Checklist for setting a and personalising a new macOS installation.
- 1. Install updates
- 2. Disable iCloud Drive
- 3. Customise trackpad gestures
- 4. Customise modifier keys
- 5. Disable the 🌐 key
- 6. Disable startup sound
- 7. Disable power chime
- 8. Disable floating screenshot thumbnails
- 9. Disable adaptive screen brightness
- 10. Make Desktop icons snap to the grid
- 11. Disable "Click wallpaper to reveal desktop"
- 12. Customise menu bar
- 13. Customise Dock
- 14. Customise Spaces
- 15. Customise Finder
- 16. Customise TextEdit
- 17. Restore keyboard brightness keys on the physical keyboard
- 18. Install custom keyboard layout
- 19. Install Xcode Command Line Tools
- 20. Install Homebrew
- 21. Install Homebrew formulas from Brewfile
- 22. Set Bash as the default shell
- 23. Apply iTerm2 settings
- 24. Apply settings of optional tools
- 25. Install dotfiles
- 26. TODO: Install sudoers file
- 27. Install fonts
- 28. Install eduroam
- 29. Configure Google Chrome
- 30. Configure Google Drive
- 31. Configure Fluor
System updates:
- Go to System Settings → General → Software Update
- Install all available updates
App updates:
- Go to App Store → Updates
- If there are any updates, click on Update All
- Go to System Settings → Apple ID → iCloud → Apps Using iCloud
- Set iCloud Drive to Off
Note: this prevents distracting options in file opening and saving dialogs.
Enable tap to click:
- Go to System Preferences → Trackpad
- Make sure that the Point & Click tab is open
- Enable Tap to click
Disable opening of the Notification Centre when swiping left from the right edge of the trackpad with two fingers:
- Go to System Preferences → Trackpad
- Open the More Gestures tab
- Disable Notification Centre
Note: disabled to prevent accidential triggering when swiping/scrolling with two fingers.
Enable dragging of windows with three fingers:
- Go to System Preferences → Accessibility → Pointer Control → Trackpad Options...
- Enable Use trackpad for dragging
- Set Dragging style to Three-Finger Drag
- Go to System Preferences → Keyboard → Keyboard Shortcuts... → Modifier Keys
- Change the below items to the following values:
Item Value Caps Lock (⇪) key ⌃ Control Control (⌃) key ⇪ Caps Lock Option (⌥) key ⌘ Command Command (⌘) key ⌥ Option
Note: the above must be done for every connected keyboard (e.g the built-in keyboard and the external Magic Keyboard). Keyboards can be selected in the Select keyboard dropdown list.
- Go to System Preferences → Keyboard
- Set Press 🌐 key to to Do Nothing
Note: this makes the 🌐 key act like a normal fn (function) key (e.g. for typing F1, F2, etc.). The 🌐 key functionality is not really needed as the input source can always be changed with
Ctrl-Space.
- Go to System Settings → Sound
- Disable Play sound on startup
- Execute the following:
defaults write com.apple.PowerChime ChimeOnNoHardware -bool true - Log out of macOS and log in again
Note: the power chime is a sound that plays when connecting a charging cable.
- Press
Cmd-Shift-5 - Open the Options dropdown list in the menu bar at the bottom of the screen
- Disable Show Floating Thumbnail
Note: this saves all screenshots immediately to the file system and prevents the floating thumbnail animation in the lower right corner of the screen.
- Go to System Preferences → Displays
- Disable Automatically adjust brightness
- Right-click on the Desktop background
- Click on Show View Options
- Set Sort By to Snap to Grid
- Go to System Preferences → Desktop & Dock
- Scroll down to the Desktop & Stage Manager section
- Open the Click wallpaper to reveal desktop dropdown list
- Select Only in Stage Manager
Note: this feature has been added and enabled by default by macOS 14 (Sonoma).
- Go to System Preferences → Control Centre
- Change the below items to the following values:
Item Value Bluetooth Show in Menu Bar Focus Don't Show in Menu Bar Sound Always Show in Menu Bar Spotlight Don't Show in Menu Bar - Under Battery, enable Show Percentage
- Rearrange the icons in the menu bar by holding ⌘ and dragging the icons with the mouse
- Go to System Preferences → Desktop & Dock
- Enable Automatically hide and show the Dock
- Disable Show suggested and recent apps in Dock
Disable automatic rearrangement of Spaces:
- Go to System Preferences → Desktop & Dock
- Scroll down to the Mission Control section
- Disable Automatically rearrange Spaces based on most recent use
Create desired number of Spaces:
- Swipe up with four fingers to open Mission Control
- Move cursor to the top of the screen to reveal the Spaces strip
- Click on the + on the right side of the Spaces strip to add additional Spaces
Customise sidebar:
- Go to Finder → Settings → Sidebar
- Enable the following items and disable all other items:
Item Enabled Applications ✅ Desktop ✅ <Home> ✅ Hard disks ✅ External disks ✅ CDs, DVDs and iOS Devices ✅
Disable hiding of filename extensions and filename extension warnings:
- Go to Finder → Settings → Advanced
- Enable Show all filename extensions
- Disable Show warning before changing an extension
Set default directory:
- Go to Finder → Settings → General
- Open the New Finder windows show dropdown list
- Select Desktop
Restrict search to current folder:
- Go to Finder → Settings → Advanced
- Open the When performing a search dropdown list
- Select Search the Current Folder
Show Path Bar and Status Bar:
- Go to Finder → View
- Enable Show Path Bar
- Enable Show Status Bar
Set default window style and behaviour:
- Go to TextEdit → Settings → New Document
- Set Format to Plain text
- Set Width to 80
- Set Plain text font to Menlo Regular 12
- Disable all the options in the Options section
Disable markup rendering:
- Go to TextEdit → Settings → Open and Save
- Enable Display HTML files as HTML code instead of formatted text
- Enable Display RTF files as RTF code instead of formatted text
Disable automatic setting of filename extensions:
- Go to TextEdit → Settings → Open and Save
- Disable Add ".txt" extension to plain text files
Note: this step is only necessary if the physical keyboard does not have keyboard brightness keys (usually bundled with the F5 and F6 keys), which is typically the case for newer (i.e. post Apple silicon) models.
- Save the following as
~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.local.KeyRemappings.plist:<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd"> <plist version="1.0"> <dict> <key>Label</key> <string>com.local.KeyRemapping</string> <key>ProgramArguments</key> <array> <string>/usr/bin/hidutil</string> <string>property</string> <string>--set</string> <!-- Keys: --> <!-- 0xC000000CF: Dictation --> <!-- 0x10000009B: Focus --> <!-- 0xFF00000008: Keyboard brightness up --> <!-- 0xFF00000009: Keyboard brightness down --> <string>{"UserKeyMapping":[ { "HIDKeyboardModifierMappingSrc": 0xC000000CF, "HIDKeyboardModifierMappingDst": 0xFF00000009 }, { "HIDKeyboardModifierMappingSrc": 0x10000009B, "HIDKeyboardModifierMappingDst": 0xFF00000008 } ]}</string> </array> <key>RunAtLoad</key> <true/> </dict> </plist>
- Log out of macOS and log in again
Traditonally, Apple keyboards had two keys for decreasing and increasing the keyboard brightness bundled with the F5 and F6 keys. However, newer models (roughly since the introduction of Apple silicon) have the Dictation and Focus keys at the place of these keyboard brightness keys.
The above launch agent script reverts this change and makes the Dictation and Focus keys act as keyboard brightness keys.
See also:
- https://www.idownloadblog.com/2022/03/25/bring-back-keyboard-brightness/
- amarsyla/hidutil-key-remapping-generator#33 (comment)
✅ See weibeld-setup/install-keyboard-layout
- Execute the following to launch the installation dialog:
xcode-select --install
- Complete the installation through the installation dialog
bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"Note: see instructions on brew.sh.
✅ See weibeld-setup/install-brewfile
- Execute the following:
echo "$HOMEBREW_PREFIX"/bin/bash | sudo tee -a /etc/shells >/dev/null chsh -s "$HOMEBREW_PREFIX"/bin/bash sudo chsh -s "$HOMEBREW_PREFIX"/bin/bash
- Quit and reopen the terminal application
Note: this sets the version of Bash that has been installed by Homebrew as the default shell. By default, macOS uses Zsh as the default shell.
✅ See weibeld-setup/settings-iterm2
✅ See weibeld-setup/settings-android-studio
✅ See weibeld-setup/settings-vscode
✅ See weibeld-setup/install-dotfiles
✅ See weibeld-setup/install-sudoers
TODO: adapt for macOS.
✅ See weibeld-setup/install-fonts
✅ See weibeld-setup/install-eduroam
Set Chrome as the default web browser:
- Go to System Settings → Desktop & Dock
- Scroll down to the Widgets section
- Set Default web browser to Google Chrome
Set dowload directory:
- Go to Chrome → Settings → Downloads
- Set Location to Desktop
- Launch Google Drive
- Skip all the options in the setup dialog
- Click on the Google Drive icon in the menu bar
- Click on the gear icon
- Go to Preferences → Google Drive
- Select Mirror files
- Click on Change folder location
- In the file opening dialog, create a new folder, such as
~/Desktop/Google Drive - Click on Confirm location → Save
- Wait for the sync of the files from Google Drive to the local folder to complete
Note: this creates a local directory that is mirrored with Google Drive. That means, all the files from Google Drive will be downloaded to this directory, and any files that are locally added to this directory will be uploaded to Google Drive.
Grant permissions:
- Launch Fluor
- Do not enable any notifications
- When prompted, grant the necessary permissions for Fluor in System Settings
Enable start at login:
- Click on the Fluor icon in the menu bar
- Enable Start Fluor at login
Set trigger:
- Click on the Fluor icon in the menu bar
- In the Trigger section, enable the rightmost option:
Note: this trigger option allows changing the Fluor mode (i.e. locking and unlocking the function keys) by simply pressing the fn key.