loginitems

loginitems is a simple command line tool to manage applications that launch on startup on OS X. While previously possible with launchctl this is deprecated as of some time before or with 10.11.

Installation

I'm a big brew fan - so while this repo isn't popular enough to be included in official formulae, if you share my preference then you can run the formula from my fork here:

brew tap OJFord/formulae
brew install loginitems

Otherwise, you'll need to clone/download the repo to somewhere on your path, and chmod +x each of the included scripts.

Usage

Usage: loginitems [-h | -a NAME [-p PATH] [-s HIDE?] | -d NAME | -l]
  -h Show this help message.
  -a Add an application, optionally hide with -s false.
  -p Path to application; defaults to /Applications/NAME.app.
  -s Show/hide application; defaults to true (no hide).
  -d Delete an application from login items.
  -l List all login items (default if no option specified).

For example:

% loginitems -a Caffeine 
% loginitems -l
Caffeine
% loginitems -d Caffeine
% loginitems -l
% loginitems -a "Custom Name" -p "/Applications/Caffeine.app"
% loginitems -a "App" -p "/that/I/decided/to/store/elsewhere/because/yolo.not-app"
% loginitems -l
Custom Name, App
%

Todo

• While the Applescript use may well work (untested) on earlier versions, I hope to check OS X version and use launchctl submit on older versions, or defaults write on ancient ones