Handy Shell Scripts – part II – manage_launchpad.sh

Posted by Remon Pel on January 28, 2012. 2 comments.

The second script I’d like to share is one to list or delete items from the OSX Lion launchpad. It’s a very basic script with semi-cryptic output, but it’s useable for the two or three times you’ll ever use it.

Have you looked at your launchpad? It probably has twenty or more items you would like removed, but, …., OSX doesn’t allow you to remove items. Luckily it’s just an SQLITE database and with a few carefully built SQL queries, we can cleanup duplicates and unwanted items.

How to use;

Shell commandmanage_launchpad.sh list

Will output a list like;

Shell output

1Password|3|ws.agile.1Password

Acrobat Distiller|11|com.adobe.distiller

Activity Monitor|462|com.apple.ActivityMonitor

Address Book|5|com.apple.AddressBook

Adium|6|com.adiumX.adiumX

Adium|75|com.adiumX.adiumX

Adobe Acrobat Pro|16|com.adobe.Acrobat.Pro

Adobe After Effects CS5|18|com.adobe.AfterEffects

Adobe After Effects Render Engine|20|Adobe After Effects Render Engine

Adobe Bridge CS5|32|com.adobe.bridge4

First is the NAME of the item, the second is the ID. The third one (bundle_id) I have used to determine the company behind certain items.

If you have a duplicate item, you can make this list a bit more specific;

Shell commandmanage_launchpad.sh list Adium

Shell output

Adium|6|com.adiumX.adiumX

Adium|75|com.adiumX.adiumX

Now write down the items you wish to remove by ID. In this case, 75.

Shell commandmanage_launchpad.sh delete 75

The Dock (which is responsible for the Launchpad) is restarted automatically.

The more observant of you will notice an “undocumented” feature; delete_no_restart . This will delete the item, but not restart the Dock.

Shell commandmanage_launchpad.sh delete_no_restart 75

The script:

Shell-Script



#!/bin/sh
[ "$1" == "" ] && echo Usage: $0 list \<optional title\> && echo or…. $0 delete \<required item_id\> && exit;

if [ "$1" == "list" ]; then

sqlite3 ~/Library/Application\ Support/Dock/*.db "SELECT title, item_id, bundleid FROM apps WHERE title LIKE '%$2%' ORDER BY title ASC;" && exit

fi

DR=yes

OP=$1

[ "$1" == "delete_no_restart" ] && DR=no && OP=delete
if [ "$OP" == "delete" ]; then

[ "$2" == "" ] && echo Usage: $0 delete \'App ID\' && exit;

sqlite3 ~/Library/Application\ Support/Dock/*.db "DELETE from apps WHERE item_id=$2;" && [ "$DR" == "yes" ] && killall Dock

fi

Comments

rev says:

March 22, 2013 at 16:29

i’ve been playing around with the dock’s sqlite db for a while now and i’ve noticed one thing that might help you improve your script. the db has triggers defined to clean up stuff on delete from the items table. your script is deleting from the apps table, which has no triggers associated with it. if you change your script to delete from items where rowid=$2 instead, then the trigger item_deleted will get invoked and also delete from apps with the same item_id. other cleanup activities are invoked in that trigger too; for example, it will remove the item from any groups it was in, among other things. i think the items table is the root of all data and the apps table is just used for friendly display lookup, like what to print for the icon’s display name; it’s just a metadata table.

also i have noticed that the mac has some built-in event which i can’t put my finger on where it comes in and regenerates the entire launchpad db to add in any missing applications. i like to setup my launchpad with just the two dozen or so apps that i use regularly, but the mac won’t let me keep the launchpad that clean.

- Remon Pel says:
  
  March 24, 2013 at 10:06
  
  excellent addition, thank you