im a big fan of quicksilver. it’s the app i use every day of every week – all-day-long. this post isn’t about how i’m a quicksilver fanboy or anything, it’s just about how i use it to de-clutter my dock. if you are a mac user and dont know what quicksilver does check these tutorials out.

so basically i use quicksilver as a launcher throughout the day. since there is no real need for the dock then, i have removed 90% of what i used to keep on it. a year ago you would have seen a dock with easily 30-40+ icons. today i only have 8 [not counting the finder or trash icons], i will most likely scale that number down as well. Here is what my dock looks like right now.

so, here is the list of what’s there..

1. finder icon

2. firefox beta 3

3. quicksilver

4. trash-it

5. skitch [only showing because its on for the screen capture

6. dockables

7. file cabinet

8. downloads directory

9. junk drawer aka temp folder

10. servers [rdc shortcuts to the servers i work with]

11. trash

i am actually going to be looking for a way to remove the finder icon from the dock [if there is one]. for me it seems pretty useless. the finder is always on, i dont need to see the icon.

next i have firefox [beta 3], i leave this on the dock since its always open anyway. plus quicksilver crashes every once and awhile for me and, it always seems to happen when i need to launch a website. lately, i have been trying to use quicksilver to launch my browser and sites. im using beta 3 since i have had horrible luck with the last two versions of firefox.

quicksilver is always open, so this icon is always showing.

trash-it, a great little utility for the times the trash wont empty, or when i want to secure delete something. this icon is relatively new. i keep it in my dock to remind me to use it as needed. eventually i’ll ditch the icon and open with quicksilver when needed.

skitch is a great screen capture app [in beta at the moment] its only open so i can take the capture of the dock image. otherwise its closed till i need it.

dockables, these are easy to use shortcuts to things like restart, set screensaver, lock screen etc… most of these commands can be launched from quicksilver. the reason i keep it here is for the lock screen icon. for some reason i cant use quicksilver for that command anymore.

filing cabinet [stack], this is where all my files are stored. everything has its own folder and is sorter pretty well [for me at least] since everything has a folder it is easy for me to navigate through the structure with quicksilver. i leave is there in case quicksilver crashes.

downloads [stack], this is where i sort all my downloaded files. i also leave it there incase quicksilver crashes.

servers [stack], this stack contains a number of servers i connect to on a daily basis via rdc. i leave it there since its easiest for me to launch these from the dock.

lastly we have the trash icon. that is always there =)

hopefully, you see there is no need for the overstuffed dock if you use a launcher like quicksilver.