new to mac - how to move downloaded applications off the desktop

cbbjr...drag the icon for Firefox to the applications folder and drop it...it will be copied there...you can then drag the HD icon to the trash...and drag the Firefox icon to the dock..

The application has to be copied to the HD

dave

Don't feel bad. This is confusing to everyone. The little white drive-like icon, is the disk image, which is the container for the program. You need to drag the program out of it and into your applications folder to install it. Then you can eject the empty "box" and you'll still have the program. If you eject the disk image with the program still in it, you throw out the program, too.

The icon you see on the Desktop, does it sort of look like a white disk drive icon with the Firefox logo on it? The giveaway is you said "I tried to remove the icon that is sitting on the desktop (by dragging it to the trash which had an eject icon when I started to drag it)...". The trash only turns into an eject symbol when ejecting hard disks, CDs, DVDs & other removable media. The white icon appears there when you double click a disk image(.dmg or .img).

I have an old installer of Firefox I saved. Here's what I did: Double-clicked the Firefox x.x.dmg. The icon I described above appeared on the Desktop. Double-clicked that. Got a window with EULA, asking if I accept, bla, bla, bla. After all that, a window opened showing Firefox icon, with an arrow pointing to Applications folder. Dragged & dropped the icon from the window to Applications menu. You can then put this icon in the dock (it's only an alias that gets put in the dock, not the actual application).

You are dragging the uncompressed disk image into the Applications folder. I tried this, too. Try double-clicking that Desktop icon & see what happens.