Add Support for System Preferences ⚙️

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1

I was playing with hook to add support for System Preferences :gear: deep linking (which Apple calls them Anchors) here’s the result:

you can open System Preferences panes and anchors with this url scheme:

open "x-apple.systempreferences:com.apple.preferences.sharing?Services_ScreenSharing"

Notice it is x-apple.systempreferences: and not x-apple.systempreferences://
which currently Hook does not support as of version 3.1
So as a workaround we will add our own scheme

After the following steps you will be able to copy and open System Preferences Panes / Anchors (Deep Links) e.g. System Preferences → Spotlight (privacy)

  1. Add x-hook.systempreferences in Script Editor → Open Item → scheme

  2. Add the following script to Script Editor → Open Item

    //JavaScript

const app = Application("System Preferences");
app.includeStandardAdditions = true;
app.activate();

const [_, paneId, anchorId] = /(?::\/\/)([^?]+)?(?:\?(.*))?$/.exec("$0");

const pane = paneId ? app.panes.byId(paneId) : null;
const anchor = anchorId && pane ? pane.anchors.byName(anchorId) : null

app.reveal(anchor || pane);

  3. Add the following script to Script Editor → Get Address

    //JavaScript
/*
  Apple's URL Scheme: x-apple.systempreferences:com.apple.preferences.sharing?Services_ScreenSharing
  More Info: https://stackoverflow.com/a/24703872
*/

const app = Application("System Preferences");
app.includeStandardAdditions = true;

const pane = app.currentPane();
let anchor = pane ? app.chooseFromList(pane.anchors().map(a => a.name()), { withPrompt: 'Select an Anchor' }) : null;

anchor = anchor && anchor.length > 0 && anchor[0] || "";
let paneId = pane && pane.id() || "";
let name = "System Preferences";
name = pane ? `${name} → ${pane.name()}` : name;
name = anchor ? `${name} (${anchor})` : name;
`[${name}](x-hook.systempreferences://${paneId}?${anchor})`
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2

Can you explain the use case scenario for this script? So you are deep linking to system preference panes?

3

Nothing special, It goes deeper than just panes…
The main use case for me is finding the anchors like: Privacy_Accessibility
in the System Preferences → Security & Privacy → Accessibility

also accessible with:

open "x-apple.systempreferences:com.apple.preference.security?Privacy_Accessibility"
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