Today I cannot change the order of items in dock?

Question

Today I cannot change the order of items in dock?

Today I tried to clean up my dock and to rearrange the order the items appear. Although I was able to remove icons I no longer need quick access, but I am not able to rearrange the order in which they appear. I prefer to have the ones I use the most appear at the top of the dock. I have my dock on the left side of my iMac 21.5" screen. All the items I want to rearrange are above that line, but they will not allow me to change the order in which they appear. In the past I have rearranged those icons, but not today. HELP???

iMac (21.5-inch, Late 2013), OS X El Capitan (10.11.5), Apple Wireless Keyboard & Mouse

Posted on Sep 19, 2016 1:37 PM

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Answer 1

K Shaffer

Level 8

36,058 points

Sep 19, 2016 5:38 PM in response to RebekkahRoseRyan

There are ways of causing the Dock to be locked; keyboard shortcuts maybe, but

more certainly are terminal or command line shortcuts. Some ideas of those, here:

• How to Lock the Dock Size, Position, and Contents in OS X - The Mac ...

https://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/how-to-lock-the-dock-size-position-and-c ontents-in-os-x

Aug 28, 2015 - Here are some easy Terminal commands to lock the Dock's size, position,

and contents in OS X, and how to change it back when you realize ...

• OS X El Capitan: Use the Dock - Apple Support

Apr 13, 2016 - You can add or remove items from the Dock, make it larger or smaller, or even hide it altogether. ...

Drag files and folders to the right of the Dock’s separator, and apps to the left. If you moved the Dock to the side

of your desktop, drag files and folders below the separator, and ...

• How to Lock the Dock Icons in Mac OS X (to Make It Childproof)

www.laptopmag.com/articles/how-to-lock-mac-dock

Similar or other ideas appear in a search result such as this; some of them repeat:

https://www.google.com/search?q=OS+X+10.11+how+to++unlock+the+Dock

While somewhere I have the keyboard shortcuts support pages bookmarked, I've

no handy reference for such things otherwise. Across 5 Macs with varying OS X.

Hopefully you can resolve the issue. Sometimes a restart in Safe mode may help.

Good luck in this matter! 🙂

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Answer 2

Old Toad

Level 10

216,112 points

Sep 19, 2016 5:38 PM in response to RebekkahRoseRyan

Go to your Users/Home/Library/Preferences folder and move the com.apple.Dock.plist file to the Desktop. Reboot and try to rearrange the items again. If that fixes the issue delete the file from the Desktop.

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Answer 3

Sep 19, 2016 5:38 PM in response to RebekkahRoseRyan

Thanks for all the info. The problem is resolved.

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Answer 4

Old Toad

Level 10

216,112 points

Sep 19, 2016 8:10 PM in response to RebekkahRoseRyan

For those with a similar problem tell us which solution worked for you.

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