This page documents the configuration of Mac OS X 10.9 (Mavericks) on various Macs - particularly MacBook Pro with Retina Display and 27" iMac. We've still got a few places that apply to Mac OS X 10.8 (Mountain Lion) as we move over to Mavericks.

• Point & Click
  • CHECK Tap to click
  • CHECK Three finger drag
• Scroll & Zoom
  • UNCHECK Smart zoom

NOTE: Enabling "tap and a half" for dragging is under Accessibility.

• Desktop
  • Picture: Apple / Desktop Pictures / Sky
  • UNCHECK Translucent menu bar
• Screen Saver
  • Screen Saver: Flurry
  • Start after: 10 Minutes

• CHECK Minimize windows into application icon
• CHECK Automatically hide and show the Dock

• Language
  • Edit List…
    • UNCHECK everything except English
    • CHECK U.S. English
• Region
  • Dates
    • Customize…
      • Short: YYYY-MM-DD
• Input Sources
  • CHECK Keyboard & Character Viewer
  • CHECK Dvorak - Qwerty Command key
  • CHECK U.S.
  • CHECK U.S. Extended
  • CHECK Unicode Hex Input

• General
  • Require password: 1 minute after sleep or screen saver begins
• Firewall
  • CLICK Turn On Firewall
  • Firewall Options…
    • Add applications:
      • Chrome
      • Colloquy
      • Firefox
      • Skype
      • Songbird
      • Transmission

• Privacy
  • ADD Downloads directory

• Battery
  • Computer sleep: 10 minutes
  • Display sleep: 5 minutes
• Power Adapter
  • Computer sleep: 15 minutes
  • Display sleep: 10 minutes

• Keyboard
  • CHECK Use all F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys
    • NOTE: Use Fn+F10 for mute, etc.
  • Turn off (keyboard backlight) when computer is not used for: 1 min
  • Modifier Keys…
    • Caps Lock key: Control
• Shortcuts
  • Full keyboard access: All controls (allows tabbing to include buttons and drop-downs)
  • Launchpad & Dock
    • UNCHECK Turn Dock Hiding On/Off
  • Mission Control
    • UNCHECK Mission Control
    • UNCHECK Application windows
    • UNCHECK Show Dashboard
    • UNCHECK Show Desktop
    • UNCHECK Move left a space
    • UNCHECK Move right a space
    • UNCHECK Switch to Desktop 1
  • Keyboard
    • Move focus to the menu bar - Command+/
  • App Shortcuts
    • All Applications
      • Show Help menu - Command+Shift+/
      • NOTE: Could not get Show Xyz menu to work for any other menus.
      • NOTE: Command+Shift+G will open a "Go to folder" box in Finder and any file dialog.
    • Terminal
      • Select Next Tab - Control+Tab
      • Select Previous Tab - Control+Shift+Tab

• Add Printer or Scanner… (+)
  • Select each printer it finds
    • Set name and location
    • Use AirPrint if available

• UNCHECK On
• UNCHECK Show Bluetooth in menu bar

• Computer Name: Hope
  • Edit…
    • Local Hostname: hope.local

• Guest User
  • UNCHECK Allow guests to log in to this computer
  • UNCHECK Allow guests to connect to shared folders
• Login Options
  • Automatic login: Off
  • Display login window as: Name and password

• Time Zone
  • Time Zone: Central Time
  • Closest City: St. Louis, MO - United States
• Clock
  • CHECK Show the day of the week

• Audio
  • CHECK Flash screen when an alert occurs
• Mouse & Trackpad
  • Trackpad Options…
    • CHECK Enable dragging and select "without Drag Lock"
• Zoom
  • CHECK Use scroll gesture with modifier keys to zoom:
    • Control

• Click on battery indicator
  • CHECK Show Percentage

• Preferences
  • Settings
    • Add a profile for BoochTek
      • Select Basic
      • Select Duplicate Settings from tools menu
      • Name new item: BoochTek
    • Select BoochTek
      • Text
        • Font: Courier New, Bold, 18 pt
        • CHECK Blink cursor
      • Window
        • Background Color: off-white/yellowish
        • Window Size: 120x32
      • Keyboard
        • Edit to change PageUp to send \033[5~ to applications
        • Edit to change PageDown to send \033[6~ to applications
        • Edit to change Home to send \033[H to applications
        • Edit to change End to send \033[F to applications
        • Edit to change Shift+PageUp to Scroll Page Up
        • Edit to change Shift+PageDown to Scroll Page Down
        • Edit to change Shift+Home to Scroll to Top
        • Edit to change Shift+End to Scroll to Bottom
      • Advanced
        • UNCHECK Audible bell
        • CHECK Visual bell
    • Add a profile for BoochTek Presentations
      • Select BoochTek
      • Select Duplicate Settings from tools menu
      • Name new item: BoochTek Presentations
    • Select BoochTek Presentations
      • Text
        • Font: Courier New, Bold, 29 pt
      • Window
        • Window Size: 80x24
    • Set BoochTek as the default
      • Select BoochTek
      • Hit the Default button at the bottom of the list
  • Startup
    • On startup, open: New window with settings: BoochTek

We'll install the dockutil tool, so we can add and remove dock items from the command line.

curl -k -O https://raw.github.com/kcrawford/dockutil/master/scripts/dockutil
sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/bin
sudo cp dockutil /usr/local/bin/
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/dockutil

Now we can easily remove items that we don't want in the dock:

dockutil --remove Launchpad
dockutil --remove 'Mission Control'
dockutil --remove Mail
dockutil --remove Contacts
dockutil --remove Reminders
dockutil --remove Notes
dockutil --remove Maps
dockutil --remove Messages
dockutil --remove FaceTime
dockutil --remove 'Photo Booth'
dockutil --remove iPhoto
dockutil --remove iBooks
dockutil --remove 'System Preferences'

We'll add a couple built-in items to the dock:

dockutil --add '/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app'
dockutil --add '/Applications/Utilities/Activity Monitor.app'

We'll add the following items to the dock when we install them:

• Thunderbird
• Firefox
• Komodo
• TextMate
• Eclipse
• VLC
• VMware

• View / as List
• View / Show View Options
  • CHECK Always open in list view
    • CHECK Browse in list view
  • Arrange By: None
  • Sort by: Date Last Opened
  • Text size: 16
  • Show columns:
    • Date Modified
    • Date Last Opened
    • Size
    • Kind
  • UNCHECK Show icon preview
• Preferences
  • General
    • Show these items on the desktop:
      • CHECK External disks
      • CHECK CDs, DVDs, and iPods
    • New Finder windows show: (home directory)
  • Sidebar
    • UNCHECK All My Files
    • UNCHECK AirDrop
    • UNCHECK Documents
    • UNCHECK Movies
    • UNCHECK Music
    • UNCHECK Pictures
    • CHECK home directory
  • Advanced
    • CHECK Show all filename extensions
• ADD some folders to sidebar
  • Personal
  • Work
  • Projects
  • Utilities (subfolder of Applications)
• Sort folders in sidebar
  • Home directory
  • Personal
  • Work
  • Projects
  • Downloads
  • Applications
  • Utilities

Start daemon to populate the locate database, so we can use the locate command:

sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.locate.plist

The Computer Name is set in the Sharing Preferences pane, but this doesn't affect what the hostname command returns. To remedy this, issue the following command:

sudo scutil --set HostName hope

We'd like to create some more "standard" directories in our home directory.

cd ~
mkdir -p Work Work/Projects Work/Training Personal

For some reason, after reformatting and reinstalling Mac OS X Mountain Lion, my home directory ended up with 040777 permissions. Bundler and some other programs complained about this being world writable, and it truly is a security issue. So we manually removed the write permissions:

chmod go-w $HOME