Remove “Show all Menu Items” From Photoshop CS4

Update: John Nack from Adobe mentions a simpler solution for this particular menu behavior.

CS4 brings back the joy of the default ‘Show all Menu Items”.  As I’ve previously written when CS3 came out, there is a way to manually modify the Edit>Menu options to enable all menu items to be displayed.  It’s kinda lame that they enable this by default and offer no simple one-click solution to show all menu items.

I’m happy to report that my custom menu file works in CS4 just as well.  Just double-click the Everything_on.mnu file and Photoshop will launch, putting the settings into place.*

<rant>

As to why Adobe has this default probably goes into issues designing the interface of a complex application.  By hiding what they believe to be the least used items, it makes things appear simpler.

However, as a professional application I find this to be a bit oxymoronish.  Why not prompt the user on first run with a simple series of questions.

What do you plan on doing with Photoshop?

  1. I’m new here, just the basics
  2. Oh, you know, family photos, work on my personal site
  3. I’m a web guy, I usually start from scratch
  4. I’m a professional pixel wrangler, show me everything

Ok, while that’s by no means an ideal set of default options I hope you get the gist of what I’m trying to say.

Ask the user, don’t make assumptions and then make it possible to easily show all menu items.

</rant>

*With my limited testing this didn’t effect palettes or keyboard shortcuts, but YMMV.

102 thoughts on “Remove “Show all Menu Items” From Photoshop CS4”

  4. You are a God among men! This has been driving me nuts. I am going to promote this on my website and to my Photoshop students. Cheers!

  5. Pingback: ascendtraining.com » Archive » Photoshop CS4 Solution: Show All Menu Items

  6. Thanks, Chris!

    Having just installed CS4, I instantly noticed this annoying little feature. Downloading your file is quicker than sitting and clicking all those visibility icons one by one.

    I agree with you. Why couldn’t Adobe have had the full menu as default and the ‘simple’ menu as an option instead?

    Anyway, thanks again!

  7. I was looking for convert to smart layer forever, and then discovered it was hidden!

    I now have to keep clicking on show all menu items to show the often used smart layers.

    WHY would Adobe think this is a good idea from a UI stand point?? It’s time consuming to search for an item only to discover it was hidden, then always have to use two clicks to access an item instead of one. It also discourages users from exploring further options because they may never explore these hidden gems.

    I would have love to have sat in on that meeting listening to the brilliant logic suggesting, “hey, let’s hide the less used menu items (as deemed by us), and make it difficult to ever remove that option.”

    UGH

  9. Thanks a lot for this menu file!

    I usually use Leopard’s Help menu search to search the menu item what I’m looking for, but with auto hiding menus it was impossible to use.

  10. Pingback: » Remove “Show all Menu Items” From Photoshop CS4 at Chris Koerner · Christopher Mackay’s Blog ·

  11. Fantastic! Thank you very much!

    This ‘consumerification’ of professional software (Microsoft’s ribbon anyone?) is really getting on my nerves…

  12. Tanx man,.. i was getting pissed of when i realize that i clicked on showing all the menus and the next time i looked at the menus it only showed me some AGAIN!!

    MS Office 2003 they had that same shitty system before and had to scrap that idea because it made people stop searching for the extra functions because people are lazy.. And in 2007 they made BIG icons to make people more easy finding the functions and start using the full potential of the program.. ADOBE LEARN by other peoples mistakes!!!!

  13. I guess they hope people will adapt to their way of thinking/working. I really believe they should build in an option to toggle the new menu behavior from the old. My eye/hand coordination knows where all the menus are at almost without looking, and this was such a work stopper! THANKS FOR THE FIX. You are indeed a GOD!

  14. Excellent!! Thanks for saving me a visit to the dentist. I’ve been gritting my teeth every time I’ve had to click on the annoying ‘feature’.

  15. This was driving me nuts! Even saving custom workspace didn’t help. Thanks much for this file- don’t know where it went: I downloaded and the finder says it’s on the “desktop” but it must be invisible. And working. Could you fix the darn background tray in Flash too?

  16. thank you, was driving me a little batty also, but as usually someone has come up with a solution when the people (adobe) who should have put in a option to begin with didnt.

  17. There is no need for this work around!
    You can change this feature under the edit>menus (of course you will have to show all to see menus) select the menu tab and then change it from basic to photoshop defaults and all your menu items will appear.

  18. WOW! I am having one heck of a time, taking a college course in Photoshop, they are using CS3 and my assignments are out of Adobe Photoshop CS3 Revealed, I am using Photoshop CS4. I am not sure I should be taking this class, I am in Photoshop Help just to find the information I need 75% of the time. The “Change Layer Content” part of one of my assignments put my brain into a whirlwind. Thanks for the information.

  20. OR Edit > Menus > Set: Photoshop Default

    OR

    Alt+eus – Arrow Up – Enter
    (Windows only)

  21. Another big thanks here !!
    Thought I was going mad, I could of sworn blind the last time I used Guide Master it was under Edit > Scripts ….

    Then I spotted the “Show All” option. Question is, why did it change on its own from the previous session ?

    Oh well, Happy Chappy again ! Now, if only I could get to grips with this pen tool [newbie] !!

  29. Awesome! It worked perfectly! Thank you so much for posting!

    I too was very frustrated that they enabled this by default.

  30. Many thanks for this wonderful piece of work. It has stopped me getting repetitive strain injury!

  31. Ever since I ran the Everything_On.mnu file on my system, my Photoshop CS4 has been crashing consistently.

    I literally have to reset the preferences every time I try to launch the program. After that, Photoshop will run fine until I quit out of it and try to relaunch it again.

    By the way, I am running Photoshop CS4 on a Mac with OS X 10.4.11 installed.

    Is there anyway to reverse the effects of this file or delete whatever it did? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

  32. You can delete the file and see if that helps. I believe it’s stored in ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop CS4/Presets/Menu Customization/

  33. It seems a lot of people are still using the custom file so I’m going to quote this earlier comment by Chris in case you missed it.

    “There is no need for this work around!
    You can change this feature under the edit>menus (of course you will have to show all to see menus) select the menu tab and then change it from basic to photoshop defaults and all your menu items will appear.”

  34. hi…just switch from “Basic” to “Essentials” in the dropdown menu from the top right in your toolbar, no?

  36. Im not particulary fond of the various “boxes” choosing to link together on the precious real estate on my desktop.

    Is there something Ive missed as to how to keep that from being a default behavior for them?

  37. Hey Brett…thx a zillion…works great.
    Another easy part time ‘work around’ is to
    “Ctrl” click the menu’s at the top…
    this will produce a full menu selection.
    That’s for CS4…

  40. Chris,

    Muchos gracias!!! I have found this “show menu items” a pain in the you-know-what for a pixel wrangler like me, and most of my PW buddies. I’ll spread the word in my classes.

    Jan Armor

  46. thank god you offered away out of “show all menu items” hell. this all came about from having to reinstall CS4. when i originally upgraded from CS3 to 4 i had all my preferences retained not so with this reinstall though. thank you for helping get me back into familiar PS territory.

  47. Brilliant. The hidden menu items have been annoying me for a while now. Thank you for making it simple to change. 10/10

  48. I concur on you being a GOD! This was making me nuts! I am trying to practice for ACE certification and half the selections I needed were hidden.
    Bless You!
    Duff.

  50. Chris,
    thank you for sharing that info. It worked great for me. I was annoyed for a long time by the “show all menus” in Photoshop CS4. First I looked in the preferences and I figured it will take me longer to fix it. Finally, I got to the point where I can stand it anymore and a Google search helped me get to your page and find the solution.

    Thanks!

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