Configuable Custom Dock Icons

Tutorials
1

Took a little break from working on the upcoming AI features and implemented support for custom dock icons.

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BTT 5.518 allows currently up to 7 customizable Dock icons. Here is how they work:

  1. Limitations: Currently Custom Dock Icons only work while BTT is running - they also don't retain their icons while BTT is quit. I'll improve that soon. Also when clicking one of the custom Dock icons your active app might flash briefly. This is because Dock icons always activate the app they belong to which can not be prevented.
  2. Dock Icons can be configured in the "Automations & Named & Other Triggers" section in BTT. The trigger is named "Custom Dock Icon".
  3. Dock Icons are identified by the letters A-G, you need to choose one
  4. You can select any image / icon you want
  5. Custom Dock Icons support app-specific behavior. For example You can have a global Dock Icon with identifier A and you can have a app-specific Dock Icon with Identifier A that uses different icon and actions.
  6. To create a dock context menu (that is shown on right-click) you need to select the action category "Custom Dock Context Menu" and add the predefined action "Show Custom Context Menu (New).
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    • Dock context menus officially don't support icons. However you can workaround this by installing Apple's SFSymbols app (SF Symbols - Apple Developer ), right-click any symbol in that app and choose "copy symbol". You can then paste it into your menu items title.

I'll add a new action to dynamically update dock item icons later today.

2

Hey Andreas, nice feature. However I've noticed the following on my end:

It doesn't matter what the chosen icon is - it is not shown, but only some dotted square, even after restart :

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If I choose "Change Icon" - only then the icon is shown:

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3

weird. Could you check whether this file exists and if so, send it to me? (andreas@folivora.ai) ~/Library/Group Containers/group.com.folivora.BTTShared/Library/Preferences/group.com.folivora.BTTShared.plist

Go there via Finder => Go => Go to Folder, make sure to include the ~

4

ah I think I found the issue, for some reason the entitlements are missing (which prevents it from accessing the icons but works on my dev machine so I didn't notice).

5

I think this should be resolved with 5.544

1 Like
6

Hey @Andreas_Hegenberg , do you plan to enhance that feature? I'm thinking of dynamic/scriptable icons, something like the floating menus maybe. I think it would be really cool and handy if we can have the power (or at least small portion) of floating menus in the dock.

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7

Yes I'm looking into that, I will definitely support to embed floating menus in custom menubar items soon, AFAIK dock icons are more limited, they will probably only be able to show a non-interactive version of a floating menu.

2 Likes