hidden preferences (something else which has gotten more difficult in Snow Leopard). It's the circle of life... or at least, tips.
Thanks again, Rob. Now where do you want me to send your Ferrari? (You'll have to read Rob's post to get that joke. It also explains how to undo this change if you decide you want to revert to the standard 10.6 behavior.)
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
emil said 9:44AM on 9-30-2009
If the word is on a webpage or text you are reading, hover over and press control-command-D to get the definition without launching Dictionary.app
Reply
Adnium said 10:20AM on 9-30-2009
This doesn't work properly in 10.6, which is driving me insane.
It only works in a few applications now (Pages and TextEdit).
Reply
Nirgal said 10:49AM on 9-30-2009
Googling "Thornton Vaseltarp" used to return only a single hit, which was a page entirely in Kanji - almost as good as a zero result. Now there are dozens of hits. Pretty sad, really.
Reply
michael s said 11:12AM on 9-30-2009
I love you TUAW, and this is why—always got your ear to the streets (digitally-speaking)!
Reply
Martin said 11:42AM on 9-30-2009
Thanks for this. Nice work, TJ.
Reply
Justin said 11:49AM on 9-30-2009
I did a clean install to 10.6 and have seen no change in how the dictionary operates. Everything opens in one window. BTW emil that is a favorite short cut for me as well.
Reply
Andy Atkinson said 12:11PM on 9-30-2009
I plopped this command into Terminal but I still see my issue. I'm not sure if it is what you're describing, it is close. Basically previous Dictionary.app windows stick around when I type a new definition and it is irritating. Here is a short screencast showing what this looks like (every time I look up a word). Maybe someone at Apple will see this. http://screenr.com/k7H
Reply
Kevin Sutherland said 12:36PM on 9-30-2009
Thanks so much for this tip, that SL behavior was bothering me as well. Not only was it using separate windows for each definition, but if I Quit Dictionary from the Apple Menu or used Command + Q, the next time I searched on a definition it would load windows in the background with all the previous definitions I had looked up.
Left to its own devices, starting Dictionary would cause infinite windows to open with all my definition history. However, I found that using Command + W would close the windows, and if it was the last window, quit the application. Searching on a definition would only open that definition, and not any previous ones.
Now Dictionary is behaving more rational after running the Terminal command Rob Griffiths found. Thanks again!
Reply
Jonathan said 12:44PM on 9-30-2009
Out of curiosity, where does the defaults values get stored? Is it some sort of environment variable that is non-volatile?
It almost seems like a registry hack done in Windows, create a new DWORD Value AlwaysShowBlah and value 1....
But where in disk are these values actually stored? Can they be edited in a GUI for a list of all of these, similar to the about:config in Firefox?
Reply
Shunnabunich said 2:35PM on 9-30-2009
Don't worry, we Mac zealots wouldn't make fun of the Windows registry so often if we were afflicted with a similar train-wreck. :)
Applications (and OS X itself) store their settings in plain-text .plist files, usually in either /Library/Preferences or ~/Library/Preferences (where "~" means your home folder). You can edit them directly using any text editor, such as TextEdit, or the Property List Editor which comes with OS X's developer tools (which basically shows the plist as a tree structure with everything initially folded up).
Some apps have hidden preferences that aren't even mentioned in their factory-fresh .plist, but which they'll obey if they're written there. The "defaults" command in Terminal is simply a way to edit preferences (and add hidden ones that aren't yet laid out in the file itself) without foraging through the above-mentioned folders.
Schell said 12:49PM on 9-30-2009
Brilliant. I was just complaining about this (to myself) the other day. Thank you.
Reply
Andy Atkinson said 1:04PM on 9-30-2009
Awesome, Rob's video was informative! http://www.robservatory.com/movies/dictchange2.mov I was not also explicitly closing (command-w) all the existing windows, so I thought it wasn't working, but in fact it was. Happy camper now. :)
Reply
ecobore said 1:46PM on 9-30-2009
Funny, it is working the way it always worked for me. No difference at all!
Reply
Paul Sorensen said 5:04PM on 10-01-2009
I upgraded to snow leopard and the dictionary app is not opening a new window as you traverse through the dictionary (clicking on words).
ROb said 2:41PM on 9-30-2009
Just use ctlr-cmd-D and hover over a work. Much better.
Reply
Boyd said 8:23PM on 9-30-2009
Sweet.
Reply
Troy Murray said 10:58PM on 9-30-2009
Thank you so much, this was driving me crazy!
Now, can you find a way to adjust the frequency in which Address Book syncs my contacts with Google?
Reply
Calvin said 2:07PM on 10-01-2009
I think this may be a bug in Dictionary for Snow Leopard. If you have multiple windows open and quit the app with Cmd+Q it re-opens with all previous windows. However if you Cmd+W all open windows which 'quits' Dictionary once the last window is closed, then when opened again you only have the 1 new window.
Seems like a bug? If not then it should at least be a preference setting to re-open with previous open windows.
Reply
Dima said 7:17AM on 10-04-2009
Thank you!
Reply
Gnarlodious said 9:53AM on 11-03-2009
THANK YOU!
This was buggin' me no end.
Reply