The Finder

Flipping through your open applications (for example by pressing Command and Tab) you will notice that there is an application called the “Finder” which is ALWAYS running. No matter what you do, it’s there. So what is the Finder and what exactly does it do on your Mac?

The Finder is the very core of Mac OS X. It is the be all and end all, literally, of your system, as it automatically starts up at the beginning of every boot, and switches off at every shutdown - it can never be deactivated (only re-launched) while your computer is running. As the name suggests, the Finder keeps track of all files, folders and applications on your Mac. It is the very reason why the Mac is so good at multi-threading (doing multiple tasks simultaneously) and why the Mac is superior, by a long chalk, at finding and then listing the results of search results you may make when looking for something on your Mac. 

If something goes wrong with your Finder, you could be in trouble. Symptoms of Finder corruption include icons being displayed as generic document icons, when before they displayed, for example, a preview of a file or logo of a software.

As is the case with all software, the Finder has a preference file, called com.apple.finder.plist and located in your user library “preferences” folder. Sometimes trashing this can fix problems, but please do not touch these things unless you know what you are doing. Normally the only fix for drastic finder problems is a complete reinstallation, since certain problems would be hard to trace as the finder is just so vast.

Some third party developers such as Cocoatech or Xfile offer alternatives to the finder which could be interesting. It is also worth checking out your finder preferences which includes way to personalise your Mac - an option close to the hearts of most Mac users ;)

A little bit of history - it is interesting to note that the very first finder could only handle one application at a time and it was only with the advent of OS 4.x that multi-threading became synonymous with the Mac!