Given the plethora of other Mac news likely to appear Tuesday, this Mac OS X Hint is short, sweet, and to the point. As you know—I hope—OS X allows you to move the dock to any edge of the screen you like—left, bottom, or right. However, if you move the dock from the bottom of the screen to a screen edge, it will cover any icons you have on your desktop on that edge of the screen. (The right edge is usually more troublesome in this regard, as that’s where icons appear by default).
You can hide the dock, of course, to get access to the obscured icons, but that’s a bit of a hacky solution. Instead, just select View -> Clean Up, and the obscured icons will magically move out from under the dock. Why this doesn’t happen automatically is an open question, but at least the solution is relatively painless.