Different Resolutions for Different Users

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Level 1

29 points

Different Resolutions for Different Users

Hello,

I just got my parents their first Mac - a 20" iMac. I am just setting it up now, and all is going smoothly. The one snag I've had thus far is in setting the screen resolution.

My dad's eyesight is not so great, so I wanted to make things "bigger" for him on this beautiful display. I first toyed around within Safari, making the text bigger, but found that doing so messed with the formating of different sites. So, I instead went into System Preferences and change the resolution from 1280x800 to 840x524. I was very happy with this solution, until I switched from his account to my mom's. Needless to say, Mom's vision is not THAT bad and 840x525 looks awful to her.

I assumed the display settings applied only to the user changing them. Guess I was wrong. So, my question:

Can I somehow set different resolutions for different user accounts?

Thanks much,
Matt

Posted on Dec 25, 2008 5:55 PM

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Answer 1

V.K.

Level 9

56,192 points

Dec 25, 2008 8:00 PM in response to mac032

no, display resolution is set globally and there is no way around that.
other than resetting display resolution by hand every time you switch you can use zoom feature. control+scroll will zoom in/out.
you can also try playing with resolution independence which doesn't require changing display resolution. However, i should warn you that resolution independence is experimental in leopard (and quite buggy) and my not work well.
In particular, Finder's toolbar looked pretty terrible when I tried it.

on your dad's account run the following terminal command and log out/in.

defaults write -g AppleDisplayScaleFactor 1.5

1.5 is the scaling factor and you can put anything else there. the default value is 1. to restore the default run

defaults write -g AppleDisplayScaleFactor 1

and log out/in.

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Answer 2

mac032 Author

Level 1

29 points

Dec 26, 2008 3:55 PM in response to V.K.

That's a bummer.

A friend suggested there is a way to write a script to have the resolution change at each user login.

Instead of your suggestion of writing a script for magnification, could I write a script for login to change the resolution?

I have never written a script or used Automator before, so I would need a little help actually doing that.

Again, your help is appreciated.

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Answer 3

V.K.

Level 9

56,192 points

Dec 26, 2008 4:36 PM in response to mac032

mac032 wrote:
That's a bummer.

A friend suggested there is a way to write a script to have the resolution change at each user login.

Instead of your suggestion of writing a script for magnification, could I write a script for login to change the resolution?

First, understand that what I suggested is not a script. it's a command that you only need to run once and it affects only one account. you don't have to redo it on every login.

I have never written a script or used Automator before, so I would need a little help actually doing that.

It might be possible but it would have to be an apple script, not an automator script and it would have to use GUI scripting. there isn't any way around that. as such it would be highly unreliable. I'll have to play with it and see if I can make something like this work.

Again, your help is appreciated.

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Answer 4

V.K.

Level 9

56,192 points

Dec 26, 2008 5:10 PM in response to mac032

ok, the following sort of works. on your dads account go to system preferences->universal access and check the box to enable access to assistive devices. next go to system preferences->displays and check the box to show displays in menu bar. the script below will work to change resolution among the 3 resolutions that show up in the display menu in the menu bar.

paste the following into Script Editor (it's in /Applications/Utilities).

<pre style="
font-family: Monaco, 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;
font-size: 10px;
margin: 0px;
padding: 5px;
border: 1px solid #000000;
width: 720px;
color: #000000;
background-color: #ADD8E6;
overflow: auto;"
title="this text can be pasted into the Script Editor">
delay 1
tell application "System Events" to tell the front menu bar of process "SystemUIServer"
tell (first menu bar item whose value of attributes contains "displays")
click
tell (first menu item of front menu whose name is "1600 x 1200, 60 Hz, Millions")
click
end tell

end tell
end tell</pre>

Change the resolution "1600 x 1200, 60 Hz, Millions" in the above script to what you need. save the script as an application. add this application to login items in system preferences->accounts->login items.

Now repeat this for every account on the computer changing the resolution accordingly.

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