Easy way to switch between color and grayscale display?

Hi Marja,

Here is a brief AppleScript that will toggle between color and grayscale display each time it is run. Save it as an application, drag it into your Dock, and away you go. Tested on High Sierra 10.13.2. You may have to authorize scripting access via System Preferences : Security & Privacy : Privacy tab : Accessibility. Just check the box next to whatever you choose to name your script.

This code was courtesy of user3439894 at stackoverflow, where there is also an interesting bash script too.

tell application "System Preferences"

launch

reveal anchor "Seeing_Display" of pane id "com.apple.preference.universalaccess"

end tell

tell application "System Events" to tell process "System Preferences"

delay 1

click checkbox "Use grayscale" of window "Accessibility"

end tell

tell application "System Preferences" to if it is running then quit

return

I tried doing this with Automator and it worked. I was going to upload the little saved app in the reply, but apparently you can only upload images. 😟

It was quite easy to do. The steps I added in Automator were:

1. Open application "System Preferences.app"
2. <I hit record ("Watch me do")>
   1. clicked on "Accessibilities"
   2. clicked on "Displays" (On the left)
   3. clicked the "Use Greyscale" checkbox
3. <stop recording>
4. Quit application "System Preferences.app"
5. Save as an application (I saved it as, "greyscale.app" to the Desktop)

To allow this to work, you must open your system preferences (Yes, again! LOL). Select "Security & Privacy". Select "Accessibility" (On the left). Check the name of your new saved app, in my case, "greyscale.app".

(You will have to click the lock icon [bottom left] and enter your admin password to make these changes.)

Now, when you want to switch between color or greyscale, just double-click the new app. If it's color it checks "Use Greyscale", if it's already greyscale, it unchecks it!

Marja,

Make this one line change, click the compile button in Script Editor, and run:

click checkbox "Use grayscale" of window 1

That would indicate that you didn't include the first step in the automator code I posted:

Open application "System Preferences.app"

LOL. That's what happened to me too the first attempt.

Sorry worked out what it was now everything ok.

Glad to help.