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Add Double Scroll Arrows to Both Ends of the Scroll Bar
Posted by Adam Pash at 6:00 AM on August 22, 2008
All-things-Mac weblog TUAW highlights a handy Terminal trick for adding OS X's double scroll arrows to both sides of your scroll bar. Just fire up Terminal (it's in the Utilities folder of your Applications folder) and paste (one line):
defaults write "Apple Global Domain" AppleScrollBarVariant DoubleBoth
You'll need to log out and back into your Mac before the changes take effect. If you prefer more traditional variants, you can actually tweak the other two options—place scroll arrows together on one side or separately at the top and bottom—in the Appearances section of your System Preferences. Since the point of keeping the scroll arrows next to each other is to minimize mouse movement, though, have the double arrows at both ends makes a lot of sense.
Comments (AU Comments · US Comments)
There are currently no AU comments for this post.
teh
Posted 7:03 AM 22/8/08
You don't need to log out and log in again, you just need to restart finder.
teh
Barron
Posted 6:39 AM 22/8/08
Not that a whole Pref. Pane is better than a simple Terminal tweak or anything, but this is also one of the available settings in Secrets.
Barron
moe52
Posted 6:36 AM 22/8/08
There are several Mac apps that can do this for you (and provide access to a number of other 'hidden' features. TinkerTool is one.
moe52
LeaGiraffe
Posted 6:17 AM 22/8/08
why not just use the free utility tinkertool, a preferences pane tool to do this without cutting, pasting or needing to handle the terminal app. and it does a bunch of other neat tricks too. gordon.
LeaGiraffe
gorilly
Posted 7:46 AM 22/8/08
@Carso: yeah you are missing something... two finger scrolling on my MBP... its a dream!
gorilly
Carso
Posted 7:30 AM 22/8/08
Mousewheel?
Am I missing something?
Carso
Prolific Programmer
Posted 8:20 AM 22/8/08
Is there any way to move the scrollbar to the left like it was in NextStep? :)
Prolific Programmer
Klopfer123
Posted 8:04 AM 22/8/08
@gorilly: I know, I wouldn't have believed me if I'd said that two finger clicks/drags made things so much easier but going back to a laptop without it is very frustrating.
Klopfer123
rychdom
Posted 8:33 AM 22/8/08
@rychdom: Or you could skip the command line and just edit the plist files...
rychdom
rychdom
Posted 8:32 AM 22/8/08
The benefit of the command line is not needing to rely on third-party apps to do the job for you.
My favorite Terminal Commands:
Set Dock Icons Spring-Loaded:
(* one line, then killall Dock. Change YES to NO to disable.)
defaults write com.apple.dock enable-spring-load-actions-on-all-items -boolean YES
killall Dock
Mouse-Over Gradient in Stacks
(* one line, then killall Dock. Change YES to NO to disable.))
defaults write com.apple.dock mouse-over-hilte-stack -boolean YES
killall Dock
Set Expanded Print Menu as Default
(* Change True to FALSE to disable. You may need to killall Finder or log out...)
defaults write -g PMPrintingExpandedStateForPrint -bool TRUE
Set Expanded Save Menus as Default
(* Change TRUE to FALSE to disable. You may need to killall Finder or log out...)
defaults write -g NSNavPanelExpandedStateForSaveMode -bool TRUE
Disable X11 Quit Warning
(* Change TRUE to FALSE to disable. You may need to killall Finder or log out...)
defaults write org.x.x11 no_quit_alert TRUE
rychdom
HeartBurnKid, creepy morbid freak
Posted 9:05 AM 22/8/08
Command prompts? Editing config files? OMGWTFBBQ MacOS SUXX0R!
(Sorry, bitter Linux geek here who is sick and tired of hearing everybody rant about how Linux sucks because you "have" to use the command prompt to do stuff).
HeartBurnKid, creepy morbid freak
farlane
Posted 11:43 AM 22/8/08
Lifehacker, you are like the how-to milkman. Fresh & delicious!!
farlane
inaniac
Posted 9:44 PM 22/8/08
Oh poop! Why did everyone remind me about secrets? I've just tweaked *something* and ended up with that horrible horrible see-through menu but only in half of my apps. Help?
inaniac
Styyl
Posted 5:51 AM 23/8/08
I have absolutely no need to do that. I only ever even use the scroll bar when I manually drag and drop the indicator to browse the page. The arrows, on both Mac and PC, are far too slow to be at all useful for that purpose, and when I need to scroll down gradually, the scroll wheel/ball/trackpad is much more convenient to use than the arrows. As far as I'm concerned, having two sets of arrows at the top and bottom of the bar is as useful as one, and OS X can separate the arrows natively without having to mess with ugly terminal code.
Styyl
ICEBreaker
Posted 2:00 AM 27/8/08
OK, thanks. But does anyone actually use those buttons?
ICEBreaker
jdman128
Posted 6:56 AM 23/8/08
Hey if you change that command to;
defaults write "Apple Global Domain" AppleScrollBarVariant Single
; then you will split the arrows so that you will have one on each side.
jdman128