June 2004
Intermediate to advanced
1056 pages
39h 58m
English
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Viewing and Editing Property Lists
There are two ways you can view and edit the contents of an application’s preferences file:
With the Property List Editor (
/Developer/Applications/Utilities)From the command line, using the
defaultscommand
The Property List Editor is available on your system only after
installing the Xcode Tools; however, the defaults
command is available with the base installation of Mac OS
X, and doesn’t require you to install any additional
software.
Viewing is one thing, but knowing what you can enter into a
plist file requires a bit of investigative work.
An application asserts its domain through the
CFBundleIdentifier key in its internal
Info.plist file, which is stored in an
application’s /Contents
directory. For example, the Info.plist
file for the Dock can be found in
/System/Library/CoreServices/Dock.app/Contents.
The preferences available to an application are defined via the
CFBundleExecutable key in the
Info.plist file. Typically, the string for
CFBundleExecutable is the short name for the
application (e.g., Dock). This executable can be found in an
application’s /Contents/MacOS
directory; e.g., the Dock executable is located in
/System/Library/CoreServices/Dock.app/Contents/MacOS.
To see a listing of available keys and strings for an application,
use the strings command in the Terminal,
followed by the path to the application’s short name
as defined by CFBundleExecutable:
$ strings /System/Library/CoreServices/Dock.app/Contents/MacOS/Dock Unfortunately, ...
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O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.Julian F.
I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.Addison B.
I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.Amir M.
I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.