ms868iMAC

Q: just finally did my Yosemite update. omg who chose the folder color? how to change ALLL!!! thanks

please help change color...this is hard on eye

Posted on Jun 11, 2015 4:21 PM

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Q: just finally did my Yosemite update. omg who chose the folder color? how to change ALLL!!! thanks

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  • Helpful answers

  • by Kappy,

    Kappy Kappy Jun 11, 2015 4:33 PM in response to ms868iMAC
    Level 10 (270,283 points)
    Desktops
    Jun 11, 2015 4:33 PM in response to ms868iMAC

    They are all the same colors as before. So you need to be clear about what you mean.

  • by ms868iMAC,

    ms868iMAC ms868iMAC Jun 11, 2015 4:37 PM in response to Kappy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 11, 2015 4:37 PM in response to Kappy

    my folder on desktop were yellow..have now turned a shade of bright blue.

    i had Mavericks Os..been away for while from this imac, back home and just ran the yosemite update today.

    I've been searching for answer but to no avail.

    I want to change the default folder color, so when adding new folder it wont be blue

    thanks

  • by Kappy,Helpful

    Kappy Kappy Jun 11, 2015 4:52 PM in response to ms868iMAC
    Level 10 (270,283 points)
    Desktops
    Jun 11, 2015 4:52 PM in response to ms868iMAC

    Do you mean the icon color? Yes, they are all blue. The Yosemite color scheme is modeled after that of iOS. OS X does not provide any means of changing those colors. Note that in the Finder's sidebar the icons are all gray. Get used to it.

  • by Roote,Solvedanswer

    Roote Roote Jun 12, 2015 12:09 AM in response to ms868iMAC
    Level 2 (417 points)
    Jun 12, 2015 12:09 AM in response to ms868iMAC

    Grab1.png

     

    To change Yosemite's folder icons to less saturated versions:


    1. Download and install LiteIcon into your Applications folder. LiteIcon is available @ http://www.freemacsoft.net/liteicon/.

     

    2. Create a new folder on your Desktop and give it a name.

     

    3. Press the Option-Command-Spacebar keys to open a Finder window. Press the Shift-Command-G keys and type or copy/paste the following text into the "Go to the folder:" text input field and press the Enter key:

     

    /System/Library/CoreServices/CoreTypes.bundle/Contents/Resources/

     

    4. Type "icons" (without quotes) into the Finder search box and select "Apple icon image" from the pop-up panel. Click the "+" button to add search criteria. Click the "Kind" button and select "Name". Click the "matches" button and select "contains". Type "Folder" into the text input field.

     

    5. Hold down the Shift key and select the folder icons you want to change. If you want to deselect an icon, select it while still holding down the Shift key. Drag the selected icons to the new folder you created on your Desktop to copy them. Hold the cursor over the folder until a window opens and release, or if you just dropped the icons onto the folder, select the folder and press the Command-O keys to open it. Press the Command-A keys to select all the icons. Press the Command-O keys to open the icons in the Preview application.

    Grab2.png


    6. With the Preview window open, navigate your mouse cursor to the sidebar and click the disclosure triangle to the left of each icon's title to reveal all the images of each .icns file. You will need to to scroll down the sidebar to do this. You will notice the images get more diminutive until you reach the next .icns file .

     

    7. Press the Option-Command-C keys to open the "Adjust Color" inspector. Select the first icon image in Preview's sidebar. Slide the Saturation slider in the adjustment inspector to the value of your choice. Leave the mouse cursor where it is on the slider control. It will be much easier to change all the icon images to the same saturation value if you use a trackpad and "Tap to click".

    Grab4.png

    Grab5.png


    8. Press the Down Arrow key to move to the next icon image. Tap to click the trackpad to set the saturation level. Repeat the two steps until the saturation level is set for all the icon images. Once you've changed all images, you can check that the saturation levels are consistent by pressing the Up Arrow key to move up to the next image. If the saturation slider doesn't move, the saturation level is the same for all images. Note: you can also change any of the other parameters using the sliders if you want to change more than the saturation, or instead of the saturation.

     

    9. Press the Command-A keys to select all the images. Press Command-S to save them. Press the Command-Q keys to quit the Preview application.

     

    10. Open the LiteIcon application. Select "Folders" in the sidebar. For each icon that you want to change, drag the icon from the new folder you created with the desaturated icons and drop it onto the corresponding icon in the Icon pane. For instance, drag and drop ApplicationsFolderIcon.icns onto "Apps" and release. Repeat for all the icons you want to change. If you want to revert to the original icon, drag the selected icon from the pane.

    Grab3.png


    11. Click the "Apply Changes" button. A pop-up panel will prompt you for your password. Enter it in the text input field and press the Enter key. A dialog will slide down and provide you with a chose of "Later" or "Clear Cache & Log Out". If you choose the latter, you will be logged out of your account and will need to log in. Save any changes in open applications before proceeding. Once you log out you will need to log back in. You now will be able to view the changed folder icons.

    Grab6.png

  • by Roote,

    Roote Roote Jun 12, 2015 10:22 AM in response to Roote
    Level 2 (417 points)
    Jun 12, 2015 10:22 AM in response to Roote

    There is an autocorrect typo I missed in step 4.: instead of typing "icons" into the Finder search box, type "icns" (without quotes).

  • by ms868iMAC,

    ms868iMAC ms868iMAC Jun 13, 2015 8:04 AM in response to Roote
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 13, 2015 8:04 AM in response to Roote

    thanks will give it a try

  • by landxrover,

    landxrover landxrover Jan 7, 2016 12:01 PM in response to ms868iMAC
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 7, 2016 12:01 PM in response to ms868iMAC

    This no longer works.  Apple has made it so you can no longer use Liteicon to change any system icons in Yosemite. FYI

  • by Roote,

    Roote Roote Jan 9, 2016 7:39 PM in response to landxrover
    Level 2 (417 points)
    Jan 9, 2016 7:39 PM in response to landxrover

    landxrover wrote:

     

    This no longer works.  Apple has made it so you can no longer use Liteicon to change any system icons in Yosemite. FYI

    As tested on my system LitIcon can still be used to change system icons using OS X Yosemite v10.10. Perhaps you are referring to OS X El Capitan v10.11. Apple has added a layer of security to OS X El Capitan called System Integrity Protection (SIP), which one of its functions removes the ability to write or modify files in the root System folder. You can learn more by watching the WWDC 2015 session video Security and Your Apps, or reading the transcript. El Capitan ships with SIP enabled by default. Under this condition LiteIcon is limited to changing icons for your apps and volumes.

     

    LiteIcon.png

    Full functionality of LitIcon can be restored by disabling SIP from the Recovery OS and running the csrutil command in Terminal:


    bash-3.2# csrutil status

    System Integrity Protection status: enabled.

     

    bash-3.2# csrutil disable

    Successfully disabled System Integrity Protection. Please restart the machine for the changes to take effect.

     

    Only the user can decide if the ability to customize the appearance of system icons is worth disabling the added layer of protection SIP provides in protecting personal data and its role in hardening resistance to malware exploitation by reducing the attack surface.

  • by MrHoffman,

    MrHoffman MrHoffman Jan 9, 2016 7:57 PM in response to ms868iMAC
    Level 6 (15,612 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 9, 2016 7:57 PM in response to ms868iMAC

    Here's the official Apple doc on how to do this OS X Yosemite: Create custom icons for files or folders

  • by Roote,

    Roote Roote Jan 9, 2016 9:23 PM in response to landxrover
    Level 2 (417 points)
    Jan 9, 2016 9:23 PM in response to landxrover

    As described on LiteIcon's website, you can set a custom configuration for SIP to temporarily disable filesystem protections only, make the icon changes, and enable SIP again:

     

    bash-3.2# csrutil status

    System Integrity Protection status: enabled (Custom Configuration).

     

    Configuration:

      Apple Internal: enabled

      Kext Signing: enabled

      Filesystem Protections: disabled

      Debugging Restrictions: enabled

      DTrace Restrictions: enabled

      NVRAM Protections: enabled

     

    Keep in mind that with future system updates you may lose any changes made as this message states when running the csrutil enable --without fs command:

     

    bash-3.2# csrutil enable --without fs

    csrutil: requesting an unsupported configuration. This is likely to break in the future and leave your machine in an unknown state.

     

    Use at your own discretion. As always, backup all data before making any changes to your system.