Is OS/X's 'terminal' app really as weird as it seems...

I just set up a .command file to test launching a terminal-based
command from an icon.

Worked great, except that the terminal didn't go away when the command
completed. So, I went to the 'Window Settings' dialog and clicked
'close when shell completes'. Then I saw the 'Apply to all' (or
whatever) button and figured sure, why not have all my terminal
windows close when the commands they're running finish?

Well, I ended up somehow setting the terminal app to always launch my
..command whenever a new terminal window is created. Apparently 'Apply
all' means apply all settings to all windows, including the command
that was run in this window. Now, I'd argue that that's none too
intuative. But what's worse, is it's near impossible to reverse.

When you've got a system that launches a command and then closes
whenever you try to launch a terminal window, you're in big trouble.

Finally, I managed to sort of fix it by doing File-New Command,
running /bin/tcsh, and then doing the 'Apply All' trick again. What I
ended up with is that terminals launch a shell, which runs a shell and
then exits when the 2nd shell finishes. I don't know if that's what
the original settings were, but I don't think so, since it complained
that stuff was still running when I tried to close the window, and I
ended up having to add 'tcsh' to the list of programs to ignore when
closing terminal windows.

Now, maybe Terminal is supposed to be for advanced users only. Still,
as a longtime unix programmer, it had me totally flummoxed. If this
is the much-vaunted Apple ease-of-use, then I don't get what all the
fuss is about.

In article <ed8b1495.0502091617.1f864017@posting.google.com>, Rob
Yampolsky <rob.yampolsky@encodasystems.com> wrote:

> I just set up a .command file to test launching a terminal-based
> command from an icon.
>
> Worked great, except that the terminal didn't go away when the command
> completed. So, I went to the 'Window Settings' dialog and clicked
> 'close when shell completes'. Then I saw the 'Apply to all' (or
> whatever) button and figured sure, why not have all my terminal
> windows close when the commands they're running finish?
>
> Well, I ended up somehow setting the terminal app to always launch my
> .command whenever a new terminal window is created. Apparently 'Apply
> all' means apply all settings to all windows, including the command
> that was run in this window. Now, I'd argue that that's none too
> intuative. But what's worse, is it's near impossible to reverse.
>
> When you've got a system that launches a command and then closes
> whenever you try to launch a terminal window, you're in big trouble.
>
> Finally, I managed to sort of fix it by doing File-New Command,
> running /bin/tcsh, and then doing the 'Apply All' trick again. What I
> ended up with is that terminals launch a shell, which runs a shell and
> then exits when the 2nd shell finishes. I don't know if that's what
> the original settings were, but I don't think so, since it complained
> that stuff was still running when I tried to close the window, and I
> ended up having to add 'tcsh' to the list of programs to ignore when
> closing terminal windows.
>
> Now, maybe Terminal is supposed to be for advanced users only. Still,
> as a longtime unix programmer, it had me totally flummoxed. If this
> is the much-vaunted Apple ease-of-use, then I don't get what all the
> fuss is about.

Just do the same thing you always do when a program starts
misbehaving... delete the preference file. In this case it's
~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.terminal.plist.

--
Jerry Kindall, Seattle, WA <http://www.jerrykindall.com/>

Send only plain text messages under 32K to the Reply-To address.
This mailbox is filtered aggressively to thwart spam and viruses.

Rob Yampolsky <rob.yampolsky@encodasystems.com> wrote:
>
> Now, maybe Terminal is supposed to be for advanced users only. Still,
> as a longtime unix programmer, it had me totally flummoxed. If this
> is the much-vaunted Apple ease-of-use, then I don't get what all the
> fuss is about.

What you observed re Terminal and .command files I can verify - threw
me for a loop too. That has absolutely no bearing of "ease of use" WRT
Apple's Aqua GUI layered over-top of Darwin's BSD underpinnings.

Mac OS X is for "users". If you hack in Terminal/X11 land, you bear
the burden of gettng your work done: no further complaining allowed.



So, let's work together to file a proper bug/enhancement report to
Apple. As you note, something is flummoxed.!

Jerry Kindall <jerrykindall@nospam.invalid> wrote in message news:<090220051659561471%jerrykindall@nospam.invalid>...

>
> Just do the same thing you always do when a program starts
> misbehaving... delete the preference file. In this case it's
> ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.terminal.plist.

I was going to do that, but the Terminal Help told me to look in
~/Library/Application Setup/Terminal, which didn't exist.

On 10 Feb 2005 06:54:34 -0800, Rob Yampolsky wrote:
> Jerry Kindall <jerrykindall@nospam.invalid> wrote in message news:<090220051659561471%jerrykindall@nospam.invalid>...

>>
>> Just do the same thing you always do when a program starts
>> misbehaving... delete the preference file. In this case it's
>> ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.terminal.plist.

> I was going to do that, but the Terminal Help told me to look in
> ~/Library/Application Setup/Terminal, which didn't exist.

Are you sure it wasn't ~/Library/Application\ Support/Terminal? That's
where your .term files would normally go (you may need to create it), but
not the preferences file.


--
Dave Seaman
Judge Yohn's mistakes revealed in Mumia Abu-Jamal ruling.
<http://www.commoncouragepress.com/index.cfm?action=book&bookid=228>

Edit your config-dot-sys!

Dave Seaman <dseaman@no.such.host> wrote in message news:<cufu4r$b93$1@mailhub227.itcs.purdue.edu>...
>
> Are you sure it wasn't ~/Library/Application\ Support/Terminal? That's
> where your .term files would normally go (you may need to create it), but
> not the preferences file.

That must have been it. I tried deleting the Preferences file, and
that did bring be back to the default settings.

Thanks

> I just set up a .command file to test launching a terminal-based
> command from an icon.

There's a simpler way to do this (assuming the command you are running is an
executable file, like the tin newsreader, for example.) Use the Finder to
navigate to the directory where the executable is located (/usr/local/bin in
my case), and drag the command's icon down into the dock (right-hand side.)
Then just click on the icon. Terminal will automatically launch and run the
command. This only works on OS X 10.3.

K.

"GG" <anonymous@email.invalid> wrote in message
> There's a simpler way to do this (assuming the command you are running is an
> executable file, like the tin newsreader, for example.) Use the Finder to
> navigate to the directory where the executable is located (/usr/local/bin in
> my case), and drag the command's icon down into the dock (right-hand side.)
> Then just click on the icon. Terminal will automatically launch and run the
> command. This only works on OS X 10.3.

But will the terminal window close when the command completes? That's
what I was trying to configure terminal to do when I got into this
mess in the first place. Even now, I can get the normal terminal (the
one that opens to run a shell) to close when the shell completes, but
I still can't get the terminal that opens to run my .command file to
close when the command completes.