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Duplicate Menu Bar on Multiple Monitors, Possible?
- Thread starter chelsel
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One OS = 1 Menu bar
Look for third party macro utilities or floating menu utilities or mouse click utilities and roll your own solution. www.versiontracker.com
Look for third party macro utilities or floating menu utilities or mouse click utilities and roll your own solution. www.versiontracker.com
1 OS = 1 Menu bar? Actually I'm running OS X, Windows and CentOS on my machine, so it's like 3 OS... but I'm still just looking for 1 menu bar... just two copies of it 
Thanks for the tip on DejaMenu, it looks like a good interim solution, and a potentially long term solution if I can't figure out a way to dupe the menu bar.
Now, how do I move the menu bar? I tried clicking on it and dragging but... no dice.
Cliff.
Thanks for the tip on DejaMenu, it looks like a good interim solution, and a potentially long term solution if I can't figure out a way to dupe the menu bar.
Now, how do I move the menu bar? I tried clicking on it and dragging but... no dice.
Cliff.
I asked about this a while ago. Hope Apple supports extending the menu bar to the second monitor in Leopard. Not all of us have a 30" ACD. I just want the menu bars right side (where the clock is etc) to be stretch to the end of the second monitor.
Although I assume most people use multiple monitors side by side, they don't have to be side by side or even contiguous. Each monitor maps to a portion of a very large virtual display space. People who do video production sometimes use 3 or 4 monitors, some on top of others. Should the menu bar span all of them?
How big is your monitor and how much optional stuff do you have on it?
the real issue is usability... if you are 'working' on the right-hand monitor but your File menu is on the left-hand monitor then it's a royal p.i.t.a. to keep mousing over between monitors. This is a perfect scenario where the one menu bar per application model of Windows beats the Mac. Really hope Apple wakes up to the multi-monitor user requirements.
And, yes, I'm aware of keyboard shortcuts... but if I wanted to use the keyboard I'd use DOS
And, yes, I'm aware of keyboard shortcuts... but if I wanted to use the keyboard I'd use DOS
the real issue is usability... if you are 'working' on the right-hand monitor but your File menu is on the left-hand monitor then it's a royal p.i.t.a. to keep mousing over between monitors. This is a perfect scenario where the one menu bar per application model of Windows beats the Mac. Really hope Apple wakes up to the multi-monitor user requirements.
And, yes, I'm aware of keyboard shortcuts... but if I wanted to use the keyboard I'd use DOS
i don't know if it's possible but what would be nice in future OS, is if somehow the menubar itself could be mirrored on all displays... so that all desktops on all monitors would display the same exact menu bar...
i don't know if it's possible but what would be nice in future OS, is if somehow the menubar itself could be mirrored on all displays... so that all desktops on all monitors would display the same exact menu bar...
that would be so useful
Some applications such as After Effects CS3 will not let you extend areas to the second monitor without getting a "gap" that's the same height as the menu bar on the second monitor. The only way is to undock the items, and that's a headache, but a workaround.
I have dual 20" Wide Samsungs, each running at 1680x1050. If I had a 30" ACD, I wouldn't complain obviously. But they need to think of the people with multiple monitors.
Under Windows, there are many tools that duplicate the taskbar and extend it to the second monitor, let's just call it a "virtual task bar"..
What you have in the Windows task bar is what you have on the Mac in the dock and the right side of the menu bar. The actual menu bar is attached to the application window and if you move window to the secondary monitor the menu bar moves, too. I have an 30"ACD plus a 21" Wacom Cintiq right now on my machine and this is one the times I wish Apple would copy Microsoft for a change.
Steffen
Steffen
Apple woke up to multi-monitor user requirements in 1987. The thing is, y'see, that the stopwatch doesn't support your claim. The Windows menu model is without fail the least efficient alternative in current use. The Mac's model - even with large and irregular desktop spaces - is most efficient. With a *truly* huge desktop the typical UNIX model of having the whole menu hierarchy as a context menu can barely surpass the Mac.
Completely nonsensical. Having the menu bar jump around is a great way to reduce user efficiency and effectiveness. And that's even before you consider the reality that monitors can be arranged in such a way that your suggestion would leave the menu bar in the middle of the desktop.
Huh? 22 years ago Apple had no concept of multiple monitors, and it's self-evident from using multiple monitors. Having a fixed menu bar on the top left when the active application is on a right-side monitor is not "efficient". To say otherwise suggests a person has never used multiple monitors. I can't say Windows has it right, though with dual monitors, there is a logic and ease to having the menu closer to the mouse, despite the loss of Fitt's Law efficiencies.
In my experience, neither Apple nor MS has seriously considered UI concerns of multiple monitors. I hope that both Apple and Microsoft begin to take it seriously sooner than later. Dual monitors have been easy even on Windows for over a decade and are becoming commonplace; solutions are ten years overdue and still look to be a long ways off.
I say otherwise and have used multiple monitors routinely - on multiple platforms - over a span of nearly two decades. I'll turn it back at you: A fixed menu bar at any fixed, and rooted, location of any practical desktop today - including very large and non-convex spaces - is more efficient than the alternatives. To say otherwise suggests a person has never actually looked at the numbers coming out of every experiment on this subject but rather relies on their gut sense of how things "must" be.
The OS X fixed menu may be the most efficient of all the inefficient schemes, but it's not efficient. As the desktop size increases, the distance to a fixed menu location becomes greater. The inefficiency scales with desktop size.
As Palm and then Apple brought new and more effective interfaces for handheld devices, I believe that there are significant improvements possible, yet to be invented, for the large desktop (multiple monitor) interface. I look forward to them, because the current methods, fundamentally unchanged for 25 year-old 9" monitor design, only get worse as desktop sizes increase.
As Palm and then Apple brought new and more effective interfaces for handheld devices, I believe that there are significant improvements possible, yet to be invented, for the large desktop (multiple monitor) interface. I look forward to them, because the current methods, fundamentally unchanged for 25 year-old 9" monitor design, only get worse as desktop sizes increase.
I would suggest using Spaces on Leopard to your advantage. It might defeat the purpose of you utilizing multiple displays, and I'm also not sure how it works on multiple displays, but having virtual desktops for each application would be a simple keyboard shortcut away to have to travel to the menu bar for that particular application.
The Windows/Linux method may be useful for multiple displays in situations such as this, but for the majority of others who use a single display, having one menu that takes up far less screen real estate when having many windows open has its advantages as well. Also, one would most likely place the menu bar on the middle display of three in order to make it less of a hassle, as opposed to creating more by placing it on the left or right screen, but I understand your point.
Also, the DejaMenu app suggested displays a replicant menu bar wherever your mouse is, making it even more efficient than any OS method in this situation.
The Windows/Linux method may be useful for multiple displays in situations such as this, but for the majority of others who use a single display, having one menu that takes up far less screen real estate when having many windows open has its advantages as well. Also, one would most likely place the menu bar on the middle display of three in order to make it less of a hassle, as opposed to creating more by placing it on the left or right screen, but I understand your point.
Also, the DejaMenu app suggested displays a replicant menu bar wherever your mouse is, making it even more efficient than any OS method in this situation.
Mac has many windows in one app
There's another difference in the Macintosh Way that people are ignoring: each app has many independent windows. For example, in the stats package that I use, I have a data explorer window, a command window, a graphics window, a plot window, and two dataset windows, all open on the screen at the same time. In Windows, all these windows are forced to be inside one application window. In Mac OS, they are independent, and could be moved to separate screens. The plot window, in particular, is just a display, and the mouse doesn't affect it (usually). I don't go up to the menubar for very much when I'm using this package, and I don't think I would mind having to go across a couple of screens occasionally. Someday I must get a couple more screens and try it.
Of course, if you're running badly-ported Windows apps on a Mac, you're trying to fit the Windows Way into the Mac Way, and it doesn't work very well.
There's another difference in the Macintosh Way that people are ignoring: each app has many independent windows. For example, in the stats package that I use, I have a data explorer window, a command window, a graphics window, a plot window, and two dataset windows, all open on the screen at the same time. In Windows, all these windows are forced to be inside one application window. In Mac OS, they are independent, and could be moved to separate screens. The plot window, in particular, is just a display, and the mouse doesn't affect it (usually). I don't go up to the menubar for very much when I'm using this package, and I don't think I would mind having to go across a couple of screens occasionally. Someday I must get a couple more screens and try it.
Of course, if you're running badly-ported Windows apps on a Mac, you're trying to fit the Windows Way into the Mac Way, and it doesn't work very well.
Drop-down menu's are slowly becomming obsolete and being replaced with context sensitive menus that can be invoked with a right-click and by button bars for frequently used tasks that reside on the window to which they're relevant.
If you really need the drop-down menus often, then your app is probably out of date or poorly designed... so do what they should have done and make the menu choices available as a context menu with DejaMenu as linked above... you can't get a better solution than that (at least in terms of distance your mouse needs to travel).
If you really need the drop-down menus often, then your app is probably out of date or poorly designed... so do what they should have done and make the menu choices available as a context menu with DejaMenu as linked above... you can't get a better solution than that (at least in terms of distance your mouse needs to travel).
Google is your friend... DejaMenu is what you are looking for.
I got it from Emeek77 aka AppleSoldier on YouTube.
I got it from Emeek77 aka AppleSoldier on YouTube.