AppAddict Newsletter

By default, the built-in macOS backup utility, Time Machine, makes a new snapshot on your designated backup disk once an hour. This can be problematic during your work day if you need the full system resources of your computer, but it has decided to start copying a bunch of files to your backup. The venerable utility, Time Machine Editor, a free app by developer Thomas Clement is the solution to this problem. To use TME, you first need to go into Time Machine options in System Settings and set your backups to “Manually.” Download and install TME from the developers’s website or through Homebrew.

brew install --cask timemachineeditor

Once installed, you can choose any of several options to schedule Time Machine backups. On my work iMac, I chose to stop the backups between 8am and 5pm when I am using the computer but to continue hourly backups after that. To be on the safe side, TME allows you to create local disk snapshots during the time you are not writing to your backup disk. They are very fast to make, and provide additional restoration points. Since they are local, they do not protect against a disk crash but can be useful if the machine goes away from the backup disk for a while.

I’ve used this utility for more than a decade, and it’s never let me down.

Sharing sensitive data via email or cloud services is risky without using encryption. Advanced users can use Disk Utility or a compression app like Keka to make a disk image or ZIP file with a password but an easier solution and one with a few more features is Encrypto from MacPaw.

Encrypto takes any file or folder and secures it with 256-bit AES encryption. Instead of relaying the password in a separate email or phone call, you can create a password hint with the app that only the recipient would know. You can send the encrypted file via email, Messages, Airdrop, cloud sharing, a USB drive or any method you choose. You can also use Encrypto to create encrypted archives on your own computer for an extra layer of protection if you want to.

Encrypto is a free app, available in the Mac App Store.

I am a firm believer in establishing a backup routine with multiple failsafes. I’ve managed to hold on to some of my data for over 25 years as a result. Yep, I still have the MP3 files I downloaded from Napster in the 90s. I run a Time Machine backup and I make regular SuperDuper full disk clones. For offsite data storage, I recently discovered Duplicati, a free, open-source backup program that uses encryption to securely store your data on various cloud services, local drives, or remote servers. It offers flexible scheduling, versioning, and incremental backups for reliable data protection.

The free plan covers up to five computers. I downloaded and installed the client. It launches a web interface that walks you through setting up you first backup. To test it, I elected to create a backup of my Obsidian vault using my free Dropbox account as the file storage destination. I elected to back the files up every 24 hours and it has been running every day at exactly the time I selected. 

Duplicati also works with Google Drive, One Drive and Box as well as Azure Blob and Amazon S3. It works with Windows machines too, in case you want to add one of those to your free account. Be default is uses AES-256 encryption standard, but you can choose PGP encryption as an option.

The free plan includes:

• Monitor backups from anywhere
• Secure credential storage (planned)
• Insights dashboard
• Monitor up to 5 machines
• View the last 200 backups
• 1 year monitoring retention
• Community support

Most AI tools on the market these days fall into one of two categories:

• Writing assistants that correct spelling and grammar or do other text manipulation
• Basic question answering or search engine type functions

ClicKnow by independent developer aike9m studio doesn't do either of those things. It also doesn't require a monthly fee or the use of your own API key. What ClicKnow does is act on text you select to perform a variety of functions. It is compatible with PopClip in that you can have apps running at the same time and get full functionality from both of them.

ClicKnow Features

• Translates selected text into the language of your choice (select language in settings)
• Summarize big blocks of selected text, very useful when researching
• Spell check (can be turned on/off in settings)
• Tracks flight numbers
• Pops up a calendar when a time string is selected, allowing you to add it to Google or Apple Calendars
• Calculates the result of a math formula
• Explain selected programming code in plain language

All the actions take place as popups in the app you are working in. There is no switching between apps to get your results. You can copy data right from the ClicKnow interface. If you are working in a multilingual document or even a social media app with an international flavor, the multi-language support is awesome. The ability to get any text explained, whether it is complex scientific terms or the latest Internet slang, is better than any dictionary app.

ClicKnow comes with a free trial. A single license is good for two Macs. The one-time cost is $12. You can download it from the developer’s website.

Kiano, a free app from the Visual Computing Group, provides a unique way to view and search your photo library. On my M3 iMac, it analyzed 22K images in about two and half minutes. It then displayed a grid of all the photos grouped together by similarity to one another. For example, all the landscape images I had showing broad expanses of sky were together, as were the man, many dual selfies of my wife and i. You can choose to have the sorting weighted towards color or towards content. Clicking on an image opens it within the program, where you can make your search even more granular by it having it find all the images that are similar to the one you have selected. From that interface, you can also:

• See creation and modification dates
• See the album (if any) the image is in
• View a history of the images you've examined
• Move to the next or previous photo in the album
• View a slideshow
• Add the photo to an existing or new album
• Delete the photo
• Share the photo via the Mac share sheet

You can download Kiano from the Mac App Store. There is also a version of the app for iOS.

If you have a large monitor and have the need to share your screen with others, you can experience issues when they can’t match your resolution. The free app, Deskpad, creates a virtual display within an application window that you can easily share with others. Launching Deskpad is equivalent to plugging in an additional monitor. You can use the display settings in System Settings to change the resolution and wallpaper, as well as any other monitor specific setting you have access to. Whenever you move your cursor to the virtual display, the color of the window title changes to blue, so you will know it is active.

You can download the latest version from Github or use Homebrew.

brew install deskpad.

The current version is 1.3.2, released in October 2024.

I’ve been making my way through some of the recent additions at thriftmac and testing some of the most useful looking apps. Here are five that address some real world issues in a simple and understandable way. You won’t have to spend a lot of time reading documentation or setting up intricate preferences. You can start using these quickly.

• TrashSweep - For anyone who churns through a bunch of files, whether you are a chronic downloader. doing video editing or just overworked, automating the size of your Trash can be accomplished with this app that lets you set a certain size limit and when you reach it, begins deleting files on a first in, first out basis. Never be shocked by the size of your trash again.

• Speediness — Sindre Sorhus - I'm making a rule that every list of good apps posted on r/MacApps has to include one from Sindre Sorhus. This app uses the macOS network-quality command line tool under the hood to give you better results than Ookla or fast.com. You can pair Speediness with other tools to have it run automatically and display the results in your menu bar. See the app's website for instructions.

• JuxtaText - If you use an AI based grammar and spell checker that doesn't tell you what it changes in your test, use this app to find out yourself. Paste your original text in one pane and the corrected text in the other one, and let JustaText show you what got changed.

• QuickRecorder for Mac This free app allows you to record your entire screen, an area of the screen you define, an application, a particular window or a mobile device connected via USB. In addition, it records system audio without the need for any extra drivers or applications.

• KeyCastr - This free and open-source app is for anyone who does presentations, make videos or shares their screen. It allows your keystrokes to be displayed and you can choose the size, color, time on screen and the fade delay. It also shows mouse clicks.

I recently discovered Gladys, a free app that allows you to stash a variety of data types an a shelf on your computer display to retrieve later or to access from another computer or iOS device. I quickly tested:

• A dragged image from a web page
• Pasted text copied from the web
• A URL dragged from my browser
• An image file from Finder
• A text document from Finder

All of these quickly synced via iCloud and were available immediately on my iPhone.

Some of the functionality is similar to Yoink, a paid app that also features a clipboard manager and a notes function.

Gladys is a native Mac app that supports standard keyboard shortcuts for cut/copy/paste, handoff, Quicklook, Spotlight, Handoff, service integrations and a share extension for apps that don’t support drag & drop. You can use notes and labels for each item you add if desired. The app has built in search for any element. You can share items from Gladys with other users of the app, helpful on a workplace team or in a family environment. Glady collections can be exported and imported via .zip files.

Gladys has a strict privacy policy and employs no analytics. You can download it on the Mac App Store.

Mac Pilot, a customization and utility app from Koingo Software is currently $3.00 on BundleHunt. There are similar apps like Onyx and Tinker Tool out there that are free, but for the price I thought I’d take a look.

Applications

Mac Pilot contains settings for several system apps. Here are just of the few things it can control.

• Calendar - change event duration
• Dock - single app mode, enable window previews
• Finder - enable "Quit Finder"
• Help Viewer - user normal instead of floating windows
• Launch Pad - Reset contents, control \# of rows and columns
• Music - enable half-star ratings
• Quick Time - Remember open movies on quit
• Safari - Backspace goes to previous page
• Screen Capture - change file type
• Spotlight - Reset index
• System - Disable notification center
• Terminal - Window focus follows mouse
• Time Machine - Do not prompt to use connected drives

Disk

Gives info and lets you perform maintenance on individual partitions

• Disks info
• Files Info
• Maintenance

File Browser

Detailed file information and settings

• General - Includes last backup date
• Details - Over 30 Unix characteristics on each file
• Access - Adjust traditional permissions and ACLs
• Advanced - Allows you to lock files
• Legacy

Login

• Change many features of your login screen - including the displayed image, which is totally worth the whole purchase price to me!
• Show or hide any users of the computer on the login screen
• Enable and disable login items and launch agents
• Set defaults for window states on login

Logs

• Built in log viewer
• Complete list of system receipts for installed software titles that issue them

Maintenance

• Automated - Enable or disable system cron jobs
• Update or rebuild launch services database
• ** Force empty trash and clear print queue - Very Helpful!**

Network

• Detailed info for every network interface
• Custom sharing settings including enabling airdrop on legacy machines
• Shortcuts to hidden utilities: Airport Utility, Wireless Diagnostics
• Complete Port List
• Network Optimization for selected broadband connections

Power

• Hidden settings for system, AC and battery
• Sleep settings for disks, display, and system. Plus auto-power off settings
• Hibernation settings
• Scheduling for wake and sleep

Reference

• Error Codes
• Fonts
• Key Combos
• Manuals
• System Profile

In addition there is a section for getting more information and doing some optimization but it requires disabling System Integrity Protection and I did not explore that.

The final potentially helpful tool is one that strips out the files from binaries for either Intel or ARM processors if you are running low in disk space and want to eliminate things you don’t need. I’d make damn sure I had a good backup before using that.

If you are one of those Mac users frustrated by the fact that the default dock is only visible on a single display, or you don’t like the way it deals with hidden windows, or maybe you wish you could hide certain apps, you might want to try Switch Glass, an app by well known Apple podcaster, developer and writer, John Siracusa.

Switch Glass lets you configure a (hide-able) floating app switcher for each display in your setup.

• Visibility - Set it to be visible, hidden or auto-hidden/visible depending on mouse position 
• Position - Choose from eight positions on each screen 
• Orientation - Horizontal or vertical positioning 
• Background - Choose from four different backgrounds including dark mode toggling 
• Styling - Three different corner styles 
• Icon Size - App icons can be anywhere from 16 to 256 points in size 
• Icon Spacing - Adjust from 0 to 100% of the icons sizes 
• Margin - Adjustable around the switcher itself 
• App Sort Order - Apps can be sorted by name or launch order

You can customize what clicking or shift clicking on an app does, with options to bring all windows or a single window to the front. Using option+click will hide the current front app while opening the app you click on. The app switcher has a context menu for each app and supports dragging items to the icons to open them.

As would be expected from a developer known for having exacting preferences in his workspace, you can fine tune almost every element in the app. Switch Glass is $7.99 on the Mac App Store.

Yonks is a well-designed iOS app that works quite well as a standalone app on Apple Silicon Macs. It’s a day counter that determines how many days since and event or how many days until an even with lots of extra special touches. For a one time purchase of $1.99 in the App Store vs. subscription apps at 4X that price just for a year of use, it’s almost unbeatable.

Ever wanted to know how many minutes, hours, days, weeks, months or years have passed since you were born or since you got married? What about counting down to your next vacation or the end of an important project? Maybe you want to count the days since you started a diet, quit smoking or drinking or started a new fitness routine. Do you want a way to count down the time until a new movie or video game is released. Yonks (British slang for “a long time”) can do it for you.

Features

• Choose between counting minutes, hours, days, weeks, months or years and select a custom emoji and color for every counter.
• Order your counters manually, alphabetically, increasing or decreasing by date or by color.
• See when a notable milestone occurs (e.g. "When is your 1000 day anniversary?") and add it to your calendar.
• Need to remember more than just a date? No problem, just add a custom note to your counter.
• Yonks has a growing list of popular counters from a variety of categories (holidays, sports, movies, games, …) for you to add with one tap.
• Change the date, time and number formats according to your local or personal preferences.

Yonks does not have iCloud syncing but I had no trouble creating my setup on my phone and exporting a json file via the settings that I easily imported on my MacBook via the same mechanism.

According to the developer, Stefan Grund, a new update is scheduled to drop on 2024-10-14 and version 2 of the app is in the works.

Marta is a free, dual-pane file manager for macOS written entirely in Swift, making it fast and responsive to both keyboard and mouse commands, although it specializes in the former. Under development since 2016 by software engineer Yan Zhulanow of Jet Brains, Marta may move to paid model in the future but for no it can be downloaded for free at the dev’s website.

Some of Marta's key features include:

• Extensive keyboard support
• No user tracking
• Ability to edit files inside archives and nested archives
• Documentation to guide users in customization
• Theme supprt (plus you can add your own)
• Plugin support through a custom Lua API
• Actions panel (instead of layers of menus)
• Quick search
• Uses Mac's Quicklook and plugins
• Toggle hidden files
• Built in terminal
• Disk usage analyzer
• Multiple tabs and windows to create workspaces

Keysmith is an automation app that works in any other app on your Mac to record actions you can later trigger from a menu or with a keyboard shortcut. I’ve been a Keyboard Maestro user for many years. I have over 800 macros within that application and a lot of experience using it, but after working with Keysmith for just a short while, I have to admit it makes some actions easier to record and activate. It’s not a replacement for Keyboard Maestro, but it will certainly supplement it.

Keysmith detects buttons, lists, and page loads automatically. The first macro I created with it was able to Open Obsidian, copy my daily note, open Day One, create a new entry and paste the content from Obsidian. I assigned it to HyperKey+D and was able to trigger it while I was in my web browser. I tinkered with it a little and was easily able to get it to close Day One after the entry was created.

The process is simple. You start the recording of a macro from a button on the menu bar. Your perform the action you need and Keysmith records your clicks and keystrokes. When you’re done, you save the macro, give it a name and assign a hotkey if you want to.

Some of the example macros available for download on the Keysmith web site are:

• Refresh extensions in Chrome
• Share screen in Discord
• Eject external hard drive in Finder
• Assign and submit a pull request on GitHub
• Enable Dark Mode in macOS
• New note with template in Apple Notes
• Switch to a specific Slack channel
• Switch to Zoom gallery view
• Quit all apps with AppleScript
• Close Notification Center in macOS

You can use the total functionality of Keysmith for free to make up to five macros. The full version is $54. It is also available as part of Setapp.

One of the reasons that I go to r/MacApps every single day is the prospect of discovering news apps and developers. This week I found out that an ancient app (well, 17 years), Licensed, has been updated and is compatible with macOS 15. Licensed is a simple database to keep track of your software purchases. It has fields for:

• Maker
• Product
• Version
• Owner
• Email
• Code
• Date
• Notes

The database is searchable. From the app's file menu, you can identify the data file for easy backups, and you can export your data as a CSV file so that you can be assured you aren't locked into any proprietary format.

Licensed is a free app from developer Amar Sagoo. You can download it on his website.

I’ve found myself in a small and unpopular minority over the past couple of years as user and sometimes advocate for Microsoft Edge, mostly because I use it for work where I’m required to use Microsoft Admin Center and the suite of Microsoft 365 apps. I still stand by my opinion that it doesn’t suck, but I’ve been looking for a more privacy focused alternative to use outside of work, so I decided to take the Zen browser for a spin. Zen’s promise on its website is

"Beautifully designed, privacy-focused, and packed with features. We care about your experience, not your data."

Development is community driver and open source. You can go to GitHub and explore to your heart's content.

Zen Browser is built on the Mozilla framework and is compatible with the existing suite of plugins for Firefox. You can still use the good version of Ublock Origin with it. The testing I’ve seen shows that Zen is slightly speedier than base Firefox but not as fast as Chromium based browsers. To me the speed difference is negligible, and I am not going to split hairs or get out a stopwatch. It’s fast enough for daily use.

The developers of Zen tout how easy it is to customize, and they are not lying. It has a theme store, and you have your pick from a variety of looks. Similar to Edge, among others, Zen has a split view feature to allow you to run two web pages side by side. It’s uses vertical tabs by default and that took me some getting used to.

The side bar is like a mini browser which you can keep open to your favorite social media or news site or use with Wikipedia or other research material. Zen Browser’s compact mode hides all superfluous design and interface elements and leaves you just the data you need to focus on getting work done.

I was able to find the extensions I needed: Ublock Origin, Raindrop.io, Archive Page, Keychain Passwords, Toby, Aboard, Omnivore, Mark Download

CurrentKey Stats has several target audiences.

• Time tracking your app usage and time spent working. Unlike Apple's Screentime, CurrentKey Stats only tracks an app when it is in the foreground, not the whole time it is open to give you a more accurate view of your time.
• Controlling movement between spaces. CurrentKey Stats lets you name each space with a descriptive name and lets you move between them with a menu bar icon or a hot key combo.
• Automators who want to trigger certain actions tied to individual workspaces.

For time trackers, you can dedicate a task to a certain space/desktop on your computer and the app will give you a dedicated report for just what happens within that space. You use your browser for work and play, so just getting stats on your usage wouldn't necessarily be helpful unless you could tie that usage to a certain project. You can get reports that give insights into your last month, past two weeks compared hour-by-hour, and get you the ability to export your data in over 10 different reports! You can even set up automatically-generated weekly reports.

For those wanting more control over their spaces (the app calls them “rooms”), CurrentKey Stats lets you choose a different icon, color and name to be shown in your menu bar for each room. macOS lets you have up to 16 per display. With hotkeys you can move between them using the keyboard.

For automators, you can trigger AppleScripts whenever you enter a certain room. The workflows you could generate this way include automatically bring a specific app to the front, take a screenshot, mute the volume, toggle macOS dark mode, activate LED desk lights, trigger an IFTTT routine, selectively start/stop a timer based on what Room you are in or App is active. You can even pass parameters along to a Python script.

There is extensive information on Applescript usage and automation on the developer’s website.

CurrentKey Stats is available on the App Store. It offers a one month free trial. It is a subscription app costing $2.49 a month and there doesn’t appear to be an option for a yearly subscription or a lifetime purchase.

I have been using the Apple Passwords App instead of a third-party alternative for a few weeks. I’ve managed to get my work done and not get locked out of any apps, so it’s OK, I guess, but it does not have all the features I’m used to and it has presented some frustrations.

To set up the app, you need to use a Mac and not an iPhone. You will probably already have some passwords in the app but you can download and import from your current password manager or browser and it will do a pretty good job of skipping duplicates.

The passwords app saves login information for web sites and apps, wi-fi networks, 2FA One-Time Passwords and passkeys. You can share passwords easily with people in your family or with others with just a few extra steps. If you have any weak, reused or compromised passwords, the security tab in the app will let you know and guide you through fixing the problem. One feature I like is that if you have one account that uses multiple websites, like Microsoft 365 for example, you can group them together so that the security algorithm doesn’t think you are reusing passwords.

To enable the Passwords app on your Mac go to Settings > General > Autofill & Passwords and enable AutoFill Passwords and Passkeys, along with Passwords.

The drawbacks to the app are plentiful. Unlike other password managers, the app doesn’t have a secure notes feature for storing things like backup codes for 2FA sites or your partner’s SSN pr passport data. If you use a browser other than Safari, it won’t suggest  passwords when you add a new site or change an existing account.  In my case, as an Edge user, it turned off the ability to fill forms with my name and address and it won’t allow me to add any credit cards to the form fill function in the browser.

There is a new app from a third party called Access Passwords Companion for people who want to use Apple’s Passwords and still have access to their other data. It’s a paid app with both a subscription and lifetime purchase option.

The Mac ecosystem is not at a loss for task managers. Apple’s own Reminders app has steadily added features over the years, incorporating things like grocery shopping and adding items via Siri. There are full blown GTD systems for executives and others with super complicated lives like Omnifocus. Then there are wonderfully designed apps like Things 3 that you can make complicated if you want to. But what if you don’t have complex needs and don’t need areas and projects and subtasks and repeating tasks and all the other bells and whistles that come with those systems? What if you just want something to mimic the ease of pencil and paper?

If that’s you, then I suggest taking a look at Daily, a personal task manger designed to help you succeed. Its keyboard focused with just a handful of easy to memorize shortcuts designed to help you plan a day’s work without having to fiddle with an app. There is no carry over feature. the app is designed to help you plan a single day at the the time, although you do have the ability to refer to past days ir to skip ahead and add tasks to future days. It’s free and in active development with a few unobtrusive features coming in the near feature like:

• iOS version
  - iCloud sync
  - Search
  - Appearance customization

Daily is available from Mac App Store.

I recently saw an announcement for the release of version 3.0 of the Internet history and bookmarking tool Surfed. Previous app store reviews of the app stated that it had a lot of potential but that it wasn’t a mature product. I had hopes that a new version would correct that.

I downloaded the app and purchased the pro version. I was disappointed to find out that the iOS version only works with Safari as I am an Edge user. After downloading the browser extensions needed for the app to work I opened a new tab in my browser to find that Surfed had taken over that feature and that if I disabled it, Surfed would not work.

One of the primary features of Surfed is recording your browsing history. It does this on a joint and per device basis. I have a desktop, a laptop, an iPad and an iPhone. Surfed consistently creates duplicate copies of both my computers causing me to constantly merge the browsing history of the copies with a master record and then delete the extras. Surfed also randomly stops or fails to record my browsing history for hours at the time.

After the 3.1 update, the new page browser feature is no longer working as it was before. I use my new browser page to hold shortcuts to frequently opened web pages and not having the ability to access those is a serious impediment to my workflow.

I imported about 1000 favorites from Raindrop.io into Surfed. The bookmarks are organized by the tags I had assigned in Raindrop and the tags in Surfed are case sensitive, which means that for many categories, I have for example, a #Blogging and a #blogging collection. There is no way to drag and drop multiple bookmarks onto the correct tag, nor is there a way to rename tags to merge them, making it necessary to retag the bookmarks one at the time. There is a workaround available that involves making a tag group I eventually discovered but the process was not intuitive and featured disappearing and reappearing tags. It was very confusing.

I plan to spend more time with Surfed to try and figure out how its logic works and to troubleshoot the reasons why it stops recording web history and why the browser page isn’t functioning properly. One of the things I discovered today was that the sync function has to be run manually from the menu Like previous reviewers have noted, the app has a lot of potential, but it is still not mature enough to recommend.

The developers website explains some more of the claimed functionality of the program.

The username I employ here on Reddit is one that I first used on my AOL account back in the 90s before you could even get a real Internet account in my area. Until recently, I had no idea how many times I’d employed it over the years, at least on services that are still in business. Well, thanks to a simple Homebrew app called Sherlock, I can search for my own or a friend’s username across 400+ social media networks. I tried it with a couple.

To install Sherlock, use the following Homebrew command from the command line in Terminal or your terminal app of choice: 

brew install sherlock

To use the app, type the following at the command line 

sherlock "username"