Menu zen

With a 1280x800 screen, I decided to put a little effort into reducing my menu bar baggage.

Menu Zen

What I removed:

  • BlueTooth: Useful, but not on a day-to-day basis.
  • Time Machine: This system isn't backed up. What? No, really. Everything important on it is either in MobileMe or Subversion. All my other systems use Time Machine.
  • MobileMe Sync: Knowing when MobileMe is syncing isn't really that useful.
  • Keychain: Because I mostly use this to access Keychain Access, and I can just use Quicksilver.
  • Fast User Switching: Because it's usually just me using this computer.
  • Quicksilver: Because it functions just as well without the menu.
  • Volume: Because there's keys on the keyboard.

What I'm keeping:

  • smcFanControl: Because I want to run smcFanControl, but there's no way to turn off the menu.
  • ExpanDrive: Again, no way to turn off the option.
  • iChat: Because I want to be able to quit iChat and stay online, and keeping it in the menu is requirement. But I never use the menu.
  • WiFi: Because wireless connections take just long enough to establish for this indicator to be useful.
  • Battery: Obvious.
  • Spotlight: Because there's no official way to remove it. If there were, I'd probably use Quicksilver to activate it, but as it is I use it a lot too.

What I may change:

  • Add Script menu. Because it's cool.
  • Display temperature in smcFanControl. Very anti-zen, but useful information. I'd prefer if the temperature was in the menu somewhere after you clicked it, like Apple's battery menu and the "battery remaining" time.