Mac OS: Menu Differences Between Simple Finder and Regular Finder

Starting with Mac OS 8.0, Apple has offered a Finder Preference item called Simple Finder. When this option is selected, the menu item choices are reduced to a minimal, simplified set of choices that still enable most basic operations.

This reduction in menu commands can be best shown with the following screen shots. Note that the menus shown here are for Mac OS 9 and will be slightly different from Mac OS 8. Figure 1 shows the standard Finder menus.

Figure 1: Standard Finder menus.

Figure 2 shows the menus available when the Simple Finder option is selected.

Figure 2 Simple Finder menus.

Menu Items Not Available in Simple Finder

Here is a summary listing of the menu items not available in Simple Finder:

File Menu

• Print
• Move To Trash
• Get Info
• Label
• Make Alias
• Add To Favorites
• Put Away
• Encrypt (Mac OS 9)
• Show Original
• Page Setup
• Print Window

Edit Menu

• Undo
• Clear
• Select All
• Show Clipboard

View Menu

• as Window
• as Pop-up Window
• Clean Up
• Arrange
• Reset Column Positions
• View Options

Special Menu

• Erase Disk
• Sleep
• Restart

Note that no command key equivalents are supported using Simple Finder. For example, Command-N does not create a new folder; you must select the New Folder menu item for this action.

Also note that since Pop-up Window is removed from the View menu, Pop-up Windows are not available in Simple Finder. If you have Pop-up windows established and you turn on the Simple Finder preference, all Pop-up windows are redrawn as normal windows on the desktop. Turning off Simple Finder does not restore them to being Pop-up windows, because the window state has been changed to normal.

Simple Finder can be enabled or disabled by choosing Preferences from the Edit menu and clicking to place or remove the check mark next to Simple Finder.