Telling Folders - the Easy Way to Make Customized Folders (For Max OSX)

If you own Microsoft Office, or Adobe Photoshop, or any number of software applications that come - not as a single application bundle - but as a bunch of programs and documents all installed in a folder, you've seen how some, if not most, of those applications all come in a folder with a customized icon.

It would be great if folders could automatically be "set" to display the icon of the program inside them, but unfortunately, at least that I've seen, this is not possible.

Thankfully, there are programs that can make creating custom folder icons a breeze. I first wrote about the program I've used the longest, a freeware Mac application called Viou. View has a ton of options, and really lets you tweak your folder to your heart's content. Unfortunately the application is beginning to show its age, but in spite of that it still works great.

Another application I just looked at a couple weeks ago is a shareware application called Gluestick. In many ways, Gluestick is a much more powerful and "Mac-like" application. In additino to customizing icons, you have very detailed editing tools, so you can add text, change colors, mask images, resize, rotate and more. And you can do this, not just on folder icons, but on document icons and plugin icons as well. You can even use Gluestick to "glue" two images together to form a collage. Unfortunately, for those of us counting pennies, Gluestick costs 525.00 to use past the trial.

In between is a program I'll be looking at today, called Telling Folders. Telling Folders is a new program, completely free, aimed at allowing Mac users to create custom folders to show off their favorite applications.

Creating a custom folder with Telling Folders is a simple, two-step process:

Step One: Open the program, where you'll see a rather large window with a large, blue folder in it. Simply drag an image, icon, or even an application onto the blue folder. Instantly, that image, icon, or the icon of the application, will be superimposed on it. That's it! You've created your own customized folder. (More on editing later.)