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Command line or script to activate Reduce Transparency

Bernard_Huang
Contributor III

Posted on ‎03-23-2017 09:18 PM

Hi all,

Would any of you know the command or script to activate "Reduce Transparency" within System Preferences > Accessibility > Display ?

WIthin our company we are using macOS Sierra 10.12.3 with Targus DisplayLink Docks. When connecting the Macbook (with 10.12.3) to the Targus docking stations, the monitor display looks a bit off. Somethings to refresh rate is not right, sometimes the colours are a bit off.

We searched DisplayLink's website, http://support.displaylink.com/knowledgebase/articles/949426 , it recommends:
"
Corrupted window title bar and widgets. To work around, select System Preferences -> Accessibility -> Display -> Reduce transparency (27244226)
" We have tried their suggestion, and it seems to be better.

So we want to use Casper policy to roll this setting out, but we need a command line that will do that.

Thanks in advance :)

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mm2270
Legendary Contributor III

Posted on ‎03-24-2017 08:08 AM

Hi Bernard,

That setting gets stored in each user's com.apple.universalaccess.plist file. To deploy it, you can either try scripting it into each user's plist, or do the following for a Config Profile:

  1. Open Terminal and type in the following. This creates a new plist on your Desktop with the setting you're looking for.
    • defaults write ~/Desktop/com.apple.universalaccess.plist reduceTransparency -bool true
  2. Now run the following in Terminal:
    • plutil -convert xml1 ~/Desktop/com.apple.universalaccess.plist
  3. Go into your JSS > Configuration Profiles, and create a new one. Give it a name, set any other settings, like Site, Category, etc. And set the "Level" to "User Level"
  4. Click on Custom Settings and add that payload with the configure button. Click Upload Plist and find the plist on your Desktop. It should show com.apple.universalaccess for the domain, and something like {reduceTransparency=true} for the setting. If you see an error when uploading it, make sure you did step 2 to convert it to an xml or the JSS won't accept it.
  5. Save the Configuration Profile, scope it and deploy. Might want to only scope it to a couple of test machines to start with to see how it works.

I tested it out quickly here and when it's installed, this is what I see in the Accessibility settings

32f632231df741778f0d1dbbfe34e415

Note that it's enabled and greyed out, so user's can't disable it.

Although you could script this to just write that setting into their plist, using a Config Profile enables it and doesn't allow it to get unchecked unless the configuration profile is removed from the Mac.
The only caveat I should mention is that it doesn't seem to take effect right away. What appears to happen is, any applications that were open, other than the Finder, don't see the setting. However, when launching new apps, the menubar goes white-ish, instead of the semi transparent version. Not sure what the best way is to make all apps adopt it, but I have a feeling even if you did it via script you'd have the same issue. Clicking that checkbox must purge some cached setting somewhere and force all apps to use the adjustment.

Anyway, hope that helps.