Macbook Pro with Touchbar questions

roiegat
Contributor III

So I'm still waiting for my test Macbook Pro with the Touchbar, but been trying to look into what we'll be able to allow and what we wouldn't. We already disable Siri and the the unlocking with Apple Watch, but were going to test the touch id for use. Looking at the system preference for Touch ID online it seems that you can add finger for: unlocking mac, apple pay, iTunes and Apple Store.

So the question is:
1) Does anyone have one of these magical Macbook Pro with Touchbar yet?
2) Are you able to enable unlocking, but disable the apple pay and iTunes and Apple Store function?
3) How loud is the keyboard?

Here's an article with some good shows of the panel:
https://9to5mac.com/2016/11/16/how-to-setup-touch-id-fingerprint-apple-pay-cards-transaction-history-macbook-pro/

13 REPLIES 13

madscripter
New Contributor II

I am curious as well except that I want to disable unlocking, but enable the Apple pay and iTunes and Apple Store function (maybe)
Has anyone seen a way of enforcing this?

MikeF
Contributor II

I picked one up last night.

There are 3 checkable options for the touch ID
1 Unlocking your Mac
2 Apple Pay
3 iTunes and App Store

Keyboard is the same type as the 12 in macbook has so it is pretty quiet.

Just started playing with it but is is so cool to use the touch id for all the admin prompts when installing stuff.

roiegat
Contributor III

@MikeF does it create a plist file with your settings? Ideally would be nice if we can lock the ability just to access apple pay and iTunes and keep the ability to unlock the mac.

Look
Valued Contributor III

@MikeF You must have got a better unit than us! We just had a 15" demo unit arrive and I can't believe how noisy the keyboard is compared to my previous generation MacBook, it's a very loud sharp click click click that I find very irritating. The other thing I find quite annoying is that the track pad is so big (LIKE FREAKING ENORMOUS) that when I click near the top it does a weird kind of counterclick against my palm that has slid up onto the corner of it, functionally it's fine, it's just a little strange to use.

Maybe I just need to get used to it...

MikeF
Contributor II

@roiegat I don't see a plist file for this. But I am sure that some thing is there.

@Look I like the keyboard but then I bought this as a replacement for my 12 in MacBook. I wanted more power and this has it.

josh_goldberg
New Contributor

I have been able to get about 5 of them in... keyboard is LOUD as ever, I'm hoping with more use it will quiet down a bit. Touchpad while very nice, is very big on the 15" model... I am used to resting my palms below the touchpad so this has definitely become an issue with the new touchpad size.. I am now having to rest my palms on the left and right side of the touchpad

roiegat
Contributor III

@MikeF Can you run composer and grab a snapshot and change the settings to see what plist it effects. Wondering if I can create it ahead of time as I'm still waiting for mine to arrive.

dpratl
Contributor II

Hi @roiegat ,

If you mean the standard functions like Siri, Sound and so on this plist is effected:
/Users/*/Library/Preferences/com.apple.controlstrip.plist

and it looks like that in my environment:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>FullCustomized</key>
    <array>
        <string>com.apple.system.group.brightness</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.mission-control</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.launchpad</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.group.keyboard-brightness</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.dictation</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.group.media</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.group.volume</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.siri</string>
    </array>
    <key>MiniCustomized</key>
    <array>
        <string>com.apple.system.brightness</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.volume</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.mute</string>
        <string>com.apple.system.screen-lock</string>
    </array>
    <key>last-messagetrace-stamp</key>
    <array>
        <real>505230989.382254</real>
    </array>
</dict>
</plist>

I replace Siri with the Screen Lock Button.
<string>com.apple.system.screen-lock</string>

BR
Daniel

karthikeyan_mac
Valued Contributor

Thanks @dpratl.

The below command will add System Lock item to Touch Bar Control Strip

defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized –array-add com.apple.system.screen-lock
killall ControlStrip

karthikeyan_mac
Valued Contributor

Thanks @dpratl.

The below command will add System Lock item to Touch Bar Control Strip

defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.screen-lock
killall ControlStrip

ammonsc
Contributor II

Perfect! I now run this script. Thanks all.

#!/bin/bash

# Get the Username of the currently logged user
loggedInUser=`/bin/ls -l /dev/console | /usr/bin/awk '{ print $3 }'`

##Set control strip for user

sudo -u $loggedInUser defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.screen-lock
sudo -u $loggedInUser defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.mute
sudo -u $loggedInUser defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.volume
sudo -u $loggedInUser defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.brightness

killall ControlStrip

CorpIT_eB
Contributor II

@ammonsc This works but I tried to rearrange the order of the icons and now I have a blank space in between each icon any idea how to fix this?

#!/bin/bash

Get the Username of the currently logged user

loggedInUser=/bin/ls -l /dev/console | /usr/bin/awk '{ print $3 }'

Set control strip for user

sudo -u $loggedInUser defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.brightness sudo -u $loggedInUser defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.volume sudo -u $loggedInUser defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.mute sudo -u $loggedInUser defaults write com.apple.controlstrip MiniCustomized -array-add com.apple.system.screen-lock killall ControlStrip

CorpIT_eB
Contributor II

Does anyone know how to undo this?

I can't seem to find the files to remove this policy on my test machine and the touch bar now looks all messed up.

Anyone's help would be kindly appreciated.

Thank you.

UPDATE: Never mind I answered my own question since the script does this by user showing the hidden file structure and navigating to ~/Library/Preferences/ and deleting com.apple.controlstrip.plist and restarting the machine will fix this problem on 10.14.4