10.5: Create a custom Dock for the Guest account

Feb 14, '08 07:30:03AM

Contributed by: Király

If you're like me, you like Leopard's new guest account and how it is flushed of all data between logins. How nice it is for house guests to be able to log in while visiting, and have no remnants of their activity remain when they leave.

But that darn Dock. What guests are going to want to use Address Book or Garage Band? And for my guests who have never used a Mac before (most of them), where's the Web browser? What does Safari do? How nice it would be for the Guest account's Dock to have only Firefox in it. But if I change the Guest Dock, the Leopard default Dock comes back the next login. Here's a way to set up the Guest account's Dock however you like, and have it automatically come up at each login -- and this doesn't involve hacking the System folder like some other hints floating around out there.

Here's how to do it:

  1. Download and install the Leopard Server Admin Tools from Apple.
  2. Make sure the guest account is logged out.
  3. Open Workgroup Manager, which you just installed as part of step #1.
  4. Select the guest account and click Preferences in the tool bar.
  5. Click Dock on the right side. Click Manage Always at the top of the window. Add and remove the Dock items you want in your customized Dock.
  6. Uncheck Merge With User's Dock" at the bottom of the window.
  7. Quit Workgroup Manager.
Done! A custom Dock for the Guest account that comes up with each new login.

[robg adds: I haven't tested this one.]

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