Industry guru Dave Taylor answers free tech support questions about a wide variety of business and technical topics, including blogging, Google AdSense, MySpace, Sony PSP, Apple iPod, Mp3 players, management, Linux, SEO, Mac OS X, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Microsoft Windows.

SupportSpace: Immediate Live Tech Support. Free Assessment + $10 coupon!!

How do I change file icons and the default application on my Mac?

How do I change the program associated with specific file types and the icons associated with specific file types? For example, I want to change all my PDF icons...

Dave's Answer:

There are two parts to this question, so let's tackle the harder one first. To actually change the icon associated with a specific file type you need to munge around with the innards of Mac OS X. This, as you might expect, isn't recommended for most users, so I would instead strongly advise you to check out some of the great shareware applications that have arisen to help you accomplish just this task.

A quick visit to VersionTracker reveals quite a few choices. Of these, the 800 pound gorilla is Candy Bar which lets you do tons of cool things with your Mac interface, if you're into that kind of thing! A geekier and more sophisticated alternative is Iconographer X, and Duality GT.

To change a single icon on a single file is easy, however, which is why there are so many icon libraries on the Web. To do that, well, let's answer your other question, then come back to this question, okay?

To change the application associated with a specific file type, click on an icon of the specific file type, then choose File --> Get Info. You'll see the following:

Notice the "Open with" section - which here shows that Preview is my PDF application of choice - and that there's a pop-up menu of possible applications that are registered with the OS as being able to handle this particular file type (PDF). If I click on that menu item, I see:

If I choose a different application, say Adobe Reader 6.0, then the "Change All..." button suddenly becomes active and the small print immediately above it becomes far more interesting. It says: "Use this application to open all documents like this."

The OS reminds me that this is a significant change by asking:

Mac Finder: Get Info: Change All? Continue

I'm ready to make the change, so I click "Continue" and suddenly all the icons of all the PDF files on my system change to reflect that they're now tied to Adobe Reader, not Preview.

That's all there is to it.

Oh! And if you want to change just one icon on your Mac system, open up two Get Info windows, one that shows the information on a specific file that has the icon you want to copy, and the other that has the destination file that has the boring old icon. Now click on the new icon, choose Edit --> Copy, then click on the old icon (in the other Get Info window) and choose Edit --> Paste. Close both Get Info windows and, poof! Same old file, cool new icon.

Hope that's helpful!

Help others find this article at Del.icio.us, Digg, Netscape, Reddit, and Simpy.

Categorized: Mac OS X Help (Article 4196)
Tagged:
Previous: What's a blogroll?
Next: Does Googlebot visit more often because of my blog?

Subscribe!

Never miss another useful Q&A article again! Subscribe to AskDaveTaylor with Google Reader.

Comments

Hi. I've been adjusting all the major icons on Mac OS X 10.4. All the icons have changed to my satisfaction, except the Applications icon in the sidebar. Previously, this problem did not exsit, however after a constantly changing the Applications icon for sidebar, it would revert back to the default after logging in and out. Do you know what is wrong? My Apps icon in the Finder displays the customized icon, but the Finder icon is not staying with the new image. I know there's a problem since everything worked before. Thanks a lot.

Posted by: TN at October 9, 2005 7:49 AM

Thanks for the info ! Greatly helps !

Posted by: v at November 16, 2005 3:17 AM

i take an itunes file with a /mp3 extension and edit it with quicktime pro
if i save it with a .mp3 extension after editing it with qtime pro the icon is no longer itunes but quicktime and if i send a file q/ a quicktime icon and .mp3 extension my phone will not recgonize
however a .mp3 with and itunes icon is recognized by my phon...
somebody help me

Posted by: Colin at January 28, 2006 10:18 AM

Colin, it sounds to me like the edit that Quicktime Pro is actually saving it in a different format but you're putting an .mp3 suffix on it anyway. Not sure, I haven't tried editing audio files with QT Pro, I'm afraid. Perhaps someone else can comment?

Posted by: Dave Taylor at January 28, 2006 6:29 PM

Dave:

I have used file --> get info to change the default application for pdf files to Acrobat Reader from Preview. However, any new pdf's downloaded from the net are associated with Preview. About once a week, I grab one of the Preview pdf's and reassociate all with Acrobat.

How do I get OS X to know I want all present and future pdf's to open with Adobe Reader?

Posted by: Albert Kinderman at February 13, 2006 7:24 PM

Hi, I would like to change the album title on mp3 files on my hard drive, how can this be achieved. I have accessed the file properties in "get info" however my mac wont allow me to make changes.

Posted by: Martin at February 20, 2006 4:38 AM

Hi Dave. I found Al's question to mirror my own dilemma. Any suggestions on how to do this?

Thanks

Andrea

Dave:

How do I get OS X to know I want all present and future pdf's to open with Adobe Reader?

Posted by: Andrea at March 15, 2006 1:57 PM

I'm also running into the same problem posted by Al on February 13, 2006. Is there a way to get all new PDFs associated with Acrobat?
Kim

Posted by: Kim at July 20, 2007 9:26 PM

You changed my life. I hated having acrobat open all my PDFs, very helpful tip. Keep up the good work.

Posted by: EvY at January 19, 2008 11:08 AM

HI.do you know how to change the psp Home page.

ps.its as soon as you turn the psp on.

Posted by: nick at March 16, 2008 3:09 PM

Thank you, this was driving me crazy (opening Excel files in the statistical package JMP, opening each worksheet individually, crashing JMP, and generally being a big pain.) I appreciate it!

Posted by: Kim at April 14, 2008 2:00 PM

Hi, i am new to the world of mac and would like to change the default search engine from google.com to google.com.au...

Posted by: Terry Brady at April 24, 2008 4:15 PM

I have a lot to say, but ...

I have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but most of all I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a chai!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!