dockmacosterminal
I have a terminal shortcut on my dock which I use every day. Depending on my monitor setup (extra, 2 extra, etc.) to my Macbook Pro, I like to have a different launching scheme (either 4 windows or 5 windows).
Is there a way to have 2 (or more) terminal launchers on the dock, one which launches the "4 windows" setup and one which launches the "5 windows" setup?
DockSpaces is nice and convenient, but annoyingly unscriptable. So, I wrote two little shell scripts, one to change to my desktop Dock and one to change to my mobile Dock.
The desktop script is triggered on arrival in my Home context in ControlPlane, and the mobile script is triggered by departure from it.
The desktop context is defined based on the presence of my external displays:
Here's how the scripts work:
I save a copy of both Docks in my Documents folder (the Dock configuration is stored in ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.dock.plist).
When I switch from one to the other, I replace the appropriate file in my Documents folder with the current file in my Preferences so that changes I've made to the Dock are saved. Then I copy the alternate Dock from my Documents to my Preferences. Finally, the Dock process is restarted so that the changes take effect.
The Scripts:
To Desktop:
#!/bin/bash
cp ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.dock.plist ~/Documents/Docks/mobile.plist
cp ~/Documents/Docks/desktop.plist ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.dock.plist
killall Dock
To Mobile:
#!/bin/bash
cp ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.dock.plist ~/Documents/Docks/desktop.plist
cp ~/Documents/Docks/mobile.plist ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.dock.plist
killall Dock
There's a Multi-Touch gesture that can show you all the instances of one app. Swiping downwards with either three or four fingers (configurable in System Preferences > Trackpad > More Gestures) opens "App Exposé", a handy birds-eye view of all your open windows in the frontmost app. It's not the same as an indicator in the always-present Dock, I know, but I think this can be one of the best options you'll get without 3rd-party software (assuming such software exists).
Best Answer
Here's how you can switch Terminal's startup window group automatically:
(
four-windowsandfive-windowsshould be replaced with the Terminal window group names.)You can use AppleScript or Automator to make an app that does that then launches Terminal:
Or you can use my
linkappscript to make a new app bundle that will do the same thing, and the icon will stay there.Then when it gives you the wrapper script, edit it and add the defaults write line above the
"$executable".You can then do the same with your other window group. One caveat with linkapp.py is that you can't run them both at the same time, because it will try to restore your windows.
If you want you can change the icon too (but if you don't use linkapp.py, the normal Terminal icon will be what shows up in your Dock and Command+Tab when it's running).