The betterdummy from kyrawny

BetterDummy

Dummy Displays and Better Display Management for Macs - a menubar app from one of the makers of MonitorControl.

About

BetterDummy helps you create and manage virtual displays for your Mac, create Picture in Picture windows of your displays and helps you to manage your display's preferences easily from the menu bar.

Custom resolutions with BetterDummy for your display

Some Macs tend to have issues with custom resolutions. The new Apple Silicon Macs notoriously don't allow sub-4K resolution displays to have HiDPI ("Retina") resolutions even though most 1440p display would greatly benefit from having a HiDPI "Retina" mode. On other Macs the resolution options for wide displays are too constrained. To fix these issues, some resort to buying a 4K HDMI dummy dongle to fool macOS into thinking that a 4K display is connected and then mirror the contents of this dummy display to their actual monitor in order to have HiDPI resolutions available. Others use the built in screens of their MacBooks as a mirror source. These approaches have obvious drawbacks and limits.

BetterDummy solves the problem by creating a flexible virtual "dummy" display that supports an unprecedented range of Retina resolutions. You can then utilize this dummy display as a mirror source for your display achieving any HiDPI resolution.

Advantages of BetterDummy over a physical 4K HDMI dummy plug or mirroring your internal display:

Your HDMI port will remain usable for an other display on the Mac Mini
Your internal screen will be available as an extended space on a MacBook (or you can use clamshell mode).
Does not suffer from issues that prevalent with the physical dummy (like jittery mouse cursor).
Offers a much wider range of HiDPI and standard resolutions.
Works with all aspect ratios, does not depend on what resoluations are recorded in the dummy's EDID/firmware.
Available instantly.

Other uses / features

The app is useful for anybody who is not satisfied with the offered default HiDPI resolutions offered by macOS.
Use headless Macs (servers) with any resolution and HiDPI mode for remote access.
Create Picture in Picture window for any real or dummy displays. *
Redirect your display's contents (real or dummy) to an other screen via streaming. *
If you are using a big TV up close, use the bottom half of your TV as a wide screen display (off-center streaming). *
Scale Sidecar resolutions.
Portrait SideCar support. *
Better quality zooming (System Preferences»Accessibility»Zoom) or High Quality screenshots even on 1080p displays.
Easily change the resolution of your real and dummy displays via a slider (or submenu) from the menubar.
Simplify creating mirrored sets. *
Easily move around displays relative to each other using the app menu. *
Easily designate a display to be main display.
Associate dummies with displays for auto connect/disconnect.
Keyboard shortcuts support *
Custom dummies (resolution, orientation, naming) *
Create a dummy optimized for a real display *

Features marked with an asterisk (*) are available in BetterDummy Pro

Installation

Download the latest version
Move the app to Applications folder on your Mac.
Start the app.
Use the app menu bar item to interact.

Usage

This tutorial is for the v1.1.x version of the app, currently available as beta. If you are running the v1.0.13 version, please refer to this guide on how to setup dummy mirroring!

BetterDummy has several uses and lots of features but most users tend to use it to create a mirrored dummy to use custom resolutions on Apple Silicon machines. Follow these steps to do this:

Start the app and locate the app menu (you'll see a BetterDummy icon in the menu bar).
In the app menu locate your display's name and click on the Settings sub-menu under it.
Click on the Create Dummy for This Display option.

In the ensuing pop-up select Connect and Set up Mirroring.

It's that simple. Afterwards you should see your dummy mirrored to your display where you can use the slider to change the resolution quickly:

Notes:

Due to the finnicky nature of macOS display and mirror management, sometimes setting up the mirror fails or the mirror reverts to work 'the other way around' (namely instead of the dummy being mirrored to the display, the display is being mirrored to the dummy). In this case you should stop the mirroring (select Mirror Target > Stop Mirroring) and reconfigure the mirror under the dummy in the display list Mirror Target > Display Name.
Sometimes the created mirror might not be the main display (the display with the menu bar and the one where windows are located by default) or a created but invisible dummy becomes the main display which makes moving forward difficult. You can easily change any display or mirror set to be main by simply choosing Settings > Set as main under the display in the app menu.
If you find that your new dummy or dummy mirror is not located where you actually want it to be relative to your other displays, you can easily move around a display using Settings > Move Next to ... from the app menu.
You can configure both mirroring, main status, resolution and everything else in System Preferences the old fashioned way as well. If you are not using Pro, you actually need to do this. Follow the this guide on how to do this.
If you really can't set up what you want, just hop over to the BetterDummy discord channel where you can lay out your problem and eventually somebody should help you out! :)

Compatibility

The app is compatible with all Apple Silicon macs running macOS Monterey (MacBook Air, Mini, 2020 and 2021 MacBook Pros).
The app is also compatible with Intel Macs capable of officially running macOS Big Sur but mirroring might not work as expected especially on Macs with AMD GPUs.
The app is compatible with headless mode as well (both Apple Silicon and Intel).

Some notable articles about BetterDummy

BetterDummy is now famous! :)

Also the app made it to the featured news (once took the first spot) in Hacker News.

Supporting the project / purchasing BetterDummy Pro

You can now support development by purchasing a BetterDummy Pro license directly in the app. You need to download the latest version (v1.1.10 or newer), navigate to Preferences... > Pro and click on Buy BetterDummy Pro. Please note that even if you don't buy the app, you can still use the core features for free and the open-source version is also available for free!

For more info check out this discussion

To those who backed the open-source project in the past (Open Collective)

I'd like to thank you for backing the open source project in the past by providing you with a coupon code so you can get a Pro license for no additional cost.
Open Collective does not let me contact you directly. If you'd like to receive a code, please contact me at Discord by sending a private message or opening a separate discussion and posting a screenshot of the confirmation you received from Open Collective. I'll respond with a code (some patience might be needed). Thank you!

Notabe contributors to the open-source project

I am thankful for each of you who contributed to the BetterDummy project.

Generous contributors, who donated $50 or more for the open-source project:

Patrick Mast - $222
Riten Jaiswal - $200
Wesley - $200
Dean Herbert - $150
Myles Dear - $100
Jose Tejera - $100
Bill Southworth - $100
Will_from_CA - $100
MFB Technologies - $100
Brian Conway - $60
Ron W - $61
Michael Charo - $50
Jens Kielhorn - $50
Victor - $50
Nicholas Eidler - $50
Jeff Nash - $50

Additional notable contributors, who donated $20 or more:

Derek Johnson
Jerry C
Jung Yeop (Steve) Kim
Jason
Kaz
Nikola
wanyeki
Felix
Emilio P Egido
Thomas Varghese
Reactual
Stephen Richardson
Peter Szombati
NP
David Verdonck
Knut Holm
Jan Behrmann
Danilo
Andrew Braithwaite
Splay Display
Incognito
Florian Gross
David Richardson
Jari Hanhela

William Edney
David W
Chetan Kunte
Martin Clayton
Nikola Milojević
Wolf1701
Arthur Müller
Tom Dai
Jeff Lopes
Jormsen
Yeo Chang Long
Wayne G
Udome
Bart Krijnen
jviide
Keezy
SenPng
Jakub Koňas
docljn
Adam Lounds
Pablo Sichert
Ville Rinne
Gheorghe Aurel Pacurar
Peter F.

Thomas Brian
Jedrzej Gontarczyk
Chris Brooks
Wang Yang
Arjen
Peter Cole
Simon Jarvis
mgiiklel
Eric
Alasdair
Friedemann Wachsmuth
Pranav Raj S
Eddy
George Billios
Alfred Visnevsky
Martin Cohen
HWM
Oliver Eilhard
Alastair Thomson
Örn Arnarson
Chris Spiegl
Radim Balner
yipru
petertriho

+ guest supporters

Please don't forget to star the GitHub page and spread the word about the app. :)

Privacy

Licensing uses a Paddle as backend. This also means that the app communicates over the network with Paddle's servers to verify licensing, trial status and facilitate check-out using Paddle's SDK. Besides data required for licensing purposes by Paddle's services, no other info is transferred over the network.
I decided not to have a marketing list (marketing opt-in) of any kind. I also do not build any usage database or collect unique (and not unique) IDs either - besides what Paddle collects and presents on its dashboard for me (to keep track of valid software licenses).
Aside from Paddle the only other form of network communication by the app is what is required for the built-in updater to work. This communicates directly with github.com to download the update metadata and download the update binary.

Known issues

Please take a look at the list of known issues before using the app or submitting an Issue.

Don't forget to check out MonitorControl!

If you like BetterDummy, you'll like MonitorControl as well! Control the brightness, volume of your external display like a native Apple display! The two apps are fully optimized to work together.

Discord channel

You can join the (mostly self help) discussion on the new BetterDummy discord channel.

kyrawny / betterdummy Goto Github PK

betterdummy's Introduction