With a bit of tinkering the TouchBar can go from mild mannered to super hero.
My ToolBar has led a double life. At first, the Touch Bar was thought to be an all singing and dancing touch screen.
At the announcement, we saw how it could be used to help with the editing of video, Photoshop and even DJ-ing. However, once people bought the MacBook Pros, that incorporated the TouchBar, they found that it had no real value. Some YouTubers were able to make use of it in their editing process, but even here it was thought to be underused.
The view seemed to be that the Touch Bar should be inherently better, than the function keys by itself with no further assistance. This view is false and even Apple are to blame for this narrow perception. Just as Automator and Shortcuts are allowing a more fluid use of devices under the direct control of its users then the Touch Bar also requires this sophisticated level of interaction.
I wanted to see how I could bring the Touch Bar under my control and see if it was better than the function keys that it had replaced.
It has to be obviously better than the function keys it has replaced.
My initial response was the same as all the naysayers. With no perceived advantage my Touch Bar went mostly unused the great majority of the time. I clung onto the hope that Apple may make it a programmable element just as the function keys had been before.
Finally, I saw a comment that briefly spoke about the Better Touch Tool(BTT). A utility that helped Macs and gave the mouse, keyboard and now the Trackpad more functionality.
We'll just look at how BTT helps me with the Touch Bar. It should be noted that this will only be how I barely scratch the surface of what this software is able of doing. Basically, I can now display buttons on the ToolBar and to assign functionality to then when I touch or swipe it.
I now have ten icons that have tasks including toggling light and dark mode; connecting my AirPods; opening my Contacts book; activating a link to Google Maps and YouTube; speaking text; starting the screengrab process; Dictation and opening a folder that contains my most frequently used folders. I also have sliders for brightness and sound(using Star Trek colours) and the current time in Hong Kong.
Not surprisingly, all the items are useful to me on at least a weekly basis. A few buttons are used several times a day. These include connecting to my AirPods, Speaking Text, sliders and screen grab.
If you have any experience with Automator or Applescript, you will love how BTT can link closely to what you have produced. I'll briefly explain my process of populating my Touch Bar.
Adding any interaction to the Touch Bar starts by accessing the Preferences within BTT. From here you choose whether to add a Button or a Widget/Gizmo.
I tend to select both types and then check within the predefined actions if the desired functionality is already there to access. The most straight forward were buttons to reproduce the Screengrab button found on Apple's default Touch Bar and also a button to toggle Dark Mode. With the Speaking Text button, it was just a case of attaching a Custom Keyboard Shortcut that is fired when I touch the button.
For most cases, I use the Launch Application from the Predefined Events menu. This allows me to quickly access Contacts, open a general website or launch an Automator .wokflow or .app file.
Through simple programming, my perception of the Touch Bar has been transformed from a function key usurper into a unique and highly personal form of communication with my Mac.