WindowStacker is a free system extension that, incredibly enough, stacks windows in the Finder. Why on Earth would you want to do this? Well, if you have more than a few folders on your hard drive or--even worse--have more than a few hard drives, you know how easily your desktop can become a hideous, cluttered mess. Folder windows are especially nasty, what with them sprawling all over the desktop, mocking your every attempt at efficient use of your files.
Well, suffer no more at the hands of evil scattered windows! Tame them, harness them, use them to do your bidding. With WindowStacker as your window-stacking pal, you can do it!
I N S T A L L A T I O N
1. Drag WindowStacker into the System Folder and restart your Mac.
2. Rinse.
3. Repeat.
U S I N G W I N D O W S T A C K E R
It’s simple. Really. Just remember this: The Control key is your magic window-stacking key. Hold it down when a Finder window is opened, and the window will be stacked upon its “parent” window automagically. To stack an already-open window, hold down the Control key as you click its zoom box.
If you don’t like the way WindowStacker stacks your windows, you can train it to stack in any manner that you prefer. Have it your way. Here’s how. Arrange a few windows in the manner you prefer and then click in the front-most window’s zoom box while holding down the Control and Shift keys. WindowStacker will learn your stacking method and flash the window to let you know how smart it is.
That’s it. You’re now a window-stacking warrior.
T I P S
Window stacking encourages the use of efficient folder arrangements. Here’s the arrangement that I use. It’s simple and makes Finder navigation a snap. Start by anchoring your hard drive’s root folder: Close all open windows in the Finder by Option-clicking on any window’s close box. Double-click on your hard drive’s icon to open its window. Size the window so that it is about one-third the size of your monitor and position it about one inch away from the top and left edges of your monitor.
Now that you have your anchor window, you can neatly stack its sub-windows by holding down the Control key whenever you open one of its folders. After a while you won’t need to hold Control because most of your windows will be stacked already. (They remember where they are stacked.) When you encounter an occasional rogue window, just Control-click its zoom box to show it who’s boss. Once you’ve stacked all your windows, you can “drill down” into folders, building a neat hierarchy of stacked windows. To backpedal up the hierarchy, just use the Finder shortcut Command-UpArrow, again leaving a clean trail of stacked windows.
You can similarly anchor your other hard drives and build neat hierarchies of folder windows that dance majestically across your desktop. It’s your Mac, do what you want. Enjoyify!
W O R D S O F E N W E A S E L M E N T
WindowStacker is free for non-commercial use, but I retail all rights to it. That is, you can use it for free, but you cannot profit from it. If you want to use it commercially, let me know, and we’ll work something out.
[Disclaimer of warranty] By using this software you understand and agree that it is provided “as is” without warranty of any kind. You, solely and entirely, take the entire risk involved with using this software. The author makes no warranties, expressed or implied, for the software, including but not limited to implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose.
In no event shall the author be liable for any damages, be they consequential, incidental, or special, arising out of the use or inability to use the software. This stuff varies from state to state, so your exact rights may be different. Go figure.
Contrived, yet highly-illustrative, legal quiz:
In the unlikely event that after installing WindowStacker your Macintosh computer turns into a big, tasty pretzel, you are entitled to:
(a) nothing
(b) major bucks
(c) another big, tasty pretzel
The correct answer is (a).
R E A C H I N G T H E A U T H O R
I don’t like errors in my code. (They give me the willies.) If you can find a bug, please let me know so that I can remove it. You can reach me at my Internet address, given at then end of this text. Not only do I appreciate bug reports, but I also enjoy comments, suggestions, praise, ridicule, and the like. Again, mail it to me.
