The dock is your shortcut bin where you can get to the programs you use most often. It also shows icons of all the programs you have running. Here are a few of the features of the dock:

1. When you run your mouse over the dock icons, it will display the name of the program in a bubble above the icon.
2. Icons with a blue dot under them are programs that are currently running. Unless they are permanent shortcuts, the icons will disappear when you quit the programs. You can quickly open or move to an open program by clicking its icon in the dock. If the program is running, it will switch to that program as the active one. If it’s not running, clicking on the dock icon will start a program.
3. The divider at the right side of the dock (your appearance may vary depending on how you have it set up) separates the program icons from the special icons. In my dock, I have the default shortcut to the documents folder and downloads folder. You can change the size of your dock by clicking on the divider and holding as you drag it up and down.
4. When you minimize programs, they will appear in the right side of your dock. Clicking the icon will bring them back to full screen.
5. The trash is where you throw any files you want to delete or where you drag applications to uninstall them. If the trash looks like it has paper in it, there are files, folders or applications that it’s holding there until you confirm that you want them removed from your machine permanently. You can open the trash from this icon and pull things out if you decide you still need them.

When you right click on any of the dock icons, a popup menu will appear. Some programs have functions you can perform from the menu like checking mail or showing a contact list. But all icons have some features in common.

1. Add to or Remove from Dock – You can either keep icons in the dock all the time, or they will only appear in the dock when you have the program running. Click this to change whether or not the icon is a permanent resident of the dock.
2. Open at Login – When this option is selected, a check mark will appear next to it, and when you boot your system, this program will start up. This is handy for the things you use all the time like Mail, browser, chat programs, etc. Just remember that the more programs you load at start, the longer start will take so use this sparingly.
3. Show in Finder – When you click this option on any item throughout your Mac, it will pop open a Finder window and show you the location of the application or file.
4. Hide or Show – Clicking this option will either hide the program from your screen or show it. It can be helpful if you need to keep something running but you aren’t using it at the moment.
5. Quit – This shortcut will close a program from the dock. When a program isn’t responding, this option will change to Force Quit, which will end the program without it finishing the process it’s running. Only use Force Quit in the rare moments when your Mac gets terminally confused. Force quit is the equivalent of Control-Alt-Delete and terminating a program.

There are two ways to add an icon to the dock. When you have an application running, you can right click its dock icon, then click on Keep in Dock on the menu. When the program is closed, the icon shortcut will stay in the dock so that you can launch the application from it.

Open the Finder window, find the icon of the application you want to add to the dock and place it between existing icons. The icons will separate and the icon will appear in the dock.

Your default dock will be filled with icons you may or may not use. Don’t be afraid to remove them.

Apple fills your dock with icons for their products. There are some that you’ll just never use. Garage Band is one of those for me. And others you really won’t use that often. I like to keep my dock lean and mean so that the icons stay relatively large and they’re easy to flip through. So I only have the applications that I use every day.

Just like almost everything else on the Mac, there are a couple ways to remove icons from the dock. You can just click and hold down on the image, then drag it away from the dock. It will vanish in a poof of cartoon smoke.

Right click on the icon and a menu will appear. Choose Remove from Dock and it will disappear.