TinkerTool

TinkerTool --- http://www.bresink.com/osx/TinkerTool.html---is an free application that gives you access to additional preference settings Apple has built into Mac OS X. This allows to activate hidden features in the operating system and in some of the applications delivered with the system.

The tool makes sure that preference changes can only affect the current user. You don't need administrative privileges to use the tool. With this design, it is no problem to use TinkerTool in professional networks where users have restricted permissions. The program will never change any component of the operating system, so the integrity of your system is not put at risk, and there will be no negative effect on system updates.

All preference settings changed by TinkerTool can be reset to Apple's defaults, or to the state that existed before using the tool. No dangerous background processes are used for TinkerTool's operation.

Because TinkerTool only gives you access to features already built into Mac OS X, its feature set varies greatly between different operating system versions. Please refer to the following table:

Setting	10.1	10.2	10.3	10.4
Prevent the Finder from using the Desktop background	x		x	x
Prevent the Finder from displaying the "empty trash" warning		x
Disable the animation effect when opening files in the Finder	x	x	x	x
Enable the Finder to show hidden and system files	x	x	x	x
Enable the "Quit" menu item of the Finder	x	x	x	x
Disable sound effects of the Finder				x
Disable display of the full user and group list in ownership settings of the Finder				x
Disable the animation effect when opening information panels or Desktop icons		x	x	x
Disable the animation effect when selecting information categories		x	x	x
Enable dark labels for the display of Desktop icons		x
Disable the display of arrows in the Finder's column view	x	x	x	x
Disable Finder icons in column view	x
Disable the preview column in the Finder's column view	x
Set the maximum number of label lines in the Finder's icon view	x	x	x	x
Disable the creation of hidden Finder .DS_Store files on network volumes				x
Use transparent Dock icons to show hidden applications	x	x	x	x
Display the Dock with a shadow	x	x	x	x
Put the Dock to the top screen position	x	x	x	x
Place the Dock at the beginning or end of any screen border	x	x	x	x
Set the Dock minimization effect to a "suck in" animation	x	x	x	x
Place both scroll arrow buttons of any scroll bar at both ends of the bar	x	x	x	x
Disable the default application for playing audio disks	x
Disable the default application for playing video disks	x
Control how the Finder scales the Desktop background image	x
Set the file format for the creation of Desktop screenshots	x			x
Enable extended options for conversion of disk images		x	x	x
Automatically skip checksum verification when opening disk images			x	x
Control how Exposé hides windows to show the Desktop			x
Accelerate the animation of opening and closing sheets			x	x
Enable the diagnostic menu of the Address Book		x	x	x
Automatically activate Terminal windows by pointing at them with the mouse cursor			x	x
Control how Mac OS X handles application crashes			x	x
Enable the Mac OS X Menu Extra to open optical disk drives			x	x
Enable analysis and inspector windows for the DVD Player		x
Enable the diagnostic menu of Safari		x	x	x
Disable Dashboard				x
Enable the developer mode of Dashboard				x
Force an updated import of Internet Explorer® favorites into Safari		x	x	x
Force an updated import of Mozilla-based bookmarks into Safari		x
Set the number of visible entries in the main history menu of Safari			x	x
Set the maximum number of entries stored in the history list of Safari			x	x
Set the minimum font size limit for Safari		x
Reduce the delay time of Safari before page content is displayed			x	x
Disable native PDF display support in Safari				x
Set nine categories of default fonts used in Cocoa applications	x	x	x	x
Set the transparency for Terminal windows	x
Add keyboard shortcuts for menu items of native Mac OS X applications	x	x	x
Enable or disable restrictions for the permission settings of newly created files or folders			x	x
Switch off font-smoothing in general	x
Set font-smoothing limits for all Quartz applications			x
Set font-smoothing limits for Cocoa applications	x
Set font-smoothing limits for legacy applications using QuickDraw	x	x	x
Set font-smoothing limits for all types of applications