The Control Strip is a

user interface In the industrial design field of human–computer interaction, a user interface (UI) is the space where interactions between humans and machines occur. The goal of this interaction is to allow effective operation and control of the machine f ...

component introduced in the "classic"

System 7 System 7, codenamed "Big Bang", and also known as Mac OS 7, is a graphical user interface-based operating system for Macintosh computers and is part of the classic Mac OS series of operating systems. It was introduced on May 13, 1991, by Apple Co ...

Macintosh operating system. It currently exists as part of the Touch Bar interface in

macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...

History

The Control Strip was initially released in 1994 with the

PowerBook 500 The PowerBook 500 series (codenamed ''Blackbird'', which it shared with the older Macintosh IIfx) is a range of Apple Macintosh PowerBook portable computers first introduced by Apple Computer with the 540c model on May 16, 1994. It was the firs ...

series of

notebook computer A laptop, laptop computer, or notebook computer is a small, portable personal computer (PC) with a screen and alphanumeric keyboard. Laptops typically have a clam shell form factor with the screen mounted on the inside of the upper lid ...

s and the PowerBook Duo 280

subnotebook Subnotebook, also called ultraportable, superportable, or mini notebook, was a marketing term for laptop computers that are smaller and lighter than a typical notebook-sized laptop. Types and sizes As typical laptop sizes have decreased over t ...

computers, at that point shipping with

System 7.1 System 7, codenamed "Big Bang", and also known as Mac OS 7, is a graphical user interface-based operating system for Macintosh computers and is part of the classic Mac OS series of operating systems. It was introduced on May 13, 1991, by Apple Co ...

. Later on it was made available to desktop and portable Macintosh computers, beginning with

System 7.5.3 System 7, codenamed "Big Bang", and also known as Mac OS 7, is a graphical user interface-based operating system for Macintosh computers and is part of the classic Mac OS series of operating systems. It was introduced on May 13, 1991, by Apple Co ...

. Apple removed Control Strip in 2001 as a consequence of its move to

Mac OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. Within the market of ...

. Apple initially attempted to integrate the Control Strip’s features into the

Dock A dock (from Dutch language, Dutch ''dok'') is the area of water between or next to one or a group of human-made structures that are involved in the handling of boats or ships (usually on or near a shore) or such structures themselves. The ex ...

. After this was found to be too clumsy, most of its features were again duplicated in the

menu extra A menu extra, menu item, menulet, or status item is a graphical control element in macOS. It is a small indicator that appears at the right of the menu bar. They often provide quick ways to use applications (e.g. iChat) or display information (for ...

s of 10.1. An attempt was made at an

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...

reimplementation of the Control Strip for OS X, but it never received much developer traction and the last release is dated 27 October 2000. Apple revived the Control Strip as a component of its Touch Bar in October 2016. By default, the rightmost portion of the Touch Bar displays a subset of system controls previously available on the keyboard's function keys. When Control Strip is expanded the full set of system controls is displayed.

Features

Somewhat like the

system tray A taskbar is an element of a graphical user interface which has various purposes. It typically shows which programs are currently running. The specific design and layout of the taskbar varies between individual operating systems, but generally a ...

s of other operating systems, the Control Strip allowed easy access to status information about and control of simple tasks such as screen resolution,

AppleTalk AppleTalk is a discontinued proprietary suite of networking protocols developed by Apple Computer for their Macintosh computers. AppleTalk includes a number of features that allow local area networks to be connected with no prior setup or the n ...

activity, battery status etc. Each task appears as a button-like popup menu called a module, these modules are managed in the Finder as individual module files, which have their own folder in the System Folder ("Control Strip Modules") and are executed alongside the Control Strip as it starts up or can be dragged directly onto the strip while it is running. The Control Strip always anchors itself to the closest vertical screen edge (left or right,) but can be freely moved up and down both sides of any display by the user. It defaults to the lower left corner of the primary display on fresh systems. Users can choose whether to turn the Control Strip on and off and even set a

hot key computing, a keyboard shortcut also known as hotkey is a series of one or several keys to quickly invoke a software program or perform a preprogrammed action. This action may be part of the standard functionality of the operating system or a ...

to hide and reveal it using its control panel. Two buttons at either end allow the Strip to be collapsed and expanded (with the one opposite the screen edge also allowing the strip to be resized when dragged), while two more buttons just inside those allow one to scroll through a very full Strip. Holding down the option key while clicking turns the cursor into a distinctive hand shape that allows one to drag the Strip around the screen, rearrange modules within the Strip and drag modules out.

Extensibility

Control Strip modules were also available from many third parties. For example,

Conflict Catcher Conflict Catcher is a discontinued utility software application that was written by Jeff Robbin and published by Casady & Greene for classic Mac OS. It aided Macintosh users in solving conflicts between Mac OS that could occur on startup when a l ...

included a Control Strip module to switch extension sets, while

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used one to toggle SMB/NetBIOS networking. Some novelty modules even consisted of calculators, calendars and games. Like the System Trays of other OSs, this was often abused to insert a flotsam module that merely launched and quit a given application.

References

External links

* ** {{Mac OS Macintosh operating systems user interface