displaydockkeyboard
I would like to move my dock via keyboard shortcut between displays. When I connect my second display (which I use as my active display) and try to use the pad to 'learn' this new display is the main one it takes probably 20-30 seconds of moving my mouse up and down before the display finally jumps.
I was wondering if there is a keyboard shortcut that exists or I could create that could handle this action?
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 another hidden preference for the delay before the animation starts:
defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-delay -float 9999999
osascript -e 'quit app "Dock"'
It doesn't affect full screen windows though.
This would increase the delay to about a second:
defaults write com.apple.dock autohide-delay -float 0.5
Best Answer
I thought perhaps the default [Opt + Cmd +D] to toggle Turn Dock Hiding On/Off would work. I considered that, depending on which display was active, that toggling the dock would cause it to appear on whichever display was active at the time. However, I find that dock remains on the given display.
However, I believe the solution is simply to explain how the mouse or trackpad is used to move the dock.
The rule is that by moving the cursor 1" below the bottom of the given display, the dock will then move.