This seems to be a copy of Mathias Bynen's Dotfiles (<a href="https://github.com/mathiasbynens/dotfiles/blob/master/.osx" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/mathiasbynens/dotfiles/blob/master/.osx</a>, 'sensible hacker defaults for OS X'), with a few minor changes. Specifically, comments explainung each line have been changed to echo statements, and the following lines have been inserted:<p><pre><code> echo "Use current directory as default search scope in Finder"
defaults write com.apple.finder FXDefaultSearchScope -string "SCcf"
echo "Show Path bar in Finder"
defaults write com.apple.finder ShowPathbar -bool true
echo "Show Status bar in Finder"
defaults write com.apple.finder ShowStatusBar -bool true
echo "Set a shorter Delay until key repeat"
defaults write NSGlobalDomain InitialKeyRepeat -int 12
</code></pre>
Also, some commands have been commented out:<p><pre><code> # Automatically hide and show the Dock
# defaults write com.apple.dock autohide -bool true
# Show remaining battery time; hide percentage
# defaults write com.apple.menuextra.battery ShowPercent -string "NO"
# defaults write com.apple.menuextra.battery ShowTime -string "YES"
# echo "Always show scrollbars"
# defaults write NSGlobalDomain AppleShowScrollBars -string "Auto"
# Disable window animations and Get Info animations in Finder
# defaults write com.apple.finder DisableAllAnimations -bool true
# Don’t animate opening applications from the Dock
# defaults write com.apple.dock launchanim -bool false
# Disable opening and closing window animations
# defaults write NSGlobalDomain NSAutomaticWindowAnimationsEnabled -bool false
# Empty Trash securely by default
# defaults write com.apple.finder EmptyTrashSecurely -bool true
# Remove useless icons from Safari’s bookmarks bar
# defaults write com.apple.Safari ProxiesInBookmarksBar "()"
# Disable send and reply animations in Mail.app
# defaults write com.apple.Mail DisableReplyAnimations -bool true
# defaults write com.apple.Mail DisableSendAnimations -bool true
# Disable Resume system-wide
# defaults write NSGlobalDomain NSQuitAlwaysKeepsWindows -bool false
#Fix for the ancient UTF-8 bug in QuickLook (http://mths.be/bbo)
# Commented out, as this is known to cause problems when saving files in Adobe Illustrator CS5 :(
#echo "0x08000100:0" > ~/.CFUserTextEncoding</code></pre>
If you are worried about some of these settings before running them, you can backup your preference files<p>All that the 'defaults' command does is alter values stored in plist files, which are located in /Library/Preferences (and for the user in ~/Library/Preferences).<p>You can add something like this to the top of the script:<p><pre><code> echo "Making a backup.."
tar -pzcf ~/preferences-`date "+%Y%m%d-%H%M%S"`.tgz ~/Library/Preferences /Library/Preferences
</code></pre>
You may need to sudo to read some of the machine plist files
Before I saw this gist I had been completely unaware of the fact that Snow Leopard disables subpixel font rendering on non-Apple displays. Font rendering is something that drives me crazy if it's not done right. It's one of my main gripes with Windows (YMMV).<p>Thanks to the respective hack my Samsung 24" has suddenly become acceptable to work on again. Awesome.
This is totally awesome, however one of the biggest things for me since i've recently bought a mac and coming from linux is the focus follows mouse issue, which i know has been attempted to get working but failed.<p>Other things i miss are basics like double clicking the title bar to maximise, right clicking to create a new file and a few other things i miss from linux.
my biggest gripe with mac os having recently moved from windows is hitting the maximise button on finder and it barely filling half the screen.<p>other well documented one is the ability to turn the laptop screen of when using another screen but still the laptop keyboard
I just use secrets. It was found here. <a href="http://secrets.blacktree.com/" rel="nofollow">http://secrets.blacktree.com/</a><p>I'm not sure why the site is down. But I mirrored it here.
<a href="http://stfudamnit.com/ryan/Secrets.prefPane.zip" rel="nofollow">http://stfudamnit.com/ryan/Secrets.prefPane.zip</a>
Great list of modifications. I believe Deeper for OS X has many of these tweaks bundled into a nice interface.<p><a href="http://www.titanium.free.fr/download.php" rel="nofollow">http://www.titanium.free.fr/download.php</a>
For me, the biggest problem with OS X is the command key / meta key situation. I have an impossible time going between Linux, Windows and Mac because of this. Any hacks people know of for this?
Does changing every single default really make you feel better about yourself?<p>At least one of these changes (disabling local backups) doesn't even increase performance. Unless you just like data loss.
It seems down right now, but there was a nice database of secret preferences at <a href="http://secrets.blacktree.com/" rel="nofollow">http://secrets.blacktree.com/</a> and included a Preference Pane to access them.
I through together a (rough) Cocoa version: <a href="https://github.com/dave-gallagher/OSX-For-Cocoa-Hackers" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/dave-gallagher/OSX-For-Cocoa-Hackers</a><p>Binary: <a href="https://github.com/downloads/dave-gallagher/OSX-For-Cocoa-Hackers/OSX%20For%20Hackers.zip" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/downloads/dave-gallagher/OSX-For-Cocoa-Ha...</a><p><pre><code> git clone git@github.com:dave-gallagher/OSX-For-Cocoa-Hackers.git
</code></pre>
It's not as robust as the script, but it lets you choose individually what setting you want changed, and also added defaults.
I'm still waiting for the "Quit asking me to retype my password every time I try to do anything" setting. You'd think that the fact I typed it in 30 seconds ago when I logged in would be sufficient proof that I'm me.<p>This is the type of security that actually leads to <i>less</i> security. Eventually I'll get so sick of not being able to hit the back button on my browser (or whatever similarly impactful action that OSX decides is going to destroy my machine) without special one-time-only admin privileges that I'll just remove the password from my account altogether.
If you're looking for "Alt-Tab" style window switching on OS X, the best thing I've found is Witch (<a href="http://manytricks.com/witch/" rel="nofollow">http://manytricks.com/witch/</a>)<p>"Alt-Tab" switches between windows in the order you last focused each window, so it's ideally suited to a stack-based workflow where you may have many windows open but are only using a few of them. OS X already has "Command-Tab", but that switches between applications, not windows.
> MacBook:~ ralf$ defaults write enable-spring-load-actions-on-all-items -bool true<p>Okay. Now just to check…<p>> MacBook:~ ralf$ defaults read com.apple.dock enable-spring-load-actions-on-all-items
2012-03-31 12:46:35.173 defaults[33945:707]
The domain/default pair of (/Users/ralf/Library/Preferences/com.apple.dock.plist, enable-spring-load-actions-on-all-items) does not exist<p>Hm?
Replace Snow Leopard Exposé (terrible) with old Leopard-style Exposé (amazing).<p><a href="http://superuser.com/questions/118424/old-leopard-expose-on-snow-leopard-for-mac" rel="nofollow">http://superuser.com/questions/118424/old-leopard-expose-on-...</a><p>Unfortunately it won't help those of you who have "upgraded" to Lion...