Skip to content
Thoughtful, detailed coverage of everything Apple for 33 years
and the TidBITS Content Network for Apple professionals

Quit the Finder

Sometimes it’s nice to quit the Finder. This frees up a little bit of memory (not as much as you would think) but, even better, it lets you edit the Finder or rebuild your desktop without rebooting (you can hold down the Command and Option keys when the Finder restarts and it rebuilds the desktop). Remember: when you quit the Finder you lose the Apple Menu’s items and the use of Background Printing. After you quit the Finder, you can start it with a utility that launches other applications (assuming that it’s a utility that recognizes the Finder as a program that can be launched) or by quitting all running applications.

Open a copy of your Finder in ResEdit and open the fmnu resources.

Each one of the fmnu resources is a Finder menu. Here are the more important menus:

  1251: Apple
  1252: File
  1253: Edit
  1254: View
  1255: Special
  1256: Label
  90125: Chez Oui (just kidding)

(The others are, for the most part, menus that appear elsewhere in the Finder, like in the "Find" dialog box.)

Assuming that you want to add "Quit" to the Special menu (though this works for adding "Quit" to any menu), open fmnu #1255. If all you see is a bunch of hexadecimal code, you need to install the fmnu template we just discussed. Stop here until you get the fmnu template installed. If you see:

  Visible
  Item Count
  ???

etc., then you’re ready to go. (Good hacker. <pat pat>) Now scroll down to the bottom of the dialog box. You should see:

  9) *****

Click on the "*****". A box should appear around it. Go to the "Resource" menu and select "Insert New Field(s)". A new, blank set of fields should appear below the "9) *****" followed by a new "10) *****". Fill in the fields above the "10) *****" like this: (Those are zeros, not the letter "o" below.)

  AppleEvent     xxx0
  ???            0
  ???            0
  Cmd Key        (leave this one blank)
  ???            0
  Item Text      - (a minus sign)

That will create a divider bar. Now click on the "10) *****" and select Insert New Resource(s) again. Now you have a "11) *****". Fill in #11 like this:

  AppleEvent     quit (EXACTLY 'quit' - lowercase is important)
  ???            -127
  ???            0
  Cmd Key        Q (you may leave this blank; see below)
  ???            0
  Item Text      Quit

You may leave the "Cmd Key" section blank. This is (surprise) what command key you want this menu item to have. I like Command-Q for "Quit". Some people find this inconvenient since it’s easy to accidentally quit the Finder if you have such a key. That’s up to you; quitting the Finder is no big deal since it may easily be launched again (by quitting all running applications or by launching it with a utility such as PowerStrip, as I mentioned above).

Now go up to the top of the window and make sure that the field that says "Item Count" has "11" next to it. If it doesn’t, change it.

Quit ResEdit, saving your changes. You’re done!

Using this technique, you may rearrange menus anyway you like. You could, for example, move the "Find" commands to the "Edit" menu simply by moving their 2 items from one fmnu to another. The System 7 Finder doesn’t care where things are. You could, in fact, remove all menus from the Finder except the Apple but that would be stupid.

Subscribe today so you don’t miss any TidBITS articles!

Every week you’ll get tech tips, in-depth reviews, and insightful news analysis for discerning Apple users. For over 33 years, we’ve published professional, member-supported tech journalism that makes you smarter.

Registration confirmation will be emailed to you.

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA. The Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.