It‘s really just a collection of icons...
Just below the Title Bar on every FINDER window is the TOOLBAR - a row of navigation and function buttons. Simply point and click once to activate any one of the TOOLBAR buttons.
By default, the following buttons are included on the TOOLBAR:
- BACK ⇒ This button takes you to the last folder you viewed in this window.
- VIEW ⇒ With the next group of VIEW buttons, you can select the way your window displays — by ICON, LIST, or COLUMN.
- COMPUTER ⇒ This button will show your hard drive(s), CDs, Zips, and even mounted servers — basically, anything connected to your computer.
- HOME ⇒ This button takes you to your own, private home folder and all its contents. If you use this folder to store all of your documents and files, then you can easily navigate to (or through) them, using the HOME button.
- FAVORITES ⇒ This is all the folders or files on your hard drive and network that you go to frequently, and have designated as a Favorite using the FILE menu, ADD TO FAVORITES command, or in OPEN and SAVE dialog boxes by clicking on the ADD FAVORITES button.
- APPLICATIONS ⇒ This button opens the APPLICATIONS folder which resides on your hard drive.
A nice feature of the TOOLBAR is that you can place just about anything you want on it. You can also make it take up less space, and even make it go away if you do not like it.
Adding Items To & Removing Items From the Toolbar
By default, Apple has a set of optional Toolbar icons that you can place on your Toolbar. To view these icons, use the VIEW menu, and select CUSTOMIZE TOOLBAR. Alternatively, in a Finder window, hold down the SHIFT key and click once on the TOOLBAR DISCLOSURE button (the small white one on the top right).
Apple provides a whole gallery of icons to add to your Toolbar. To add one of the items, point, click and hold down the mouse button and drag it to the desired location on the Toolbar.
To remove an item, click and hold down the mouse button, and drag it off the Toolbar.
Also notice at the bottom of the CUSTOMIZE TOOLBAR window is a drop down box for SHOW. By selecting one of the menu items, you change the view of the Toolbar to include ICON & TEXT, ICON ONLY, or TEXT ONLY.
Here is an image of the Toolbar displayed as text only:
So How Do I Put Something Else On the Toolbar?
To add something to the Toolbar that is not one of the icons provided by Apple, first open a Finder window and navigate to that folder or document. For a folder, you can either drag the folder from the view area of the window or use the Proxy Icon in the middle of the Title bar. To add a document, simply drag the document to the Toolbar.
So, what happens when you get so many Toolbar items that a window cannot display all of them? Never fear, Apple has provided a drop down list, accessible on the right hand side of the Toolbar and is designated with a >> symbol:
Rearranging Toolbar Icons
To rearrange you Toolbar icons, you can drag them horizontally to the desired location when you have the CUSTOMIZE TOOLBAR window... open (VIEW menu).
Or, to move a Toolbar icon in ANY window, hold down the COMMAND key and drag the icon horizontally to the desired location.
Written by Teresa Hagan
Here are links to more OS X tutorials: