As many of you may know, DragThing is my favorite launching utility (it has a spot in the Hall of Fame), and the author (James Thomson) and I have been having occasional email exchanges about the program. The other day he asked if I'd be interested in seeing some of the "behind the scenes" tweaks available for DragThing. After pausing about a half-second to consider his offer, I said "Sure!" The result is this hint, revealing ten hidden DragThing settings you can access only through AppleScript.
Thanks to James for writing such a cool program, and taking the time to share some of these hidden settings with all of us. With luck, there may be a few more of these 'DragThing secrets' hints in the future. So without further ado, here's James' list. Note that the following text is his, so references to "I" are not references to me, but to him ... is that clear as mud? ;-)
DragThing already has a lot of options, but there are even more hidden inside that are only accessible using AppleScript. To use these scripts, open the Script Editor application, create a new script and paste in any of the following, then click the "Run" button. Unless otherwise stated, you can run the script again to toggle the setting back to what it was previously. All of these scripts were written using the latest DragThing (4.5.1) on Mac OS X 10.2.1. You can download 4.5.1 from dragthing.com if you don't have it already.
tell application "DragThing"If the Get Info application you want to use doesn't have a unique creator code, and just sets the default "????", DragThing won't be able to use it. It might be worth contacting the maker and asking them to change this.
set theApp to choose application with prompt ¬
"Pick your Get Info application:" as alias
set theInfo to info for theApp
set theCreator to file creator of theInfo
if theCreator is "????" then
display dialog ¬
"No unique creator code, sorry!"
else
set get info app signature to theCreator
set enable Super Get Info support to true
end if
end tell
tell application "DragThing"To switch back to using the Finder again, run this script:
set get info app signature to ")DF%"
set enable Super Get Info support to true
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set enable Super Get Info support to false
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to highlight hidden processes
set highlight hidden processes to not x
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to option click hides all applications
set option click hides all applications to not x
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to do not draw icons in menus
set do not draw icons in menus to not x
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to do not use fading
set do not use fading to not x
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to process dock displays long names
set process dock displays long names to not x
set show running processes in a dock to false
set show running processes in a dock to true
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to do not emboss text
set do not emboss text to not x
set y to use Appearance font
set use Appearance font to not y
set use Appearance font to y
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to do not use zoom rects
set do not use zoom rects to not x
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to do not make docks opaque on mouseover
set do not make docks opaque on mouseover to not x
end tell
tell application "DragThing"
set x to do not use running app badge
set do not use running app badge to not x
end tell
tell application "DragThing"The example uses 13, but you can put in any size you want. Really big or small numbers might not be very useful however.
set use Appearance font to false
set dock font size to 13
end tell
Mac OS X Hints
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20021112063654550