Mac OS X Tiger/System Preferences/Dock
When the > Dock menu is missing an option you want, you'll have to turn to the Dock pane of System Preferences. This pane gives you more fine-grained control over the Dock.
- Dock Size - This slider adjusts the size of the dock. You can also do this by dragging the thin line that separates the Dock into left and right sides.
- Magnification - When Magnification is on, the icons in your Dock “bulge” as you move your cursor over them. You'll either go gaga for this effect or find it distracting. The slider next door controls just how large the icons on the Dock will become when you move your cursor over them.
- Position on screen - This controls where the Dock is located on the screen. Most people prefer to have the Dock on the bottom, but on some small widescreen laptops, vertical space is more valuable than horizontal, and having the Dock running down the side of the screen saves a lot of space.
- Minimize using - The Genie Effect, the default setting, makes the window minimize like a genie going into a bottle. The Scale Effect is more modest, and goes faster.
- Animate opening applications - By default, application icons in the Dock bounce up and down while opening. Turning this option off makes the small triangle under the icon pulse instead.
- Automatically hide and show the Dock - When this option is turned on, the Dock will disappear completely unless you let your cursor rest right next to the edge of your screen where your Dock is. The Dock will then temporarily pop out so you can work with it. When you move the cursor away, it will disappear again.