TMO Quick Tip - Leopard: Quick Look Package Contents

by , 7:30 AM EDT, April 30th, 2008

Apple offers a way to look inside installer packages via contextual menus, but it can be even easier than that. Thanks to Leopard's Quick Look feature and a free plug-in, you can check a package's contents with a quick tap of the Space bar.

You first need to download the Suspicious Package plug-in for Quick Look. It's available at the Mothers Ruin Software Web site. Open the SuspiciousPackage disk image, and drag the plug-in into Library/QuickLook in your Home directory.

Preview package files in Quick Look with Suspicious Package

After Suspicious Package is installed, you can select a package file and tap the Space bar to see the item's contents. Suspicious Package will display a listing of the package contents, show the file's size, and let you know if an Administrator password or system restart is required when the package is installed.

Suspicious Package is a slick tool for checking out a package's contents to see if it contains a file you need, or to make sure the package contains the files you expect it to.

Jeff Gamet is TMO's Morning Editor and Reviews Editor. He lectures, teaches and speaks on Mac OS X and design-related topics, and is the author of The Designer's Guide to Mac OS X from Peachpit Press.

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