Disable Caps Lock Indicator on macOS Sonoma

Going to loose my mind!!!! It gets in the way constantly! there is plenty of code writing and other programs were I use cap locks to make it more efficient but I literally cannot see around the icon. Especially if you are searching for names in emails. They REALLY need to make this one optional! I rarely complain but I would guess that I have already lost 30 mins out of my day trying to get around the distraction of this fantastic new feature

Lesley2029 wrote:

but when you want to use CAPS LOCK the indicator is ver intrusive and in your way.

It’s hardly intrusive to me.

I’ve been using Sonoma for months and I didn’t notice it until someone posted here. Maybe this post.

If you need it to go away, complaining here won’t make that happen. Use the feedback page to express your desire for a switch to disable it. If you and about 10,000 other people send feedback, they might change it.

I strongly suspected that a solution of this sort, a real solution, existed. Thank you you for finding it and posting the exact steps in terminal.

For readers who have not used Terminal before, only and always select-copy-paste code such as yochees provides into Terminal. Use the keyboard to enter your password, but do not try to type in commands.

The 10,000 complaints may get Apple to fix it, or make a switch available, but, when as many people are annoyed by this feature as now seems to be the case, a contributor with a keen sense of smell or something similar in programming terms, will usually offer up a solution such as that offered by yochees in the post that follows yours (at the time I write this).

In a sense, what he has offered us is the switch so many of us wanted.

The 10,000 complaints may get Apple to fix it, or make a switch available, but, when as many people are annoyed by this feature as now seems to be the case, a contributor with a keen sense of smell or something similar in programming terms, will usually offer up a solution such as that offered by yochees in the post that follows yours (at the time I write this).

I would have had to care enough to search out a solution like that. It should have been obvious that it didn’t bother me in the least. I cannot comprehend why it bothers you that much.

This is seriously a very annoying feature. I can't imagine why someone would think making this a default setting was a good idea. I wasted a lot of time in an application I was using trying to figure out what the blue arrow was, only to later discover it's my Mac. Now I have to waste more time trying to figure out how to disable it.

In the picture below you can see how the blue arrow obstructs my view. In this instance I was aligning text to the column, and this annoying blue arrow was in my view and distracting me constantly.

Joe1618 wrote:

I can't imagine why someone would think making this a default setting was a good idea.

It is frequently difficult to imagine why other people like different things than we do or find different ways of doing things preferable. But, it is nonetheless often the case.

Yeah..I was doing the same thing as I thought it was a problem with Excel until the Blue arrow showed up in Safari!

I agree, who in their right mind thought this was a good idea? Steve is rolling in his ashes...

This is just too much all this apple stuff turning into windows garb, if i wanted this nonsense i would get a windows machine, then i find i can't turn this nonsense off. This should be a feature in accessibility for people that need it.

I want this turned off now and not you "apple" forcing these changes. STOP doing this.

This total goes against what SJ used to say about stealing focus, it steals focus away from your attention to this dam bright icon on the screen. I have for how many years done fine without it, why and what idiot thought this would be a good idea. Over engineering something that does not need improvement.

People want to carry on and get work done, i don't come in your office and start moving stuff around and putting post it notes on everything, so stop messing with users like this. GIMICK

@autnagrag

In many command line instructions, it's simply a matter of changing the 'false' command to 'true'. (or vise versa)

If you successfully turned it off, try this to reverse it.

sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "Add 'redesigned_text_cursor:Enabled' bool true" /Library/Preferences/FeatureFlags/Domain/UIKit.plist

I guess I meant "temporary solution" not so much "temporary" :) It will make you forget the only real issue with Sonoma and you can get back to watching the beautiful screen savers. I wish they could keep moving as desktop wall papers like behind the widgets. It looks cool for the like 2 seconds that it is coming to a halt.

dialabrain wrote:

And I like Sonoma fine even with the Caps Indicator. I also don't bother with screen savers, beautiful or otherwise. 😎

I think the caps lock indicator is great. And, as I have an MBA, when I'm not using it, it's closed (because cats). so, I don't bother with screensavers anymore. Though, if they added the Flying Toasters, I might be tempted.

IdrisSeabright wrote:

Though, if they added the Flying Toasters, I might be tempted.

FWIW, these worked in Monterey on Intel Macs. Never tried it on Ventura or Sonoma on Apple silicon.

https://en.infinisys.co.jp/product/afterdarkclassicset/index.shtml

Well, they're all useful features to some.

A central key to good UI design is to not make disruptive new features the default on new Operating Systems upgrades. The second key related key is to be able to disable new features.

tuqqer wrote:

Well, they're all useful features to some.

A central key to good UI design is to not make disruptive new features the default on new Operating Systems upgrades.

It’s not disruptive to me. I didn’t even notice it. Having to swipe around to see the content I’m referencing is incredibly disrupting.

Apple always makes new features the default.