Lion’s new Launchpad feature adds the ability to organize and quickly access applications on your Mac in a similar way as you do on your iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch. By organizing similar or frequently used applications together into Folders, you can keep them arranged to suit your workflow, or just make it easier to for you, your family or work colleagues to get to your favourite Apps.
To create a folder in Launchpad, open Launchpad and then simply click and hold on an Application icon. When you do this, the icon will darken and other icons will start to ‘jiggle’ — don’t worry, this is normal! You then drag the icon on top of another application’s icon which you wish to share a folder with. Once you drag one icon onto another, it should change into a square box with a white border. This is the new Folder icon.
At this point you can let go of, or ‘Drop’ the icon and it will move next to the other icon in the folder content view which shows as a band across the screen. You can either use the folder name suggested — the white text in the upper left corner — or click on the default folder name to edit and create your own title.
Add other Apps to the folder by dragging and dropping their icons onto the new folder icon. To change a folder’s name later on, first click on the folder icon to open and view the contents, then click on the name to type in a new one.
From the band-across-the-screen folder content view, you can also click, drag and drop your Apps out of the banded area to remove them from within a folder*. Then click, drag and drop the application icons into another folder — all within Launchpad.
You can also change the layout of your individual icons or folders from the default alphabetical order, by click, dragging and dropping them between the other icons or folders, while they’re jiggling. Clicking once (a short click, without holding) on any jiggling icon will stop them all jiggling again.
*Note – some users have noticed that when using a Wacom tablet, rather than mouse or trackpad, you may be unable to drag icons out of a folder.