Show HN: A terminal glued to the macOS dock
github.comEvery single day of my life since I started programming back in 2020 I open my projects through the terminal/ghostty. "cd path" + "code .". Until today I don't even know how to open vscode first then open a project from there.
I usually have 3-4 vscode windows open at the same time, and I like them in separate desktops (for mac users). i gotta admit, i use 8 desktops, 3-4 for vscode, 1 for arc, 1 for docker, 1 for postman etc.
So my daily routine when I turned on my mac was: (1) open ghostty; (2) cd-path+code.; (3) drag the vscode window to a desired desktop; (4) get back to the ghostty desktop; (5) repeat until all is open.
i was unbothered for 6y. Until i realized how inefficient i was being: (1) opening ghostty just to run one-off commands to open another app felt wrong, like why do I need a terminal if it's not a process I need to watch; (2) the need to go back to the ghostty desktop every time i wanted to open a new project and drag it to a new desktop and switch back... it's funny how we simply accept a habit and don't bother to fix it
i wanted a terminal that persisted across desktops AND that was always visible so i could access it anytime AND that wasn't big because i would only run one-off commands. so I created starboard.
where could I fit a terminal that was always visible and accessible? i looked at the macOS dock, i looked at the empty space to its right, and I said "that's it".
starboard is a floating terminal window that's literally glued to the dock, filling the blank space to the right, tracking its height and position live. it's visible from any desktop, a real companion to the dock, and it's a persistent shell.
to close the story on my routine, I now can happily jump straight to the desktop i want my project to be in and open it there through Starboard. i rarely open ghostyy, unless i really need it.
here's where feedback is massively important. i built this for the way i work with it, the way my dock is, which is in the bottom. my dock's position and height give me a perfect sized Starboard with 3 visible lines that I can happily work with. hearing from you guys how it appears to you would be essential for further improvement.
Original idea, I like it. Can you expand it vertically in order to show larger chunks of output if needed?
i thought about it, but starboard is glued to the dock. I'm thinking of two alternatives: (1) make it expand as needed; (2) a button to open a terminal/ghostty window.
what use case are you thinking for starboard? running agents?
hey Maphielbso, now Cmd+E expands it to 100% height when you need to see larger chunks, and btw I started running my agents in starboard because of this... nice call. Cmd+E snaps it back to dock height
Isn’t it the quake console but desktop wide?
Not that I dislike it.
it's a nice framing, it's the same family, but think of starboard as a quake console that's never dismissed and never steals focus, glued to the dock in a way that doesn't interfere with anything else, an now expands for longer processes (i.e. running agents) thanks to your feedbacks
Seems cool, does it supports dock on the left side? I always place dock in the left side
hey marshallku, it does support. download the newest version. when dock is on the left, starboard defaults to the bottom right corner, same for right side dock and auto hide. what kind of commands are you most using?
starboard currently assumes a bottom dock and 1 monitor. how many of you use left/right dock placement, multi-monitor, and auto-hide? how is your setup? working on improvements in whatever order you guys need
got some people using starboard so some updates:
(1) starboard now expands to full height, you can run agents and longer processes now
(2) starboard is now also a downloadable app, macOS will warn the dev can't be verified because it's ad-hoc signed, just hit privacy & security -> open anyway, step by step in the README.md
(3) source is still there if you want to read it yourself and build
I love it. No need to deal with windows just for the sake of one or two commands.
that's the motivation, how are you using it?
Nice! This is pretty inventive.
tks! are you using it for any use case?
Nice idea!
tks! are you using it for any use case?