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21: System Preferences - Dashboard & Exposé

If you are like most computer users, you don’t have only one window open at any given time. Instead you have multiple windows open. It can be a major pain trying to find the one window that you need since all of the windows are layered upon one another. This is where Exposé comes in.

Exposé solves the problem of screen clutter by making it easy to see all of your open windows at once, all open windows in a specific application, or even just the desktop.

To configure Exposé


There are two different ways to access the different options. The first is Active Screen Corners. To set a corner to do a specific Exposé function, select it from the drop down menu by the corner. You'll notice that there is an up arrow next to all the options. This indicates that the Shift key is being held down. If you do not have anything next to the options, you do not have to hit any key but the one you have chosen.

The other option is pressing a specific key or key combination. To set a specific function, simply push the key(s) you would like to use. You can see more options when the Shift, CTRL, or Command keys are pressed. In this image, the Command and Shift keys are being held down.

The different views


All open windows will show you all windows that are currently open. This is handy when switching between multiple programs.


Application windows will show you all windows that are currently open in the active program. This is helpful when you have multiple windows in one program open.


Desktop will just push everything to the sides and show you the desktop for easy access. Notice the gray edges of the desktop, this indicates that your windows have been pushed aside so you can see the desktop. Note: The application will not switch to the Finder unless you click on the desktop.


Dashboard will bring all of your widgets to the front. The screen appears in front of all your windows. You can add widgets to your dashboard by visiting the Apple website, http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/, and downloading them.

Read more articles about System Preferences

System Preferences
System Preferences - Software Update
System Preferences - Appearance
System Preferences - CDs & DVDs
System Preferences - Date & Time
System Preferences - Desktop & Screen Saver
System Preferences - Displays
System Preferences - Energy Saver
System Preferences - International
System Preferences - Keyboard & Mouse
System Preferences - Dock
System Preferences - Speech
System Preferences - Sound
System Preferences - Startup Disk
System Preferences - Sharing

This article was last edited on Jun-12-2006 7:32 pm
This article can be referenced by its article number: 21 or by any of the following keywords: expose, dashboard.