You finally updated OS X to 10.6.6, and the very first app you downloaded from the Mac App Store was no other than Twitter for Mac (aka Tweetie 2). Great, you love the app, but there’s a few things that would make your life better. Then, out of nowhere, MacHeist comes out and says there are easter eggs for people who supported Tweetie in the past by buying one of its bundles. For a summary, check out TechCrunch’s Twitter For Mac Comes With A Secret Backdoor To Thank The MacHeist Loyalists.
Now you want in on the fun, don’t you? You’re in luck. Well, a little bit. Twitter seems to be fluttering with a few of these eggs that can be enabled through the terminal window. These features include the ability to use the “esc” key to close the compose window, type anywhere to tweet, user timeline derepeater, as well as others. Here’s a screenshot of the secret preferences pane in Twitter for Mac, which you can activate any of those settings in terminal. I will update this post as I find the other terminal tweaks.
1) Open up terminal and paste in the following commands (or choose the ones you want to use individually):
defaults write com.twitter.twitter-mac HideInBackground 1 defaults write com.twitter.twitter-mac ScrollingMakesKeyAndOrdersFront 1 defaults write com.twitter.twitter-mac UserTimelineDerepeater 1 defaults write com.twitter.twitter-mac ESCClosesComposeWindow 1 defaults write com.twitter.twitter-mac TypeAnywhereToTweet 1 defaults write com.twitter.twitter-mac NormalComposeWindowLevel 0 defaults write com.twitter.twitter-mac ShowFullNames 1 defaults write com.twitter.twitter-mac QuoteTweetSyntax –string ‘{TEXT} (via @{USERNAME}: )’
Personally, I found the “ESCClosesComposeWindow” and “TypeAnywhereToTweet” commands most useful.
Update 1: All of the commands are now included except for the link color.
Update 2: Tweaky, a new GUI app for the super secret preferences by Aral Balkan, has been released. Check it out here if you’re interested in using a graphical user interface instead of the terminal window.
Update 3: I added in the new “Show Full Names” and “Quote Syntax” preferences that came with v2.0.2 as seen below:
