[jdb8167]

It's actually easy to get a folder icon that opens with a single click on the dock. Use an alias. You can't directly drag an alias to the dock. You need to create the alias of the desired folder first. I have a folder in my Documents folder called Stacks. I put stacks there (duh) but I've also started putting aliases to folders there. Once you've got the alias you can just drag it to the Dock. Now a single click opens the folder which can then be customized with your preferred view options. This gets back 100% of the Dock functionality that I personally care about. Unfortunately it doesn't enable Tiger's hierarchical menus.

[alansky]

How is it that a feature like Stacks, which obviously hasn't been very well thought out at this stage, manages to get nods of approval all the way through the development cycle when legions of real-world users give it a big "thumbs down" the moment it's released? It certainly appears in a few instances that the Leopard development team can't see the forest for the trees.

[jdb8167]

My current favorite use of Stacks is for frequently used Automator tasks. I have about 8 that I use moderately frequently which seems to be a good fit for the Stacks functionality. I just wish that I could have them sorted by most recently used.

[Dan Frakes]

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It's actually easy to get a folder icon that opens with a single click on the dock. Use an alias.

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I mentioned this workaround in the article. Unfortunately, using an alias means you lose all of the functionality of Stacks, even the good stuff.

[jdb8167]

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How is it that a feature like Stacks, which obviously hasn't been very well thought out at this stage, manages to get nods of approval all the way through the development cycle when legions of real-world users give it a big "thumbs down" the moment it's released?

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I think Stacks are a major improvement to the Dock. Most people who are happy with a feature won't remark on it but people who are unhappy usually will complain. Don't take the current noise on Stacks as an indication that everyone is unhappy with the feature.
I had about 6 docked folders in Tiger. I never used the menu functionality. I find the Finder and the columns view to be much more efficient to navigate to where I want to go. I also keep a fairly flat directory structure which might also explain why I don't find the docked folder hierarchical menu very useful.
On the other hand I'm finding all sorts of uses for Stacks. They are a great enhancement of the Dock in my opinion. The only trouble is the dumb display of the overlapped icons which is pretty useless. I've been keeping my stacks sorted by Date Added so that they will display with a consistent icon. That is pretty inflexible.

[jdb8167]

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I mentioned this workaround in the article. Unfortunately, using an alias means you lose all of the functionality of Stacks,

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Sorry, I missed that.
I really don't want to mix stacks with folders anyway so I don't find that to be a problem. I just want always available shortcuts to open a few folders in the Finder.

[Chris_Snazell]

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How is it that a feature like Stacks, which obviously hasn't been very well thought out at this stage, manages to get nods of approval all the way through the development cycle when legions of real-world users give it a big "thumbs down" the moment it's released?

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I think Stacks are a major improvement to the Dock. Most people who are happy with a feature won't remark on it but people who are unhappy usually will complain. Don't take the current noise on Stacks as an indication that everyone is unhappy with the feature.

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I raised a bug on Stacks torpedoing folder hierarchies in the Dock back in July & it was immediately closed as a duplicate. Apple knew there was a problem. However, since most people don't seem to be aware of this feature, let alone use it, the pushback on Stacks may well have been muted.
It does blow my workflow out the water though, so moving to Leopard is on the back-burner until a suitable work around emerges.

[Macdev8]

I agree. What we love about Stacks is that it does exactly as one would expect a stack to be or do. Whether it is a stack of books, newspapers, flyers, records, mail, bills, pancakes or wood, stacks aren't meant to be uniform, logically ordered or neatly placed.
A stack doesn't stay stationary. It is not intended to be tied in a bundle. It is not like the Library of Congress. It is more like company is coming and you throw everything under the rug to be sorted, filed or trashed after everybody leaves. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Great for when you not quite sure whether to keep or delete a document, file, application, download, photos, etc., as well as for Downloads and grouping like applications.
As a developer and consultant in (massive) data base management software, Stacks addresses a need for a heck of a lot of computer users who just throw everything on the desktop and only clean it up when there is no space left. Much like how teenagers' keep their rooms.
And interesting that it was Jobs that brought us the hierarchical filing system which for the most part was used with limited success. And like routine backing up, Stacks and Time Machine offers a new programming paradigm to help us do things better. Give it a chance.

[eatapc]

I really dislike the flat, ugly, blue-grey look of folders in Leopard, but I'll get over it. What I can't get over is Stacks. I can no longer put folders in the dock and drill down hierarchically through the folders within. That was how I got around in Tiger, and Leopard REALLY slows me down.
I've always liked Drag Thing; now I find it indispensable. The Dock is dumb in Leopard, but Drag Thing still allows me to move the cursor over a tab, then over a folder, then click and hold to navigate down through the subfolders -- essentially one click (and hold) to find and open any file on the hard drive.

[woode]

Dan, this is exactly what I was thinking would be the best solution. Judging from many of the other posts, it seems that yours is a very good solution. I've been meaning to send this in as feedback to Apple, and did so today. Hopefully we'll see this very soon in a .x release.
Hurley42, you're not serious are you? Making crappy products on purpose is precisely the way to fail in a capitalist economy. Maybe you missed the part about how Apple got where it is -- continuing to make insanely great products that people actually enjoy using.

[tommy2tone]

I totally agree too. I hate the current Stacks 'feature'. If I was going to get used to it, it would've happened by now. I am not and don't see any innovation or lack of though behind it. Like you said in the article, a simple option to show a Stack in the old hierarchal manner would be the best news ever! Please Apple, please!
Don't alienate your long time users by taking away one of the most useful features in the Mac OS dating back to OS 6 [with the apple menu items] just to make room for a 'flashier' marketing gimmick. It's more than just looks, the Stacks has given me a reason already to downgrade back to Tiger already. But I want to use Leopard, but just can't as it is now. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif

[Hurley42]

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Hurley42, you're not serious are you? Making crappy products on purpose is precisely the way to fail in a capitalist economy. Maybe you missed the part about how Apple got where it is -- continuing to make insanely great products that people actually enjoy using.

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I am being a little tongue-in-cheek. Having used Apple computers since 1985 (am I dating myself?) I feel a little disenchanted with their overall quality lately. I recommend Apple to anyone who will listen, but I think it is healthy to criticize any great company. I lately have been following up my recommendations with a "but watch out for" this one (or 2 or 3) flaw(s).
Although, the "but" is so much louder when talking Windows with others. Overall I admit I love Apple, but I am not blind to the company's faults as many seem to be (winking at anyone who waits in a very long line to give money to a company). Stacks work for me - room for improvement, of course. But without room for improvement what will they do with the dock in 10.6? Basically I suppose I am picking on anyone that finds faults in Stacks. They work as advertised. No room to complain - Apple has not lied about what Stacks do. I knew what Stacks did and it was a MAJOR reason I upgraded to 10.5 the first day (without waiting in line).
This article did teach me about a previous available feature which is now missing - I would have complained about that if it was a feature I previously used.
Have I gotten off topic of the article? Okay, I will shut up if no one else responds to my rants /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[HandyMac]

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Apple has a consistent track record of pleasing its customers and turning them into zealots. I wouldn't count Apple as the evil empire just yet. With enough negative reaction, which I'm sure Apple is seeing, Steve and Co. will do the right thing and bring back the functionality we most miss.

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Since the introduction of OS X, Apple has had a "consistent record" of trying to force radically different ways of doing things on Mac users, and backing off only when forced to do so. I remember when the first screenshot of OS X appeared in Macworld: it had no Apple menu at all (just a blue apple icon in the middle of the menu bar), and the Finder's only view option was column view. In other words, it was NeXTStep with an Apple pasted on it. Only a huge outcry persuaded Apple to (obviously reluctantly) restore a sort-of Apple menu (non-configurable, unlike the classic Apple menu since System 7) and allow icon and list views in the Finder. And that was only the beginning; Stacks et al. are but the current examples of this arrogant, we-know-what's-best-for-you attitude. Coming from a guy who may be a genius in certain respects, but who's twelve years younger than me, I find this behavior consistently annoying, and, frankly, childish.
When Steve left Apple in 1986, the Mac was in its infancy; when he returned ten years later, the platform was well established, with tens of millions of users who (like me) had based their lives and built their work in the Macintosh environment. Steve, of course, did not share our experience, nor, apparently, our love of the Macintosh we knew (even though it was based on the Macintosh he'd created in 1983); ever since his return he's been doing his best to force us, the Macintosh community, to do everything his way, with no consideration of the decade (and billions of dollars) we'd invested in the Macintosh. That Steve left involuntarily in 1986 is unfortunate, but making us all "pay" for how he was treated by the Apple of 1986 seems to me less than worthy of a person now well into middle age.

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I've been a Mac user since 1989 and what keeps me on the platform is that Apple does a far better job of pleasing its customers with great interfaces and ease of use.

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True, but the fact that Apple is clearly the best of the lot is a pretty sad commentary on the computer industry as a whole.

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How is it that a feature like Stacks, which obviously hasn't been very well thought out at this stage, manages to get nods of approval all the way through the development cycle when legions of real-world users give it a big "thumbs down" the moment it's released?

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It's long been clear that most programmers, especially in large corporations, live in a caffeine-fueled world of their own, which bears little relation to the world of the everyday users who must put their bright ideas to actual work. As I wrote in another thread, I get the feeling it's mostly a kind of party at Apple, with a bunch of very bright but not very deep teenagers (that's redundant, isn't it) doing their best to one-up each other's flashy tricks. Actual workability comes a distant second.
The only real "excuse" for this stuff is what another poster wrote: that Apple needs to make 10.5 enough "different" from 10.4 to justify charging money for it -- and it has to look different, aside from any improvements under the hood. So there is overwhelming pressure to just change it, even if the change is a devolution, so marketing can make a fuss about how "new" it is.
And so it's left to us, the faithful users, to compensate with third-party tweaks (e.g. FruitMenu, which my OS X has never been without since I switched from 9.1 to 10.2) while we meekly hope that Apple will deign at least to allow us the choice of whether we want to use Stacks et al.

[glide]

Quick question: How many of these criticisms would still make sense if you would accept that a "stack" is a stack and not a folder?
In real life stacks do not behave like folders, so why are we stuck on trying to shoehorn the new "stacks" behavior into that of a folder?
It seems quite possible to me that Apple is managing a pardigm shift that includes the idea that the Finder rather than the Dock is to be used for "finding" and organizing files in folders. Although it would mean some adjustment or re-training for most us, this is not necessarily a bad thing.
However, even if we do accept that stacks are not folders (and are not intended to replace functionality that we've come to expect from folders, whether on the right side of the dock or elsewhere), I would agree that there are some features of the present functionality that need to be improved. No doubt, some of those improvements are already on the way.