Denied version 1.7.1 should resolve an issue that caused Denied to show a ‘validations error’ on exit. 🐞

You can get it from the App Store!

The start of the new year is a great time to begin reducing stress and consider potential distractions. That’s why I’m delighted to announce I’m launching my time anxiety reducing Mac app called Timeless today!

Timeless replaces the standard clock with a more subtle time indicator. It’s been tested for months, got encouraging comments on Reddit and the beta was even featured in FastCompany’s ‘best new apps of 2019’.

The clock can be a distraction for me. It imposes stress and distracts me while I try to get work done and sometimes even when I’m trying to relax.

If you’re anything like me, these will sound familiar:

• 10.00 “Only 10 am?? It feels like I’ve been doing nothing.”
• 11.30 “Better not start something new, it’ll be lunch soon.”
• 14.00 “Sheesh this day is never going to end…”
• 16.00 “It’s already 4 pm?? I did nothing today and it’s too late to start now.”

Timeless been in my menu bar since I created the first, rough version and I can’t imagine not using it anymore.

Get Timeless! (12.9 MB)

Used in conjunction with reminders and my calendar, it keeps me from glancing at the clock whenever I’m at my Mac. For me, that’s a huge stress reducer and I’d love to know if it works for you too. 😊

Photo by Filip Zrnzević on Unsplash

With DevMate sunsetting in little over a week I’ve issued an update for every app that included the DevMate SDK.

🎧 Relax 1.2

Besides removing the DevMate SDK I’ve also included support for pausing Music.app in macOS Catalina. 👌

You’ll notice that I’ve updated the App Store screenshots as well. I liked the eye piercing background color of the original images, but I think this is a little more appealing. 😅

After

Before

📹 Pipvid 2.0.1

Like Timeless this updates switches the update mechanism from the DevMate SDK to just Sparkle’s update mechanism. Updates are hosted at Microsoft’s AppCenter, for now.

🕔 Timeless 0.9.8

This is getting very close to its initial 1.0 release!

🎨 Carbonize 1.2.9

I’ve included an Internet Access Policy to every app that accesses remote resources. With an IAP apps like Little Snitch can display a meaningful message when asking you to allow or block an app’s request to fetch an online resource.

Carbonize benefits from this because it requires access to carbon.now.sh. The message that a firewall like Little Snitch displays reflects that now.

This is a huge release, with a whole bunch of invisible and some visible changes! 🚀

Most notably the entire underlying window detection and pip-toggling mechanism has been rewritten. It’s more reliable and easier to expand in the future.

Secondly Pipvid now supports QuickTime 10.5’s native Picture-in-Picture mode on macOS Catalina. I’m personally still a fan of Pipvid’s more relaxed implementation. If you enable the option however, Pipvid will just trigger the native Picture-in-Picture Agent window when you resize a QuickTime window.

This release also supports managing the built-in PiP Agent window that apps like Safari and QuickTime use. Currently it allows you to snap out of Picture-in-Picture mode by enlarging the window beyond the trigger width that you’ve set in Pipvid.

If you’re a Pipvid user, some defaults have changed. Read on to see if you need to adjust your preferences.

Changed

• The window detection and toggling mechanism has been rebuilt, making it more reliable and easier to expand to other apps in the future.
• Assign to all Desktops now only triggers after resizing the window or when a new window is created, to reduce the times the menu pops up.
• Only the window’s width is considered when checking if it should enter or exit PiP.

Added

• Support for QuickTime 10.5’s native PiP mode on macOS Catalina! (Disabled by default.)
• Support for unsticking the native Picture-in-Picture window by resizing the window. (Works when the max. window size is set to < 50%. Disabled by default.)
• A setting that allows you to choose whether Pipvid sticks windows as soon as it’s activated, or only when the window is resized. (Disabled by default.)
• A similar setting as above, but for unsticking windows when Pipvid quits or is disabled. (Enabled by default.)

Fixed

• Fixed slight glitching when dragging windows around by repositioning windows after you’re done moving them.
• The checkmark icon in the License Window and the Setup Wizard changes color with Light and Dark Mode.

Apple chose today to release macOS 10.15 Catalina. The latest major update to the Mac operating system. 🥳

I’ve been testing Denied, Carbonize, Relax, Pipvid and Timeless with every new beta since they came available and I’m happy to report they all work fine.

Upgrading

You’ll get a notification about the update at some point. If you want to upgrade early, open System Preferences and select System Update.

After a moment or two you’ll get the option to Upgrade Now.

Denied

iTunes has been replaced by separate apps for music, podcasts, TV and books. All very appropriately named after the media they expose. I’ve added support for Music.app in Denied v1.7.

Song skipping through all filters works perfectly. There’s an unfixed bug in Music that prevents Denied from grabbing the track information when the app first launches and before Music was set to play, pause, skip to the next or previous track. This is mainly cosmetic. I’m confident Apple will address the issue in a future update to Catalina.

Pipvid

QuickTime gained a built-in picture-in-picture mode in macOS 10.15. I’ve been on the fence about removing my custom solution, now there’s a native implementation.

For the moment I’ve decided to stay with the custom feature I built specifically for Pipvid. The main reason being that my solution allows me to enable and disable picture-in-picture by simply resizing the player window. I love that feature myself.

The new pip-button in QuickTime is easily accessible to those who prefer the native variant.

I’m working on a hybrid solution that could make the best of both options. That’s not quite ready yet.

Others

Carbonize, Relax and Timeless work exactly like they did on macOS Mojave. I hope you’ll enjoy them as much on Catalina as you did on Mojave. 😄

Have fun exploring the new features!