SQL_Developer to SQL Developer

When I first ran SQL Developer on my Mac I remember being a bit put off by the fact that the application name showed up as SQL_Developer rather than SQL Developer as I would have expected.

The address book application shows up as Address Book rather than Address_Book and Keychain Access show up as just that, rather than Keychain_Access. Just to pick two examples from my running applications. It just doesn’t look right!

That was a few years ago and I figured there must be a reason why it’s like this, but it didn’t bother me enough to spent any time trying to understand why it is this way and if there is any way to change it.

Having found my way into the inner files of /Applications/SQLDeveloper.app during my recent attempts to get SQL Developer working with EUS I thought it was time to see if I could work out why, and ideally “fix” it.

It turned out to be amazingly simply. I ran a quick find with grep to look for files that had the string “SQL_Developer”:

macbook-pro:~ martin$ find /Applications/SQLDeveloper.app/ -type f -exec grep -H SQL_Developer {} \;
/Applications/SQLDeveloper.app//Contents/Resources/sqldeveloper/sqldeveloper/bin/sqldeveloper-Darwin.conf:AddVMOption  -Dcom.apple.mrj.application.apple.menu.about.name="SQL_Developer"
macbook-pro:~ martin$ 

Well, this looks easy!

A quick test of changing the option to “SQL Developer” and a restart of the application makes me a happier man.

I’d like to clarify that I know this is a bit of a trivial/weird thing to be bothered by, but it just messes with my desire for consistency.

For the full harmonising effect you can also rename the application “file” in your Applications folder from SQLDeveloper to SQL Developer so that the application name in the dock and menu bar match up.