# Multiple monitor support



## Viro (Mar 22, 2005)

I wish Apple would make the menubar of apps appear on the the same monitor where the application window is displayed. As it is, if I have an application window on the secondary monitor, the menubar still appears on the first monitor. Highly annoying. Practically defeats the purpose of a second monitor.


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## Robn Kester (Mar 23, 2005)

I think the only solution to this would be to mirror the menu bar itself onto both displays. Might be possible for the display drivers to do this, who knows.

However I don't see the problem since most who use 2 displays are using 1 as their primary and the other is secondary so it doesnt need a menubar.


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## Viro (Mar 24, 2005)

I don't get that. How does using the other monitor as secondary remove the need for a menubar? That's precisely what I'm doing right now and I need the menubar on the  secondary monitor.


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## Robn Kester (Mar 24, 2005)

I posed this questoin on another forum and it was suggested that this could possibly be a task for a haxie or similar.

Viro - when I said secondary I was refereing to those who use it literally as a place to put pallettes and lesser used items, but where they still use the main display for the primary windows they are working in... where the menubar is at top.


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## adambyte (Mar 24, 2005)

True. If you use it that way, you don't really need a second menubar. However, if you use it the way Viro describes, then you need it because it's more like you've got two different computers.

The only possible work-around I can think of is learning keyboard shortcuts.


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## Viro (Mar 24, 2005)

I see how it would benefit people using applications that had loads of floating palettes. However, not everyone works with Photoshop . 

Still, hopefully Apple will come up with the option to enable this feature.


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## fryke (Mar 27, 2005)

I think we can agree that the current way Apple does it fits the first type of users, i.e. they have a clear _main_ and a clear _secondary_ monitor. I usually have the palettes and stuff on the secondary, but  I also have Mail.app's window "over there", so I see when Mail arrives (and into which box it automatically gets filtered). I also put other stuff I want in my view there, like the iChat contact list.

If you are of the second type, like Viro, you want to use one application on one and another on the other monitor. Right now, you have the choice of learning keyboard-combos (I STRONGLY suggest to use keyboard-combos as much as humanly possible, anyway!) or to wisely choose which apps are on the first, which on the second monitor, depending on their use of the menubar.

I have to admit I'd despise the idea of having the menubar a second time on the second monitor.


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## sinclair_tm (Mar 30, 2005)

i've used dual monitors for years and have never needed, or even thought of, having a menu bar on my second screen.  you can only have one app active at a time anyway, so haveing two different apps on two different screens seems pointless, but then i don't know what it is you are doing.  my second monitor has been used for pallets for graphic apps, ichat and messenger, diag boxes ( ie, copy, empty trash, stuffit, diskcopy, safari downloads, and itunes.) and never have needed a second menu bar. 
as fryke said, it would bug the heck out of me if it was there.


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## texanpenguin (Apr 21, 2005)

You know I've never thought of it as an inconvenience until right now.

Gee, thanks, Viro, now it's going to aggravate me EVERY time


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## Viro (Apr 21, 2005)

LOL. You can join me an complain to Apple .


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## AppleWatcher (Apr 27, 2005)

I will...  
Totally agree with you; there should be a menubar (or in any case a dock) on the second screen. I want to see which apps are open on my second screen, I want their functions at the top of my second screen. Logical as that.


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## chornbe (Apr 27, 2005)

*snicker*

Gee, you get that for free in Windows systems with multi-monitor support because the menu bar exists in the application... where I believe it should be, by the way. As much as I like my apple, I still think the menu bar belongs in the app.

$.02


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## Satcomer (Apr 27, 2005)

Then post it in Apple's Mac OSX Feedback.

I found the Apple feedback page (for most everything) here. if enough people provide feedback, Apple probably will respond. Also, if you are the third party developer, then I smell a shareware third party application brewing here.


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## MrNivit1 (Apr 27, 2005)

I remember back in the OS9 days that you could drag the menubar to the second monitor in the monitors preference panel.  Is this still possible in OSX, or does this simply re-assign the secondary monitor as the main monitor?  I definitly like Viro's idea about having two menubars, though.  What about two docks?


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## fryke (Apr 27, 2005)

you can do that, that's not the problem. he wants it on both at the same time but not mirroring the displays.


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## texanpenguin (Apr 28, 2005)

The menubar should merely move to whichever screen the active document window is on.


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## Lt Major Burns (Apr 28, 2005)

desktop manager. (version tracker) what behavior does that have with two monitors? it repeats the menu for each desktop that is active, and is set up to have different sets of apps active on different desktops. would it work on dual mon.? i have no idea....


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## fryke (Apr 28, 2005)

texanpenguin said: "The menubar should merely move to whichever screen the active document window is on." - and i SHIVER at the thought of it. I would start SCREAMING. I mean: Say you have two or three monitors. The system - with your thought - would become utterly unpredictable. That can't be "it". Let's keep it simple (first rule of interface design, I guess...) and predictable.

Apple has a menubar that's global. And I guess that's why it's on _one_ display, too. It's the master menubar on the master display. I don't think they'd move from that.


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## Viro (Apr 29, 2005)

Why would such a system be unpredictable? I see a window on a monitor, and lo and behold the menubar is on that monitor... I should add that this behaviour should only occur when the _main_ window of the application is on a particular monitor. Thus palettes, etc. shouldn't have a menubar anyway.


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## chornbe (Apr 29, 2005)

I agree that could get dizzying. If you can glue the menubar for a given application on top of the application, that would be ok. But the system-wide menu bar hopping around like that would be a problem.

I'm biased to the "menu in app" design that other GUIs offer, personally. I think it just makes more sense. And no, I don't just mean Windows  All the Unix/Linux offerings use the same model.


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## Pengu (Apr 29, 2005)

pfft. that leads to inconsistency, and a lack of things like Clock, menu extras, global menus (stuff in the apple menu) etc. the day Apple start taking interface hints from MS or the *NIX world, i'll marry a pig.


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## limeyx (Jun 22, 2005)

Viro said:
			
		

> I don't get that. How does using the other monitor as secondary remove the need for a menubar? That's precisely what I'm doing right now and I need the menubar on the  secondary monitor.



Right, it's obviously broken as it stands for a large number of use-cases.
Controlling an application on one display from menus on another is just unnatural. Like someone else said, if the menus were *inside* the application (where they belong anyway), then this is a non-issue.

So far there seems to be no solution


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## TommyWillB (Jun 22, 2005)

Viro said:
			
		

> I wish Apple would make the menubar of apps appear on the the same monitor where the application window is displayed. As it is, if I have an application window on the secondary monitor, the menubar still appears on the first monitor. Highly annoying. Practically defeats the purpose of a second monitor.


This isn't Windows where all application elements are in a single window. On the Mac you can have many windows for a single application. Which one of those would be the basis for deciding which monitor to use?

It'd be easier to just start learning the key-commands for things and wean yourself of the mouse all together.


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## TommyWillB (Jun 22, 2005)

chornbe said:
			
		

> http://www.jeffntom.com/misc/public/osx_com/no_application_window_menus.gif


I know you're just trying to push butons here, but NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO Application windows should NOT have menus within them!!!!


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## Viro (Jun 23, 2005)

TommyWillB said:
			
		

> This isn't Windows where all application elements are in a single window. On the Mac you can have many windows for a single application. Which one of those would be the basis for deciding which monitor to use?
> 
> It'd be easier to just start learning the key-commands for things and wean yourself of the mouse all together.



I haven't been too bothered by this issue for the last month or so since I don't have access to a secondary monitor anymore .

Nevertheless, I still think that some applications that do not have multiple windows should have menu bars at the top of the active monitor. Even with multiple windows, you should be able to just click on the icon in the dock, and say "Move to monitor 2" or something to that effect.


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## texanpenguin (Jun 23, 2005)

I've reversed my thoughts since I last posted here.

I feel that from a muscle-memory point of view, having the menubar static is important, ergonomically.

I mean, if you move the menubar, do you then also move the Dock?

It makes sense the way things work.

It'd be nice, though, if your screens were aligned, you could have the menubar span more than one monitor like the taskbar can on Windows.


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## TommyWillB (Jun 23, 2005)

Of course Apple would love us to solve this "problem" ourselves by simply buying a 30" Cinema Dispaly.


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