Recently I bemoaned the ponderous way in which Mountain Lion switches screen resolutions. I often shoot screencasts in less than optimal resolution and the multiple clicks and keypresses required are vexing. David Kreindel heard my call and answered. David pointed me to this Display Menu, a handy app that brings back some old functionality. Does this look familiar.

If that isn’t enough, David also put together a simple AppleScript to speed up the process. Copy the below into AppleScript editor and go nuts. Thanks David.

--This script only works on OS X 10.8; This is due to GUI changes from 10.7 to 10.8

--launches System Preferences to Displays pane

tell application "System Preferences"

activate

set current pane to pane "com.apple.preference.displays"

end tell

tell application "System Events"

--Ensures window is on Display tab, not Color tab

click radio button "Display" of tab group 1 of window 1 of process "System Preferences"

--Ensures Resolution preference is "Scaled" to select resolutions

click radio button "Scaled" of tab group 1 of window 1 of process "System Preferences"

--Sets the resolution to whatever is in row 9 for the primary display; 1280 x 720

select row 9 of table 1 of scroll area 1 of tab group 1 of window 1 of process "System Preferences"

--Change "row 9" to whatever row corresponds to desired resolution

end tell

--Quits System Preferences

tell application "System Preferences"

quit

end tell