How to Open and Use Snow Leopard’s iDisk

With a MobileMe account activated, iDisk is available and provides you with additional storage space. To see how much storage you’re using and configure public folder access, open System Preferences, click the MobileMe icon, and then click the iDisk button to view the settings.
The iDisk Disk Space bar graph shows how much of the current iDisk space you’re using.
You can specify the access privilege level for other MobileMe users from this part as well. Select the Read Only radio button to prevent any other MobileMe user from copying files to your public folder, or select the Read and Write radio button to allow others to save files there.
Regardless of the privilege level you choose, you can also set a password that other MobileMe users must type before they are allowed to access your public folder. If you have already set a password, you can change it by clicking the “Set Password” button and typing the new word in the password box. Retype the word in the confirmation box to check it; Then click OK to save the change and return to the MobileMe System Preferences pane.

Unlike the physical hard drive in your Mac, your iDisk never needs to be formatted or defragmented, and you never have to check for errors. However, the iDisk architecture has been fixed, so you cannot create your own folders. In fact, you can’t create new folders in your iDisk root at all, but you can create new folders within most root folders.
Here are the folders you find hanging in your iDisk:
Backup: This read-only folder contains backup files created with MobileMe Backup. You can copy the files in this folder to a removable drive on your system for an extra level of preservation.
Documents: This folder contains any documents for the application that you want to store. Nobody but you can access these items.
Groups: This folder contains the files you want to share with others in any of the MobileMe Groups you have joined.
Library: Another read-only folder. This patch contains configuration data and custom settings that you have created for other MobileMe features.
Movies: QuickTime movies go here. You can add the movies stored here to your web pages.
Music: This is the repository for all your iTunes music files and playlists, and the contents can be added to your web pages.
Pictures: This folder is the storage for JPEG and GIF images, including those you want to use with your web pages.
Public: This is the place to put files that you specifically want to share with others, either directly through iDisk or with your web pages. If you have allowed write access, others can copy the files to your public folder as well.
Sites: The web pages you store here can be created using iWeb. In fact, you can even use your own web page design application and copy the completed site files here.
Software: Apple makes this folder read-only available as a service to MobileMe members; It has a selection of the latest free, trial and commercial demos for you to enjoy. To try something, open the program folder and copy what you want to your Mac OS X desktop. Then you can install and launch the application from the local copy of the files.
Web: This folder contains MobileMe galleries created from within iPhoto, as well as other media used by iWeb.
When you’re online, you can unlock your iDisk in one of the following ways:

• From the Finder menu, choose Go → iDisk and then choose My iDisk from the submenu or use the keyboard shortcut Command + Shift + I.

 

• Click the iDisk icon in the Finder sidebar.

 

• Add an iDisk button to the toolbar of the Finder window by choosing View → Customize Toolbar.

Your iDisk opens in a new Finder window. After you use one of these methods in a Mac OS X session, an iDisk icon appears on the Mac OS X desktop. The iDisk volume icon remains until you shut down or restart your Mac.