Filed under: Hacks, Odds and ends, TUAW Tips
TUAW Tips: Get a better view with Quick Look
Quick Look is such an awesome feature of Mac OS X 10.5 and 10.6, making it really fun and easy to view files and folders from anywhere on your Mac. But what happens when you have a folder with multiple items and want to get a better idea of what's inside? Well, you could always just open the folder in Finder, but there's a cool modification you can make to get an even quicker view.
You can get this working on your Mac in a few simple steps:
[via Mac OS X Hints]
You can get this working on your Mac in a few simple steps:
- Quit/Relaunch Finder using the Force Quit menu
- Open Terminal
- Paste (or type) the following command:
defaults write com.apple.Finder QLEnableXRayFolders 1 - Relaunch Finder
[via Mac OS X Hints]
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
alex_dlc said 7:38AM on 10-02-2009
nice tip, saw it some days ago, but i tried it on leopard 10.5.8 and it works except it shows the old folder icon. it dosnt show the default leopard folder. i dont know if i explained that well, but heres a pic.
http://img185.imageshack.us/img185/8826/picture7zf.png
Reply
Norman said 7:44AM on 10-02-2009
There is an error. The terminal command should read
defaults write com.apple.finder QLEnableXRayFolders -boolean YES
(com.apple.finder as opposed to com.apple.Finder)
Reply
Johnny said 7:52AM on 10-02-2009
This worked for me. Thanks to you and John B. for the tip.
Tom said 7:46AM on 10-02-2009
That's brilliant. It makes you wonder why it wasn't there by default?
Reply
wonderdiva said 7:51AM on 10-02-2009
Awesome tips guys; well worth sharing... thanks! :o)
Reply
alex_dlc said 8:24AM on 10-02-2009
as i sayd, it was also in leopard, but for snow leopard they changed it, meaning they actually worked on it by correcting the folder icon. so, i dont know why they would do that, if they werent goign to activate it for the users. this is one of those easter eggs that are fun to find, but make you wonder why they chose to leave it hidden.
Reply
TrendGiveAfuck said 8:30AM on 10-02-2009
So apple sexy!
Reply
Brandon said 9:24AM on 10-02-2009
how do you undo this? it's great and stuff, but i just don't really need it. so how do you undo it?
Reply
James Burton said 9:38AM on 10-02-2009
Simply follow the same steps but change the value to NO at the end, like so:
defaults write com.apple.finder QLEnableXRayFolders -boolean NO
NoteComputer.Com said 9:28AM on 10-02-2009
Thanks for post.
Reply
lolism said 9:36AM on 10-02-2009
this is awesome. thanks guys.
Reply
mkumemr said 10:08AM on 10-02-2009
Works like charm as written in the initial post. great thing - i wonder why Apple did this not by default?
Reply
Sabon said 12:28PM on 10-02-2009
I was hoping that when you double-clicked on a particular file that file would open. Oh well, still cool looking.
Reply
Blake said 10:38AM on 10-02-2009
Looks great and can be very useful. Why is this not on by default?
Reply
jrflesch said 10:49AM on 10-02-2009
I cannot for the life of me seem to get this to work. I am running SL.
Any thoughts?
Reply
jrflesch said 11:04AM on 10-02-2009
JK, i guess i was expecting it to show up with a "right click" and then display the contents.... not so much. Still handy though.
Stephen said 10:51AM on 10-02-2009
Excellent tip, thank you!
Reply
Carlos said 10:52AM on 10-02-2009
Cool tip. Thanks!
Reply
.P@BsLpKn said 10:55AM on 10-02-2009
awesome! thats for sharing this kinda stuff. why would apple not use this by default? looks neat to me just to leave it like an easter egg.
Reply
mvopsu said 11:47AM on 10-02-2009
Cool tip but there's no way to "Force Quit' Finder in Snow Leopard. Any suggestions.
Reply