The dock or also known as ‘taskbar’ is a menu of tools that is usually located at the bottom or on the sides of the home screen of the MacOS computer, this Mac feature is built into your system for several years, there are several applications such as the AppStore, trash, Finder, among others.
However, the dock is a customizable tool that includes the option to hide it, in this tutorial you will see how to do it.
What types of commands are used to hide the dock?
There are many combinations of keyboard shortcuts to quickly perform certain tasks. On Mac there is a combination to automatically disable the dock and thus hide it or if you prefer to create your own keyboard shortcut you can create quick keyboard functions to perform this action, here you will see each of them.
Keys and their spatial functions on the keyboard
Each keyboard shortcut leads to a different place on the computer, to hide the taskbar or ‘dock’ of the Mac using these shortcuts just press the ‘Option’, ‘Cmd’ (Command) and ‘D’ keys at the same time.
To activate the dock again press these same keys and it will be displayed, additionally every time you move the mouse cursor to the area where the taskbar should be it will appear, since the dock icons are not removed.
Configuring and creating keyboard shortcuts
As mentioned before, Mac allows you to create your custom keyboard shortcuts with the built-in keyboard shortcut function, this applies to any action you want, such as opening a certain application and so on. You can do this by following the instructions below:
- In the toolbar of your Mac computer go to the ‘System Preferences’ program which is represented with the gear icon.
- In the new tab that appears you will see a panel on the left side of it, click on the ‘Keyboard’ option.
- Then, select the ‘Quick Functions’ section where you will press the ‘Apps Quick Functions’ option in the new menu.
- Now, you will have to tap on the Plus (+) icon and click on the application that corresponds to the dock to create the keyboard quick function of the dock.
- A new box will appear where you will have to provide shortcut information such as menu title (exact path of the shortcut), application and indicate the key combination for the shortcut.
- It is important that this combination does not coincide with other shortcuts already existing on the computer. When you finish completing this small form click on ‘Add’ and you are done.
Are there alternatives to customize the dock on a MacOS?
Mac has built-in functions and alternatives that allow you to customize the dock or taskbar to your liking, including actions such as adding applications, resizing the dock, changing the icons, among other functions. Here are some ways to change and configure the Mac dock.
uBar, change the style of the dock in MacOS
If you want to change and customize the look of the dock completely, it is best to use the uBar tool to do so, with Install the application and you can make all the changes you want, you can do it from the Mac AppStore page.
uBar is mainly used to change the MacOS taskbar for the Windows operating system, in case you feel more comfortable with the latter. Once you download the application perform the following steps:
- On the Mac home screen go to the menu button, you will notice that this button has the uBar logo.
- When you do this, a small panel of alternatives will be displayed where you will have to click on the ‘uBar Lite’ option.
- As a result, more options will be displayed, you must click on the word ‘Preference’. In the new tab you will see you will be able to change the appearance and behavior of the dock.
- In the ‘Themes’ block you can change the background color, foreground and opacity. In ‘Areas’ you can decide whether or not to show the menu and the clock.
- In the ‘Menu’ block you can add and decide which folders are shown in the main menu. In the ‘Applications’ section you will see a list with all the applications included and in the last block called ‘Advanced’ you can activate more dock configurations.
- Configurable aspects in the navigation bar
- If you enter the Dock section from the ‘System Preferences’ that Mac has you can make a variety of customizable changes. Among them you can configure aspects such as the size of the dock, position on the screen (left, bottom, right), the enlargement when you place the cursor over any of the dock tools, the way in which the windows are minimized, show open applications, among others.
How can I move the icons in the dock?
If you want to change the order of the application icons in the dock or tool menu, just hold down the ‘Command’ key (Cmd) and at the same time select the desired icon and move it to the place you prefer in the dock.
How to configure the system preferences to customize the dock?
There is a way to configure the dock from the ‘System Preferences’ tool, to do so proceed with the following instructions:
- Enter the System Preferences application located in the dock represented by the gear icon.
- You can also access the program from the Apple apple icon located in the upper left corner and then clicking on ‘System Preferences’.
- In the new tab click on the ‘Dock’ option and there you will see all the options and tools to customize the dock.
- Adding effects to the dock
- To add effects and customize the dock you should go to the following path: System Preferences > Dock. Once in the dock tab you will be able to add effects such as enlarging each icon, size and position of the dock, minimize windows, open applications, among others.