docs » hs.console

Some functions for manipulating the Hammerspoon console.

These functions allow altering the behavior and display of the Hammerspoon console. They should be considered experimental, but have worked well for me.

API Overview

API Documentation

Deprecateds

asHSDrawing
Signature hs.console.asHSDrawing() -> hs.drawing object
Type Deprecated
Description

Because use of this function can easily lead to a crash, useful methods from hs.drawing have been added to the hs.console module itself. If you believe that a useful method has been overlooked, please submit an issue.

Parameters:

  • None

Returns:

  • a placeholder object
asHSWindow
Signature hs.console.asHSWindow() -> hs.window object
Type Deprecated
Description

Returns an hs.window object for the console so that you can use hs.window methods on it.

This function is identical to hs.console.hswindow. It is included for reasons of backwards compatibility, but use of the new name is recommended for clarity.

Constants

defaultToolbar
Signature hs.console.defaultToolbar
Type Constant
Description

Default toolbar for the Console window

Notes:

  • This is an hs.toolbar object that is shown by default in the Hammerspoon Console
  • You can remove this toolbar by adding hs.console.toolbar(nil) to your config, or you can replace it with your own hs.toolbar object

Functions

alpha
Signature hs.console.alpha([alpha]) -> currentValue
Type Function
Description

Get or set the alpha level of the console window.

Parameters:

  • alpha - an optional number between 0.0 and 1.0 specifying the new alpha level for the Hammerspoon console.

Returns:

  • the current, possibly new, value.
behaviorAsLabels
Signature hs.console.behaviorAsLabels(behaviorTable) -> currentValue
Type Function
Description

Get or set the window behavior settings for the console using labels defined in hs.drawing.windowBehaviors.

Parameters:

  • behaviorTable - an optional table of strings and/or numbers specifying the desired window behavior for the Hammerspoon console.

Returns:

  • the current (possibly new) value.

Notes:

  • Window behaviors determine how the console is handled by Spaces and Exposé. See hs.drawing.windowBehaviors for more information.
clearConsole
Signature hs.console.clearConsole() -> nil
Type Function
Description

Clear the Hammerspoon console output window.

Parameters:

  • None

Returns:

  • None

Notes:

  • This is equivalent to hs.console.setConsole()
consoleCommandColor
Signature hs.console.consoleCommandColor([color]) -> color
Type Function
Description

Get or set the color that commands displayed in the Hammerspoon console are displayed with.

Parameters:

  • color - an optional table containing color keys as described in hs.drawing.color

Returns:

  • the current color setting as a table

Notes:

  • See the hs.drawing.color entry in the Dash documentation, or type help.hs.drawing.color in the Hammerspoon console to get more information on how to specify a color.
  • Note this only affects future output -- anything already in the console will remain its current color.
consoleFont
Signature hs.console.consoleFont([font]) -> fontTable
Type Function
Description

Get or set the font used in the Hammerspoon console.

Parameters:

  • font - an optional string or table describing the font to use in the console. If a string is specified, then the default system font size will be used. If a table is specified, it should contain a name key-value pair and a size key-value pair describing the font to be used.

Returns:

  • the current font setting as a table containing a name key and a size key.

Notes:

  • See the hs.drawing.color entry in the Dash documentation, or type help.hs.drawing.color in the Hammerspoon console to get more information on how to specify a color.
  • Note this only affects future output -- anything already in the console will remain its current font.
consolePrintColor
Signature hs.console.consolePrintColor([color]) -> color
Type Function
Description

Get or set the color that regular output displayed in the Hammerspoon console is displayed with.

Parameters:

  • color - an optional table containing color keys as described in hs.drawing.color

Returns:

  • the current color setting as a table

Notes:

  • See the hs.drawing.color entry in the Dash documentation, or type help.hs.drawing.color in the Hammerspoon console to get more information on how to specify a color.
  • Note this only affects future output -- anything already in the console will remain its current color.
consoleResultColor
Signature hs.console.consoleResultColor([color]) -> color
Type Function
Description

Get or set the color that function results displayed in the Hammerspoon console are displayed with.

Parameters:

  • color - an optional table containing color keys as described in hs.drawing.color

Returns:

  • the current color setting as a table

Notes:

  • See the hs.drawing.color entry in the Dash documentation, or type help.hs.drawing.color in the Hammerspoon console to get more information on how to specify a color.
  • Note this only affects future output -- anything already in the console will remain its current color.
darkMode
Signature hs.console.darkMode([state]) -> bool
Type Function
Description

Set or display whether or not the Console window should display in dark mode.

Parameters:

  • state - an optional boolean which will set whether or not the Console window should display in dark mode.

Returns:

  • A boolean, true if dark mode is enabled otherwise false.

Notes:

  • Enabling Dark Mode for the Console only affects the window background, and doesn't automatically change the Console's Background Color, so you will need to add something similar to:
    if hs.console.darkMode() then
    hs.console.outputBackgroundColor{ white = 0 }
    hs.console.consoleCommandColor{ white = 1 }
    hs.console.alpha(.8)
end
.
getConsole
Signature hs.console.getConsole([styled]) -> text | styledText
Type Function
Description

Get the text of the Hammerspoon console output window.

Parameters:

  • styled - an optional boolean indicating whether the console text is returned as a string or a styledText object. Defaults to false.

Returns:

  • The text currently in the Hammerspoon console output window as either a string or an hs.styledtext object.

Notes:

  • If the text of the console is retrieved as a string, no color or style information in the console output is retrieved - only the raw text.
getHistory
Signature hs.console.getHistory() -> array
Type Function
Description

Get the Hammerspoon console history as an array.

Parameters:

  • None

Returns:

  • an array containing the history of commands entered into the Hammerspoon console.
hswindow
Signature hs.console.hswindow() -> hs.window object
Type Function
Description

Get an hs.window object which represents the Hammerspoon console window

Parameters:

  • None

Returns:

  • an hs.window object
inputBackgroundColor
Signature hs.console.inputBackgroundColor([color]) -> color
Type Function
Description

Get or set the color for the background of the Hammerspoon Console's input field.

Parameters:

  • color - an optional table containing color keys as described in hs.drawing.color

Returns:

  • the current color setting as a table

Notes:

  • See the hs.drawing.color entry in the Dash documentation, or type help.hs.drawing.color in the Hammerspoon console to get more information on how to specify a color.
level
Signature hs.console.level([theLevel]) -> currentValue
Type Function
Description

Get or set the console window level

Parameters:

  • theLevel - an optional parameter specifying the desired level as an integer, which can be obtained from hs.drawing.windowLevels.

Returns:

  • the current, possibly new, value

Notes:

  • see the notes for hs.drawing.windowLevels
outputBackgroundColor
Signature hs.console.outputBackgroundColor([color]) -> color
Type Function
Description

Get or set the color for the background of the Hammerspoon Console's output view.

Parameters:

  • color - an optional table containing color keys as described in hs.drawing.color

Returns:

  • the current color setting as a table

Notes:

  • See the hs.drawing.color entry in the Dash documentation, or type help.hs.drawing.color in the Hammerspoon console to get more information on how to specify a color.
printStyledtext
Signature hs.console.printStyledtext(...) -> none
Type Function
Description

A print function which recognizes hs.styledtext objects and renders them as such in the Hammerspoon console.

Parameters:

  • Any number of arguments can be specified, just like the builtin Lua print command. If an argument matches the userdata type of hs.styledtext, the text is rendered as defined by its style attributes in the Hammerspoon console; otherwise it is rendered as it would be via the traditional print command within Hammerspoon.

Returns:

  • None

Notes:

  • This has been made as close to the Lua print command as possible. You can replace the existing print command with this by adding the following to your init.lua file:
   print = function(...)
       hs.rawprint(...)
       hs.console.printStyledtext(...)
   end
setConsole
Signature hs.console.setConsole([styledText]) -> none
Type Function
Description

Clear the Hammerspoon console output window.

Parameters:

  • styledText - an optional hs.styledtext object containing the text you wish to replace the Hammerspoon console output with. If you do not provide an argument, the console is cleared of all content.

Returns:

  • None

Notes:

  • You can specify the console content as a string or as an hs.styledtext object in either userdata or table format.
setHistory
Signature hs.console.setHistory(array) -> nil
Type Function
Description

Set the Hammerspoon console history to the items specified in the given array.

Parameters:

  • array - the list of commands to set the Hammerspoon console history to.

Returns:

  • None

Notes:

  • You can clear the console history by using an empty array (e.g. hs.console.setHistory({})
smartInsertDeleteEnabled
Signature hs.console.smartInsertDeleteEnabled([flag]) -> bool
Type Function
Description

Determine whether or not objects copied from the console window insert or delete space around selected words to preserve proper spacing and punctuation.

Parameters:

  • flag - an optional boolean value indicating whether or not "smart" space behavior is enabled when copying from the Hammerspoon console.

Returns:

  • the current value

Notes:

  • this only applies to future copy operations from the Hammerspoon console -- anything already in the clipboard is not affected.
titleVisibility
Signature hs.console.titleVisibility([state]) -> current value
Type Function
Description

Get or set whether or not the "Hammerspoon Console" text appears in the Hammerspoon console titlebar.

Parameters:

  • state - an optional string containing the text "visible" or "hidden", specifying whether or not the console window's title text appears.

Returns:

  • a string of "visible" or "hidden" specifying the current (possibly changed) state of the window title's visibility.

Notes:

  • When a toolbar is attached to the Hammerspoon console (see the hs.webview.toolbar module documentation), this function can be used to specify whether the Toolbar appears underneath the console window's title ("visible") or in the window's title bar itself, as seen in applications like Safari ("hidden").
windowBackgroundColor
Signature hs.console.windowBackgroundColor([color]) -> color
Type Function
Description

Get or set the color for the background of the Hammerspoon Console's window.

Parameters:

  • color - an optional table containing color keys as described in hs.drawing.color

Returns:

  • the current color setting as a table

Notes:

  • See the hs.drawing.color entry in the Dash documentation, or type help.hs.drawing.color in the Hammerspoon console to get more information on how to specify a color.

Methods

behavior
Signature hs.console.behavior([behavior]) -> currentValue
Type Method
Description

Get or set the window behavior settings for the console.

Parameters:

  • behavior - an optional number representing the desired window behaviors for the Hammerspoon console.

Returns:

  • the current, possibly new, value.

Notes:

  • Window behaviors determine how the webview object is handled by Spaces and Exposé. See hs.drawing.windowBehaviors for more information.
toolbar
Signature hs.console.toolbar([toolbar | nil]) -> toolbarObject | currentValue
Type Method
Description

Get or attach/detach a toolbar to/from the Hammerspoon console.

Parameters:

  • toolbar - if an hs.webview.toolbar object is specified, it will be attached to the Hammerspoon console. If an explicit nil is specified, the current toolbar will be removed from the console.

Returns:

  • if a toolbarObject or explicit nil is specified, returns the toolbarObject; otherwise returns the current toolbarObject or nil, if no toolbar is attached to the console.

Notes:

  • this method is a convenience wrapper for the hs.webview.toolbar.attachToolbar function.

  • If the toolbar is currently attached to another window when this function is called, it will be detached from the original window and attached to the console.