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Apply volume icons the Unix way System
Well, some of us might be aware of copying and pasting of icons onto volumes. I used to do that, but for whatever reason, I would often just get the plain old "ICNS document" icon instead. So if you try to change the icon of a volume and it simply fails every time, there's a trick.

So what's the trick?

The way OS X stores custom icons is by having an actual icns file on the volume. That icon is a dotfile, meaning that its name starts with a dot, which traditionally means it should be invisible. You can copy icns files into target folders and volumes under the names they are expected to have simply by using the Terminal. Open up a Terminal window and do the following:
cp /path/to/icon.icns /Volumes/volume_name/.VolumeIcon.icns
So if you have a stubborn icon that just doesn't want to be applied, there you have it, a solution.

[robg adds: Note that if your volume name includes a space, you'll either have to place the second part of the above command in quotes, or escape the spaces with backslashes.]
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Apply volume icons the Unix way
Authored by: lar3ry on Sep 22, '06 05:58:04AM

For what it's worth, that was the step I used originally. I found a volume that already had a customized icon and looked for the .icns file and got the file name. This turned out to be problematical, and I don't know exactly why, but sometimes, OS X "forgets" the icon (like when I transfer the volume between one of my iBooks and my Mac Mini) and the icon gets reset to the default volume icon.

The main reason that I customize a volume icon is to make the volume and its use visually stand out. To do this, I use a photographic image of the actual volume. For the system drives, that would be an image of my Mac Mini or my iBook (find images at the Apple Store web site!). For my removable drives, I use the image of the drive itself, whether it be my LaCie external drive, various SecureDigital cards, even the various iPods that my family uses. A Google Image Search usually finds a suitable picture at one of the many web sites offering the drive for sale, but LaCie actually puts the icons on the CD-ROM they include with the drive (great idea, LaCie!).

One problem: the images on the web sites are usually JPEG and are not optimized for the size of icons that OS X is using. I used to create the .icns file by hand, but I've since found a great utility called "img2icns" that will easily convert such an image to a .icns file or to a directory (folder) with the image as its icon. Using that utility, I create the directory folder, and then first copy that folder to the volume (as a backup), and then use Get Info to copy/paste the folder icon to the volume icon.

I've had to use the backup icon a couple of times, usually when reading it on a new Mac system for the first time. It's quick and it's easy, and I feel safe having the backup folder icon on the media itself.



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