One of the applications I use very often is the built-in Dictionary application. However, since upgrading to Mac OS X 10.6
about a month ago, every time I use Spotlight to look up a word’s definition or synonym, Dictionary opens a new window for every word I query using Spotlight. Do it enough times and the screen clutters up pretty quickly. Closing Dictionary won’t get rid of all the opened windows. Granted that you can command-W until all but one window is closed, however, do this often enough and things can become vexing. But thanks to TUAW, I’ve found the solution to this annoying behavior.
I normally don’t post any tips or hints that require using Terminal but I feel I’ll be doing a great disservice to those who, like me, have grown exasperated with Dictionary’s behavior in Snow Leopard.
Rob Griffiths, macosxhints.com proprietor, Macworld contributing editor and Dictionary.app users sanity messiah, has posted a hint on how to force Dictionary to show definitions in one window. It involves quitting the Dictionary app if it’s running and then entering a command in Terminal:
defaults write com.apple.Dictionary ProhibitNewWindowForRequest -bool TRUE
The same hint also tells you how to make Dictionary revert to the original behavior.
I already entered the command in Terminal and Dictionary is now behaving the way I want it to. Big thanks to TUAW and Rob Griffiths.
Related posts:
