{"id":35231,"date":"2026-01-16T07:27:24","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T15:27:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.podfeet.com\/blog\/?p=35231"},"modified":"2026-01-18T17:40:05","modified_gmt":"2026-01-19T01:40:05","slug":"panel-editor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.podfeet.com\/blog\/2026\/01\/panel-editor\/","title":{"rendered":"Spelunking Hidden Applications on macOS \u2014 Panel Editor"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I explained to you how I mind mapped all of System Settings for macOS 26<\/a>, I stumbled across some applications hidden in macOS that I\u2019d never seen before. I explained that while I knew about those in \/Applications\/Utilities (which some folks may not have realized were there), I\u2019d found some buried even deeper. I told you at the time that I might come back and tell you about one of them. Later is now.<\/p>\n

Panel Editor<\/h2>\n

The oddest and most intriguing app I discovered is called Panel Editor. When opening every single option in System Settings, and spelunking deep inside Accessibility, I wandered into the section for those with Motor control needs, found Keyboard, and within there<\/em> saw the option to toggle on something called Accessibility Keyboard. Within the same area, there was a button that said Panel Editor\u2026 and it explained, \u201cThe Panel Editor allows you to customize the panels shown by Accessibility Keyboard.\u201d<\/p>\n

I found Panel Editor again within the Motor section of Accessibility, but under Pointer Control.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re going to do a deep dive into the Panel Editor application, but when I discovered the option to open it, I got curious about where on earth this application lived on my system. As I said, it wasn\u2019t in Applications, and it wasn\u2019t in the Utilities folder within Applications either. I used the delightful app Find Any File from apps.tempel.org\/…<\/a> to figure out where Apple had buried this app.<\/p>\n

\"Find
Find Any File Discovers Buried Treasure<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It was buried in \/System\/Library\/Input Methods\/Assistive Control.app\/Contents\/Resources<\/code>.<\/p>\n

Path of Discovery<\/h2>\n

My standard method of telling you about tools is to start with a problem to be solved. This time, though, I thought it would be more fun to go through my discovery process. I had no clue what Panel Editor was when I started. I just started poking buttons, so I\u2019m going to walk you down the same button-poking path to see what we can learn.<\/p>\n

When Panel Editor opens, it has three panes. The left pane is completely blank, the center pane is an empty grid, much like the fancy engineering graph paper that shows you thicker lines every inch and thin ones for the smaller increments. At the top is a button that says Add Panel with a plus sign and a greyed-out minus sign button that says Remove Panel.<\/p>\n

\"Panel
Panel Editor’s Opening Screen is Nearly Completely Blank<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The right pane is also blank, but helpfully says No Selection. Above the right pane are four icons. The first three, Add Button, Group, and Ungroup, are greyed out. The last icon is Inspector, and tapping it simply closes and opens the right pane. I guess I can start calling it the Inspector pane.<\/p>\n

That leaves us with literally one button that does anything, and that\u2019s Add Panel. This opens a dropdown menu with a list of items to choose from: Empty, Current Text, Dwell Actions, Dwell Home, 8 different keyboards like ANSI, ISO, JIS, and Numeric, and finally Typing Suggestions. Since I have no clue what these mean, I think I\u2019ll start by selecting Empty. I\u2019m rewarded by the word \u201cEmpty\u201d in the left section, written in blue, indicating that it\u2019s selected.<\/p>\n

\"Options
So Many Options!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Once we have an empty panel, the Add Button above the Inspector is now available. Let\u2019s push it and see what happens! This puts a dark grey, rectangular button in the middle of the grid called \u201cuntitled\u201d. In the inspector, we now have lots of things we can do to our button. We can name it, change the font and font color, and change whether the title is centered in the button or above\/below it.<\/p>\n

We can make the button an image, either by adding our own image or selecting from a list of images representing functions like double click, drag and drop, or keyboard. We can also change the color of the button. But what can this button do<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Under Action in the Inspector, there\u2019s a dropdown where you can choose from:<\/p>\n