Mac Preferences and About Menu: what changed

Revision 1 to 2. Removed lines have a minus sign; added lines have a plus sign.

Old	New		Line
1	1		(macOS only)
2	2
3	3		There are certain items that should appear in the default application menu on the macOS menu bar of your application. While Lazarus does automatically add:
4	4
5	5		- Services
6	6		- Hide MyApp
7	7		- Hide Others
8	8		- Show All
9	9		- Quit MyApp
10	10
11	11		Lazarus does not add an "About MyApp" menu item or a "Preferences..." menu item. To add these two items on the same application menu as Quit, you have to perform a little trick.
12	12
13	13		Add a MainMenu component from the Standard tab of the component palette to your main form. Create a menu item and change its caption property in the Object Inspector to the name of your application just for reference. Then, under that menu add three sub-menu items with the following captions: About MyApp, "-" (a separator) and "Preferences..."
14	14
15		-	~~<figure>~~
16		-	~~<img src="MenuItems3new.jpg" title="MenuItems3new.jpg" />~~
17		-	~~<figcaption>MenuItems3new.jpg</figcaption>~~
18		-	~~</figure>~~
	15	+	![](/wiki-images/3/32/MenuItems3new.jpg)
19	16
20	17		Assign the "Preferences..." Menu Item Shortcut "Command ," using the ShortCut Editor (choose the Menu item ShortCut property in the Object Inspector and click on the ellipsis dots next to it). After checking the Meta key, change the Unknown key to a comma, this is how your shortcut will appear:
21	18
22		-	~~<figure>~~
23		-	~~<img src="MenuItemsGrab.png" title="MenuItemsGrab.png" />~~
24		-	~~<figcaption>MenuItemsGrab.png</figcaption>~~
25		-	~~</figure>~~
	19	+	![](/wiki-images/5/50/MenuItemsGrab.png)
26	20
27	21		Finally, to get these items on the MyApp application menu, we must change the caption of the first menu item in the main form's OnCreate event handler as follows:
28	22
29	23		``` pascal
30	24		procedure TForm1.FormCreate(Sender: TObject);
31	25		var
32	26		AppMenu : TMenuItem;
33	27		begin
34	28		AppMenu := TMenuItem.Create(Self); // Application menu
35	29		AppMenu.Caption := #$EF#$A3#$BF; // Unicode Apple logo char
36	30		MainMenu.Items.Insert(0, AppMenu);
37	31		end;
38	32		```
39	33
40	34		After recompiling your application and running it, you will notice that "About MyApp" and "Preferences..." have been added to the MyApp menu, which is where they should be.
41	35
42		-	~~<figure>~~
43		-	~~<img src="MenuItems4new.png" title="MenuItems4new.png" />~~
44		-	~~<figcaption>MenuItems4new.png</figcaption>~~
45		-	~~</figure>~~
	36	+	![](/wiki-images/0/05/MenuItems4new.png)
46	37
47	38		Did you notice the problem? Do you really want to call your application "MyApp" and not "My App"?
48	39
49	40		No, you cannot change the project file "program MyApp" to "program My App" or you are told "MyApp.lpr(1,11) Fatal: Syntax error, ";" expected but "identifier APP" found".
50	41
51	42		The solution is to change your application Info.plist file by opening your application bundle, navigating to Contents, double-clicking on Info.plist and using the Xcode plist editor to change the value of the "Bundle name" key to the string "My App" and saving it. Now when you run "MyApp" it displays as "My App".
52	43
53	44		Of course you would also now need to change the "About MyApp" caption too :-)
54	45
55	46		Finished? No. The Lazarus-generated menu items still show "Hide MyApp" and "Quit MyApp". To change these to "My App" you need to modify the main form's OnCreate event handler as below:
56	47
57	48		``` pascal
58	49		procedure TForm1.FormCreate(Sender: TObject);
59	50		var
60	51		AppMenu : TMenuItem;
61	52		begin
62	53		Application.Title := 'My App';
63	54		AppMenu := TMenuItem.Create(Self); // Application menu
64	55		AppMenu.Caption := #$EF#$A3#$BF; // Unicode Apple logo char
65	56		MainMenu.Items.Insert(0, AppMenu);
66	57		end;
67	58		```
68	59
69	60		And here is the final result:
70	61
71		-	~~<figure>~~
72		-	~~<img src="macOSMenuFinal.png" title="macOSMenuFinal.png" />~~
73		-	~~<figcaption>macOSMenuFinal.png</figcaption>~~
74		-	~~</figure>~~
	62	+	![](/wiki-images/9/92/MacOSMenuFinal.png)
75	63
76	64		To connect the menu options to an action, add a TActionList to the main form, add actions for About and Preferences (edit the properties and then create the appropriate OnExecute event handlers for each action), and then modify the main form's OnCreate event handler as below:
77	65
78	66		``` pascal
79	67		procedure TForm1.FormCreate(Sender: TObject);
80	68		var
81	69		AppMenu : TMenuItem;
82	70		AppAboutCmd : TMenuItem;
83	71		AppSepCmd : TMenuItem;
84	72		AppPrefCmd : TMenuItem;
85	73		begin
86	74		Application.Title := 'My App';
87	75
88	76		AppMenu := TMenuItem.Create(Self); // Application menu
89	77		AppMenu.Caption := #$EF#$A3#$BF; // Unicode Apple logo char
90	78		MainMenu.Items.Insert(0, AppMenu);
91	79
92	80		AppAboutCmd := TMenuItem.Create(Self);
93	81		AppAboutCmd.Action:= ActionList1.Actions[1];
94	82		AppMenu.Add(AppAboutCmd); // Add About as item in application menu
95	83
96	84		AppSepCmd := TMenuItem.Create(Self);
97	85		AppSepCmd.Caption := '-';
98	86		AppMenu.Add(AppSepCmd); // Add menu separator
99	87
100	88		AppPrefCmd := TMenuItem.Create(Self);
101	89		AppPrefCmd.Action:= ActionList1.Actions[2];
102	90		AppMenu.Add(AppPrefCmd); // Add Preferences as item in application menu
103	91
104	92		AppSepCmd := TMenuItem.Create(Self);
105	93		AppSepCmd.Caption := '-';
106	94		AppMenu.Add(AppSepCmd); // Add menu separator
107	95		end;
108	96		```
109	97
110	98		## See also
111	99
112	100		- [[Mac Show Application Title, Version, and Company\|Mac About Box with one line of code]]
113	101		- [[Introduction to platform-sensitive development]]
114	102		- [[Mac Preferences Read and Write]]
115	103		- [[Mac Show Application Title, Version, and Company]]
116	104		- [[Add an Apple Help Book to your macOS app]]
117	105		- [[macOS Programming Tips]]
118	106
119	107		---
120	108		From the Free Pascal wiki, page "Mac Preferences and About Menu", as it stood on 2021-12-09 after a change by Trev, out of the wiki's dump of 2024-05-26. Copyright stays with the author who wrote it, according to the old wiki's [[Licensing]] page. If you have concerns about this material, [message the admin](/wiki-contact).

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