Wednesday, November 26, 2025
PSA: Right now is a good time to buy Indie Software for macOS and iOS. There are lists online with hundreds of discounted apps, e.g. indieappsales.com or github and Lou has a Roundup of his AppAddict Reviews on Sale.
But it’s even easier than this. Just buy all the apps you don’t own yet from the Editor’s Choice bundle. You’re welcome ;-)
Friday, June 13, 2025
I have been listening to podcasts regularly for a very long time, actually since the iPod era. Sometimes more, sometimes less. Of course, I’ve tried many apps because of this. I’ve used Pocket Casts, Castro for a long time, Overcast, and then one app or another, going back to Apple’s Podcast app a few times. Somehow, there were always things that bothered me. Sometimes the interface was too complex, and sometimes I missed essential features.
But fundamentally, what I really want from a podcast app is quite simple: a queue that automatically sorts new episodes, where I can set how many unheard episodes of the same podcast I want to keep in this queue at most, and then have a simple way to sort the queue a bit if necessary. The relatively new app to me, Queue, surprisingly does all of this very well with great design. The only thing that bothers me a little is its subscription price. But there’s always something to criticise 😇.
Update 2025-12-02: back to Overcast, c.f. App Defaults 2025
Thursday, May 8, 2025
An independent reader for book lovers.
I was looking for a third party alternative to Apple's Books.app - found
it: Yomu EBook Reader. Single
purchase if you want pro features, like iCloud sync, or just support its
developer.
Thursday, February 20, 2025
Rediscover the joy of reading your favorite writers and publications with Unread.
Unread is a (not exactly cheap, subscription based) classic RSS client for iOS, iPadOS, and macOS with a strong focus on design and typography and a perfectly harmonised feature set. I am thrilled.
Monday, December 2, 2024
I use a variety of apps and services across iOS, macOS, and the web. Most operate on subscription models, and although I aim to keep each subscription under € 5 per month, the total monthly cost can quickly become significant.
At the end of 2023, I reviewed all the apps and services I was subscribed to and decided to cancel some of them.
Now, one year later, it’s time to revisit my list of subscriptions. Some are new (➕), some I will definitely keep (🟢), others I need to (re)consider (🟡), some I won’t renew once their subscription period ends (🔴)1, others I already discontinued and no longer use (⛔), and for a few I bought a lifetime license (LT).
Here’s my current list2 of all the apps and services I’m subscribed to:
| App or Service | Cost / Month | Type | State |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apple One Premium | 31.95 € | m | 🟢 |
| MS Office 365 | 8.25 € | y | 🟢 |
| YNAB | 8.19 € | y | 🟢 |
| PlayStationPlus | 6.00 € | y | 🟢 |
| Nintendo Switch Online+ (Family) | 5.83 € | y | 🟢 |
| Setapp | 5.50 € | y | 🟢 |
| Feedbin ➕ | 5.00 € | m | 🟢 |
| Micro.blog | 4.63 € | m | 🟢 |
| Obsidian Sync | 4.45 € | y | 🟢 |
| NordVPN | 3.80 € | y | 🟢 |
| Readwise | 3.71 € | y | 🟢 |
| Arq | 3.22 € | y | 🟢 |
| omg.lol (2x) | 3.18 € | y | 🟢 |
| trakt.tv | 2.32 € | y | 🟢 |
| Play | 1.92 € | y | 🟢 |
| Hemispheric Views | 1.86 € | m | 🟢 |
| Mastodon | 1.79 € | m | 🟢 |
| Drafts | 1.71 € | y | 🟢 |
| Mercury Weather | 1.67 € | y | 🟢 |
| EchoFeed ➕ | 1.59 € | y | 🟢 |
| Chronicling | 0.83 € | y | 🟢 |
| TV Forecast | 0.83 € | y | 🟢 |
| Epic Weather Ride | 0.71 € | y | 🟢 |
| HealthFit | 0.50 € | y | 🟢 |
| TrainerRoad ➕ | 21.01 € | m | 🟡 |
| Disney+ (Standard) | 8.33 € | y | 🟡 |
| 1Password | 5.50 € | y | 🟡 |
| Kagi | 4.78 € | m | 🟡 |
| FDDB | 3.33 € | y | 🟡 |
| Ivory | 2.50 € | y | 🟡 |
| iConnectHue | 1.67 € | y | 🟡 |
| SwitchBuddy ➕ | 1.50 € | y | 🟡 |
| Looks Like Rain ➕ | 0.83 € | y | 🟡 |
| tinylytics ➕ | 4.17 € | y | 🔴 |
| Frame Screenshots ➕ | 1.50 € | y | 🔴 |
| Callsheet ➕ | 0.83 € | y | 🔴 |
| Reeder ➕ | 0.83 € | y | 🔴 |
| DayOne | ⛔ | ||
| ifttt | ⛔ | ||
| Neptunes | ⛔ | ||
| Overcast Premium | ⛔ | ||
| Personal Best | ⛔ | ||
| Söka | ⛔ | ||
| Timery | ⛔ | ||
| Training Today | ⛔ | ||
| Up Ahead | ⛔ | ||
| Wahoo Systm | ⛔ | ||
| Zenitizer | ⛔ | ||
| Anybox | LT | ||
| Photomator | LT | ||
| Waterllama | LT | ||
| Total: | 166.22 € |
In total, they cost 166 € a month and almost 25 € more than last year 🤔.
Actually, my goal was to spend less money on software subscriptions, not more. It didn’t really work out. Let’s see how it will be in a year.
As last year this list only covers tech related stuff. Charity and other related expenses are not listed here.
If anyone reading here happens to have anything to do with any of the apps mentioned, please don’t misunderstand: Those are all awesome apps, otherwise I would never have subscribed to them before! 😄 ↩︎
All subscriptions have been converted to Euros and annual subscriptions divided by 12. Some are family subscriptions, some are subscriptions with an education discount. ↩︎
Monday, December 2, 2024
Make Screenshot Stitching Easy with Picsew!
Picsew is IMHO a truly underrated app whose potential is not immediately apparent. Among scrollshot stitching and other things, you can e.g. effortlessly add device frames to screenshots and pay less for its full version than you pay for other apps in a single month. Highly recommended.
Monday, November 25, 2024
It has now been over a year since Andrew, Martin, and Jason of Hemispheric Views listed their app defaults, causing probably the biggest internet movement of 2023, documented with meticulous detail by Robb.
Time to update my list. Indicated are unchanged entries (🔒) and updated entries (✨). I still use the various categories as written by Andrew:
Saturday, November 16, 2024
I’ve recently started collecting something new again. I don’t mean video games, LEGO minifigures, retro handheld consoles, SAKs, or virtual Pokémon trading cards 1.
This time it’s crown caps.
I did this already as a kid, and at a certain stage, my own kids started doing so too. But, the collection needs physical space and always looks a little messy. I have never found a nice way to store or display them.
A few weeks ago, I just decided to do it virtually. I use the app Collections together with a Apple Shortcut I set up. I can take a picture, use my shortcut to enter the name of the company, the beverage type and the shortcut extracts the location of the photo, the date, removes the background of the picture, and exports everything into my Collections database.
There, I have a nice list or grid view of all the crown caps I’ve collected. I can open a map and see where I found them, and I really do enjoy this kind of virtual collection so far.
Who knows, maybe you’ll find something you’d like to collect in the form of virtual memories too? If so, I can recommend the app Collections.
BTW my ID is 3136836414506186 😎 ↩︎
Wednesday, October 2, 2024
As an enthusiastic Obsidian user, over time I’ve built a rather complex system consisting of about 15 different shortcuts that are triggered sequentially by a master shortcut. At the end of each day, these shortcuts collect data from various apps and add them to my daily notes in Obsidian. It was undoubtedly a challenge to develop this system, and without the Actions for Obsidian plugin, it would have been impossible. It’s definitely not elegant, but rather a bit of a hack, though it worked wonderfully for the past six months or so.
Despite my love for Obsidian, I must admit that the difficulty of importing data into the app, along with the non-native user interface, represents its biggest drawback. Nevertheless, I was extremely satisfied with my solution—until iOS 18 came along.
With the update to iOS 18, my carefully crafted system broke down. About half to a third of my shortcuts stopped working correctly. The errors occur mainly with internal iOS functions but also in conjunction with integrated actions from third-party apps like Chronicling. But it’s obviously Apple who broke it and there is nothing the developers can do about it at the moment. Every error causes the shortcut to stop entirely. Rien ne va plus—nothing works anymore. Over the past few weeks, I’ve spent a lot of time looking for workarounds, disabled certain functions but at the end I came to the conclusion that running the shortcuts on my Mac, which I haven’t updated yet, worked the most reliably—even though this introduced new challenges to my workflow, as certain apps just aren’t available there. (Looking at you, Apple Health.)
This situation has made me reflect. I even considered switching back to the native Notes app from Obsidian. Partly because I also wanted to take a look at Forever ✱ Notes, which has made the rounds through the Fediverse in recent days. It’s paradoxical: Apple’s poor software quality is driving me to avoid third-party software and return to Apple’s own apps?! No, that can’t be the solution. 🤷♂️
For now, I’ve given up and am hoping for iOS 18.1. Next year, I’ll probably hold off on updating not just my Mac but also my phone to the new release.
Monday, August 12, 2024
In continuation of week 31, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the thirty-second week of 2024:
🖥️ If you’re tired of always having to find a tiny free spot on an macOS app window to move or resize it, then this app might help: Swift Shift - Manage your macOS windows like a pro.
🖥️ BetterDisplay - Unlock your displays on your Mac - was updated to version 3.
📝 Quick Note Taking - Type made the rounds. Lout has (of course) already written about it. I like the idea, but the app does not support ISO formats for date and time and it1 does not fit into my personal Obsidian workflow, as I would have to configure a new note daily. However, I can imagine that the app could be great for many people. I will stick with Drafts in combination with Actions for Obsidian, though.
📷 The image uploader for micro.blog Mimi Uploader was updated.
☀️ A hat that produces energy? Sure, why not: EcoFlow Power Hat.
🚴♂️ I really like my Lumos Ultra Fly Pro bike helmet and the matching Firefly are used in a variety of ways within my family. I also really like their announced new, smaller Firefly Mini.2
🍏 I really hope that Apple manages to get a grip on macOS Sequoia Permission Madness.
😢 I have once again been annoyed by poorly translated apps: Automated Translations in Apps: A Threat to Quality and Credibility.
🌡️ For many months now I bake bread (yeast and sourdough) several times a week. I distrusted the temperature display of our oven and was therefore looking for a reasonable thermometer I can place inside my oven. I came to the conclusion, that this is one of those categories of items for which there is only trash available to purchase. Ultimately, I bought the meat thermometer Meater 2 plus. I suspect that my Meater will never see the inside of a raw piece of meat and I dislike their target group marketing and even more dislike their advertising campaign (woman lets food burn and star chef, of course a man, rushes to help 🤦♂️) BUT I still found the product very interesting. My Meater now measures the dough temperature, supposedly to the decimal point. (The reading of the ambient temperature seems to be completely off as well but the internal readings seem to be awesome.) It does leave an ugly hole in the bread, but the endpoint (96-98 °C, depending on the dough) can be determined pretty well. (For the first loaves, it was 5 - 10 minutes longer than the maximum duration stated in the recipe; so I have already learned something about our oven.)3
👋 After actively ignoring Gruber in my podcast and RSS feed as well as social media for a while, I have now deleted all sources.
🕹️ DOOM + DOOM II was released - The legendary action FPS is enhanced, combined, and now available on modern platforms! Nice move: Existing owners of DOOM (1993) and/or DOOM II on any of the above platforms receive a free upgrade to the new combined game, and can still access their previously owned versions. So, I could download the new version for my Steam Deck, Switch, and PS5 for free. (Of course, I own a legal copy of Doom and Doom II for all these platforms.)
Have a sunny week ahead! ☀️
Monday, August 5, 2024
In continuation of week 30, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the thirty-first week of 2024:
🖼️ I’ve mentioned the image viewers Lyn and PicArrange before, but this week Musebox made the rounds. I will take a closer look at it when I get a chance.
🔄 Speaking of alternatives: Diffraction might be a (currently free) alternative to Acorn.
🔍 And if you only want to find (even the smallest) differences between two images, you can check out ImageDiff.
🖥️ Somehow, mini apps for the Dynamic Island of various MacBooks were making the rounds this week. I came across NotchDrop (FOSS), MediaMate ($7), Notchnook ($25), and DynamicLake Pro1 ($14). Since I mostly use my MacBooks with larger monitors, I currently don’t need these apps. But maybe in the future.
🌐 There is a public beta for Söka 2.0 available if you’re interested.
📑 GoodLinks also received an update and now supports highlighting text on web pages after subscribing via IAP. Since I am very happy with Readwise Reader, which admittedly is very expensive, I don’t need it. If I weren’t, I would definitely take a closer look at this feature.
📱 Many people were excited about Unread for Mac. I don’t want another subscription and will stick with Reeder for now.
📰 Speaking of RSS, Tapestry is slowly taking shape and looks promising. However, the concept only works for me with a very limited selection of resources, and I find it very difficult to choose the right ones.
📁 Nimble Commander - Free dual-pane mac file manager with classic design, charged for power users. A possible alternative for those who don’t have a license for Forklift2, Path Finder2, or Commander One2.
🔍 There are countless different apps that help you find files on your Mac in addition to Spotlight. There is now another free app that promises to do just that: File Find by Pixel-Master - Search and find files fast and easily.
🎨 This looks cool: Pixelorama - a powerful and accessible open-source pixel art multitool. Unfortunately, I am not talented enough to use such an app.
☔ Carlo discovered Merry Sky. Looks cool, too and like a free, supercharged web version of Looks Like Rain. Well, probably the other way round - but what the heck 😇.
🎮 I like the idea of a game controller that can be used with your mobile phone and a Nintendo Switch: GameSir G8 Plus Bluetooth Mobile Controller.
🤦 I first thought it was a joke because it’s so cringe: Friend. Maybe they just want to get the addresses of people who urgently need psychological support? (They already have their own addresses, though.)
🎧 I was about to throw away our Beats Solo3 because the ear pads were starting to disintegrate. Luckily, I learned that you can buy replacements very cheaply and mount them yourself. And If I had studied the instructions more carefully, I wouldn’t have almost destroyed them during the process 🤦♂️.
💍 There were increasing rumours this week about The Apple Ring and Health Tracking, presumably in response to Samsung’s Ring. I would also find such a device very attractive. After my first COVID-19 infection at the end of last year and the resulting break in my streak of closing my rings every day for several years, I’m no longer as keen on achieving this, but I still pay attention to them. On the other hand, I’m getting bored with the design of my Apple Watch(es), which I’ve been wearing on my wrist for almost 18 years now. Therefore, some variety in the form of other watches or none at all would certainly be welcome. Samsung will surely not integrate its Ring into the Apple Health universe (although this would probably be possible even without DMA). So, I just have to wait for Apple or just ignore my rings.
🚴 Due to my wife’s shoulder surgery, we unfortunately had to cancel our vacation. We will now have to go hiking in the French Alps another time. However, I still took three days off from work and did what I would have done on vacation: ate very well, read a book3, finished a game on my Switch, but spent only little time on the computer overall. Oh yes, I finally went for a bike ride again, which I hadn’t had time or motivation for lately.
Have a wonderful week ahead! 🙋♂️
Sunday, July 28, 2024
In continuation of week 29, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the thirtieth week of 2024:
📝 Might be handy, but not sure if I will actually use it: WeExpire - Create emergency notes that can be read by your trusted contacts only after your death.
🖥️ Apparency for macOS - The App That Opens Apps - received a nice update at the beginning of the month.
🖼️ PicArrange for macOS as well; although I have not yet found whether the text-based image search happens on-device or sends anything to the cloud.
🤖 Meta released Llama 3.1 and it does indeed produce much better results with e.g. Ollama.
🌐 Apple Maps launches on the web in new public beta - practical.
🎮 Along with a few new applications, Fortnite is now even coming to the AltStore PAL. Let’s see if Apple will “coincidentally” allow it back in the regular App Store. It’s also a shame that Apple has managed to make the update and installation process so broken on my system that it barely works without restarting or reinstalling the AltStore or the apps.
🎁 The German computer magazine c’t had a review of the WOWCUBE ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM - a very cool idea. Maybe a possible Christmas gift? I’m curious whether their software platform will flop or survive.
🔠 Might come handy someday: Free Anagram Sentence Generator for English, German, French, and Spanish.
✅ I’ve mentioned One Million Checkboxes in week 27, here you can read a little bit more about the author’s journey Dealing with unexpected popularity.
🗳️ My Mastodon timeline has become much more interested in American politics since certain events. I follow this with some interest. However, I couldn’t initially understand the sudden memes about a certain person’s couch. Thanks to JD Vance couch memes, explained: Why AP pulled its story, now I know.
🚑 My wife had shoulder surgery again. It’s no fun; now six weeks of complete rest are prescribed, and we really hope that the collarbone, or rather the implanted metal plate, holds this time. We had to cancel our vacation because of this. It’s a shame, but her health definitely comes first.
🧱 I have quite a huge LEGO collection (> 700 sets and > 2200 minifigs) but stopped collecting a while ago, mainly due to space constraints and of course because it was becoming increasingly expensive. But I might be tempted by this set: LEGO 71438 Super Mario World: Mario & Yoshi.
🕹️ I’ve preordered Thank Goodness You’re Here! for the Switch.
🎮 Of course, I am enjoying Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition on my Switch quite a bit and found this guide helpful. You can download a free PDF copy if you have a myNintendo account. Additionally, I am currently playing the remake of Dead Space on the PS5.
🎥 And fittingly: Watched The Super Mario Bros. Movie - it was very light entertainment, but not bad.
📺 I think someday I should really watch all episodes of Double Fine PsychOdyssey.
I wish you lovely summer days! 🌞
Sunday, July 21, 2024
In continuation of week 28, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the twenty-ninth week of 2024:
📱 Just in time for its tenth anniversary the rewrite of Overcast was released. I had canceled my subscription months ago, but since it hasn’t expired yet, I downloaded the new version and used it over the past week. It seems significantly more performant than before, but its UI is still confusing. I think I’ll switch back to Apple’s Podcast App, which I am also not really satisfied with.
📑 With Showdown, a free presentation app based on Markdown has been released. I’ve been using Deckset for a while, and then there’s Hyperdeck or, of course, iA Presenter, all of which can do similar things.
📱 The first beta of Tapestry for iOS by the Iconfactory was distributed to Kickstarter backers; it is still just a concept; I am curious to see how it develops.
🤖 Sindre’s AI Actions for the Shortcuts app now supports GPT-4o mini.
🍌 BananaBin was released in version 1.0 and here you can find some other weird but useful macOS apps.
🔋 The battery capacity of my iPhone 14 Pro was down to 79% after just 1.5 years, so I used Apple’s Express Replacement Service through Apple Care+. You have to hand it to Apple, I had the replacement device in my hands the next day. The migration went quite well. My second prepaid eSIM was not as easy to transfer, but it was eventually reactivated. But guess what didn’t work afterward? Altstore PAL along with Delta and Clip1. A knave who thinks ill of it.
🚑 My wife had a collarbone fracture a few weeks ago, had to undergo surgery, and now has a plate inside her. About a week ago, she suddenly experienced severe pain again. It turned out that two screws had come loose. Now she has to be operated on again. I feel very sorry for her.
🔪 The new Victorinox Damast Limited Edition 2024 was released. Additionally, as a big Victorinox fan, I found this video by Jon Gadget interesting. He was invited to the company headquarters after he had posted a critical video some time ago.
🎮 Continued my journey in The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening .
🌐 Enjoyed Everybody’s Free (to Make Websites), even though I didn’t even know the original before.
I wish you all a wonderful week and perhaps even relaxing holidays! 🌴
I had to delete Altstore and both apps, restart my phone and reinstall the store and its apps and of course all my roms, settings and save files are gone … ↩︎
Sunday, July 14, 2024
In continuation of week 27, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the twenty-eighth week of 2024:
🆓 DEVONtechnologies released their free Neo Network Utility app for macOS.
🛠️ Another new app from Sindre: Menu Bar Spacing - Customize the gap between menu bar items.
📄 BeyondPDF - BeyondPDF is your intelligent document companion, here to change the way you search for content in your PDF files. It works locally, without sending data to any AI startup, but so far, only for English texts. I am still waiting for a real use case and therefore cannot comment on its quality yet.
🎥 Telestream - Use Continuity Camera from your menu bar!
💸 There was another series of discounts for software from indie developers as part of the IndieAppSales. This time I didn’t go overboard like at the beginning of the year, but there were still a few very nice new apps to discover.
💰 Speaking of discounts, Skoro 3.0 is still available at a reduced price.
🍎 Apple has approved UTM SE for iOS on the App Store.
📱 Many people in my Apple bubble are impressed by this really cheap and very stylish Android mobile phone. Instead of a used iPhone, I might also buy a CMF Phone 1 for one of my sons if the need suddenly arose. A few years ago, this would have been unthinkable for me. BTW, since the end of last week, the Vision Pro is now available in Germany, and I haven’t even thought about checking out the device in person. That would have been unthinkable a few years ago, too. Due to what I believe to be very poor software quality lately, their behavior towards developers, and childish actions against the EU’s demands, Apple has actually managed to kill any interest I had in new devices from Cupertino. What a shame 😢.
🏳️🌈 Niléane from MacStories published an article about her impression that LGBT and Marginalized Voices Are Not Welcome on Threads. She and Federico received the unfortunately expected feedback directly. I don’t understand why people have such a problem with others just being different from them. What are they afraid of? It’s great to see that Niléane received a lot of support from within the Mastodon community and many people took this as an opportunity to donate to various organizations.
🤧 My cold is getting better. I hope that I can finally get back on my bike in the course of next week.
🎮 Analogue announced an Aluminum Edition of the Pocket. Unfortunately, it’s unaffordable for me. Additionally, the Odin 2 Mini looks extremely tempting, and the Ayaneo Pocket EVO with an OLED screen has also been announced 🤷♂️.
🎮 Instead, I’ve added the SCUF Nomad Mobile Gaming Controller to my wishlist. (BTW there’s a review at Retro Game Corps if you’re interested.)
🕹️ I finally played through Firewatch and started The Legend of Zelda - Link’s Awakening on my Nintendo Switch.
Have a nice week! 🌞
Monday, July 8, 2024
In continuation of week 25, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh week of 2024:
At the end of the 26th week, I suddenly became ill. It started with a sore throat, followed by headaches, cough, runny nose, and total exhaustion. I am still not completely fit. Covid tests were negative, but I suspect that I caught the summer wave 🤒. Since I spent a lot of time sleeping in bed, I could only evaluate a few things, but I bookmarked a few programs that might be helpful later on.
🖼️ Upscayl - Free and Open Source AI Image Upscaler.
🌐 WiredBuddy - The missing icon for ethernet interfaces. And matching: Online Check by Sindre Sorhus.
🚶♂️ Strolly - Generated daily walks: The app generates short (or longer) walking routes based on your location. I imagine the app to be quite helpful, especially if you are somewhere else and want to plan a dog walk.
🗑️ BananaBin - Lets you know when to empty the MacOS Bin. This is definitely the app I was waiting for! (And 100% worth giving it full disk access 😇.) And be sure to install Ball as well.
💻 About-This-Hack - Discover your hardware on macOS with this simple, user-friendly hardware info app that retains the beloved design language of the classic ‘About This Mac’ interface, while gaining access to a wealth of additional features.
📝 Zavala: This promising looking outliner had flown under my radar until now.
🗺️ Avenue-GPX-Viewer - A simple and easy GPX viewer for macOS. I use myTracks, but if you are looking for a simple and open source GPX viewer, you could check out Avenue.
🌍 Overlap - Time zones made simple.
👀 DockDoor - Window peeking for macOS. Personally, “too much” for me but maybe great for you …
💸 Support an Indie Developer today! - Indie App Sales is back for our July ‘24 Edition for two days only - July 9-10! Lot’s of discounted apps 🥰.
📊 Datawrapper - Create charts, maps, and tables. Looks like a very promising web application.
💰 YNAB has unfortunately increased prices again. I still can’t imagine life without it, but Canion has already started looking for alternatives.
🐘 Thanks to Michael I can look up all those custom Mastodon icons (emojos) of a given instance from the web. (BTW if you’re interested in additional data, you could check out Mastowatch.)
💻 Mac OS Fake Update Screen: That’s a great one for procrastination for sure. And right after the update is finished you can visit One Million Checkboxes.
✏️ Habib linked to the Hyper Realistic Pencil Drawings of Metallic Objects by Kohei Ohmori. Wow!
Stay healthy and have a great week! 🙌
Sunday, June 23, 2024
In continuation of week 24, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the twenty-fifth week of 2024:
🌐 The outrage about unethical behavior by big tech companies wanting to make money with AI features continued. See for example: How We’re Trying to Protect MacStories from AI Bots and Web Crawlers – And How You Can, Too or Perplexity Plagiarized Our Story About How Perplexity Is a Bullshit Machine.
😠 I have a strong opinion about Apple’s statement regarding alternative marketplaces during The Talk Show Live and the latest announcements about missing features in the upcoming iOS update in the fall concerning the DMA. I have long considered whether I should write it down in detail. But I’d rather save my energy for discussions with my teenage son, behave like an adult, and might simply take the advice to get an Android device as my next phone 😇.
🤖 How absolutely freaking cool is this: I made an AI LEGO® PixelArt Robot?!
🎮 Speaking of awesome: Doom x Mario Mod.
💻 There are some Mac games—available at a discount for a limited time.. I bought GRIS, which is BTW on sale for Steam right now as well.
🎉 Thanks to Ben and Ehqo and will now look for discounts on games on Game deals and IsThereAnyDeal.
💸 Speaking of discounts. Some long-established macOS apps are once again on SummerFest sale. For some of them, I wish they were a bit more modern 😎.
🪟 There is just another free and open-source window manager for macOS that looks promising: Loop - Window management made elegant. Bookmarked just in case I have to switch from Rectangle some day.
📈 Another app I’ve bookmarked in case I need it: ProcessSpy - View macOS processes with command line arguments.
📝 If you don’t want to subscribe to Drafts to quickly jot down text snippets and move them to other places and also don’t really warm up to Bebop, you might want to check out Funnel: Quick Capture as recommended by Thomas.
🔌 I have completely lost track of my USB-C cables. Which ones can only charge, which ones support fast data transfer? So I recently bought two gadgets recommended in the c’t1: Treedix USB Cable Tester2 and Gianac USB Adapter3 and now I know that I only have one high-speed USB-A to C cable and only very few USB-C to C cables supporting it.
🖥️ I have been using my ASUS ROG Swift OLED PG32UCDM monitor for about a week now and I am blown away by its panel. Still don’t like the gaming vibe, though but hey, I bought a gaming monitor so nothing to complain about. Was playing Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart on my PS5 and enjoy it so far.
As always, have a wonderful week ahead! 🙋♂️
German computer magazine ↩︎
behind paywall: www.heise.de/select/ct… ↩︎
behind paywall: www.heise.de/select/ct… ↩︎
Monday, June 17, 2024
In continuation of week 23, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 24th week of 2024.
My eldest son has a guest student from America visiting, who will be staying with us for the next three weeks. Last week was therefore very much about preparation and, after his arrival, a lot of social activities. I really hope, he enjoys his stay with us 😅.
I still watched the WWDC keynote and exceptionally listened to the Talk Show. I will leave the further reporting and commentary to others. Besides that, there was very little I watched this week or that I had a chance to try.
🔍 Somewhere I stumbled upon fastfetch-cli, which can also be installed via Homebrew; a nice tool for the CLI.
🗓️ If you would like to use an event countdown iOS app but don’t want to spend money on a subscription for Up Ahead or Pinning, you might want to take a look at Countdown Widget - The best app for your important events.
🖼️ Very beautiful wallpapers: macOS Sequoia 1984 Macintosh Wallpapers.
📱 A new version of Barcodes for iOS was released. I don’t carry many plastic cards anymore, but this seems to be a very nice app to digitize them.
🎬 The trailer for DOOM: The Dark Ages was released.
🤖 Robb has declared war on AI companies: Blocking Bots with Nginx and Perplexity AI Is Lying about Their User Agent.
🐻 Somehow, half of my timeline seems to be discovering Bear Blog, and I had to first learn that it has nothing to do with the app Bear - Markdown Notes.
😊 I was very pleased that Lou mentioned me on his Junited List.
🎮 My wife doesn’t like video games being played in the living room, and she also doesn’t want to tolerate a bigger TV there1. On the other hand, my 24" 4K LG monitor for the Mac in my room unfortunately doesn’t have an HDMI input, so I could only use the PS5 remotely or when she was already in bed. That should change, and last week I was looking for a monitor that is at least 27" in size, provides 4K, 120 Hz, 90 W USB-C PD Upstream with DP alt., Audio out, at least one HDMI input, and could actually be purchased. The picture quality should also not be terrible. There are shockingly few options. Anyway, it ended up being the ASUS ROG Swift OLED PG32UCDM and I am totally blown away 🤷♂️🤦♂️🤣.
Have a wonderful week! 🌟
Update 2024-06-18: added link to 🤖 paragraph
ours is only Full HD and 32" 😢 ↩︎
I wonder how many people don’t know that in iOS they can access a multiple selection mode in lists with a double tap and hold, e.g. in Apple Mail, with which they can very easily mark many mails as read, for example. That’s only one of so many non-discoverable features in iOS.
Sunday, June 9, 2024
In continuation of week 22, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the twenty-third week of 2024:
🔑 As the Safari integration of 1Password is getting worse and worse - at least for me it is so buggy, that I have disabled the Safari extension and moved my passwords to Apple’s Keychain1 - I am looking for alternatives. I actually don’t want to store my passwords only with Apple, either. I feel too locked in there. But using 1PW in parallel with iCloud seems weird to me in the long run. So, I looked around and for the emerging passkey front I ordered a Token2 security key, which arrived this week. According to its description, it “combines hardware-based authentication, public-key cryptography, TOTP/HOTP, U2F, and FIDO2 protocols to protect your accounts.” To make a long story short, this post-password world is still way too complicated for me. OTP/HOTP, U2F, and FIDO2?! 🤯 The token stores passkeys but also 2FA codes, and I never know what exactly where and when. Sometimes passkeys alone are enough to log in, sometimes I have to enter an additional 2FA OTP, sometimes - as with Mastodon - the 2FA seems to be the passkey and I still need a username and PW! For the token2 to work, I have to touch it, enter a 6-digit code on my Mac, and then touch it again. That’s much more cumbersome than just putting my finger on the touch ID sensor of my Macbook. On my Mac, I can access the stored passkey (but not all or just the OTP tokens, I dont know) on the token2 only very awkwardly but at least via Chrome’s settings page. OTP codes can be accessed via the iPhone app but not the passkeys. WTF?! I don’t understand anything. In addition, my most important accounts still don’t support passkeys. Parallel to this, the macOS version of ProtonPass was released this week, and the annual subscription could be purchased for 10 €. What the heck, I thought, and I purchased it. The Mac app seems, like 1Password, to be an Electron app, and it feels like they just released a web wrapper. It is still far from being a viable alternative. Maybe I have to hope for the rumor mill come true and enjoy Apple’s standalone password manager starting this fall? Anyway, I could not agree more: A Passwordless Future Needs Portability.
🚨 There was a bit of fuss this week about the app Bartender for macOS, which I have highly appreciated so far. I uninstalled it and have been using Ice since a couple of days, as mentioned. It works flawlessly.
🗺️ Organic Maps: Offline Map on the App Store now also supports iCloud sync.
📚 Sequel, the manager for a variety of media, received a major update. I am actually very happy with Booktracks, Gamery, and TV Forecast, but I started testing the app again. I am not yet sure if there is a place for an additional, more general app.
🌐 I also tried Surfed again because I actually find the idea of the app very cool. However, it somehow did not reliably record my history and synchronize it between my three used devices. This led to me not finding the things I was looking for, so I will let the subscription expire at the end of the month.
📶 Little Snitch shows network usage in the menu bar on my work computer. If you are looking for a free alternative for just this function, you can check out Scaler Bandwidth Monitor.
⏲️ I have been using Rocket for a long time, but Horo - the best free timer app for Mac from the same developer had slipped through my fingers until now.
🍏 Apple already announced the 2024 winners and finalists - Apple Design Awards. Congrats to Crouton: Recipe Manager on the App Store. (I only wish there was an import feature for Mela, the app I currently use.)
🤖 I’m Not Anti-AI spoke to my soul, and since I’m already mentioning Michael, I was very pleased with his mention in the Junited post 🥰.
📸 I learned that on macOS, you can open an image with Quick Look by hitting the Space bar and then just select all recognized text (⌘A) and copy it (⌘C) to your clipboard 🤯.
🧸 I had to stop collecting LEGO sets due to space constraints and definitely must not buy the Evercade Alpha Bartop Arcade System.
🎮 However, I couldn’t prevent myself from acquiring a Nintendo N64 console. Thanks to 2x Line Doubler and RetroScaler N64 BlueRetro Wireless Controller Bluetooth Adapter, I can now play Mario 64 with my Nintendo 64 Bluetooth Controller. Please don’t ask why I don’t just do it via Nintendo Switch Online, EmuDeck on the Steam Deck, or simply my iPhone with Delta 🤷♂️.
🎨 Speaking of which: more awesome skins for Delta: Delta Pocket - Transparent Edition.
📱 And: Nintendo 3DS Emulator for iPhone Released in App Store With Caveats.
🔋 If you don’t trust macOS’s built-in battery management, don’t use AlDente, and are looking for another application of this kind, you might want to check out BatFi – maximize your Mac’s battery lifespan. BTW I have decided that the built-in function must suffice for me.
🔋 Same topic, different area: AirBattery - Get the battery usage of all your devices at once! I noted it down in case AirBuddy stops working someday.
🌐 If you ask nicely, you might be able to test a new web-based feed reader: An introduction to Sublime Feed.
💻 Johnny Decimal brings Ellane the command line of macOS. If you want to dive deeper afterward, I can definitely recommend Take Control of the Mac Command Line with Terminal.
🛠️ I had planned months ago to finally dive into to the Gridfinity system. Somehow, I never had the time to pick out the right base plates. Thanks to the “reminder” from Marcus and the hint about these baseplates, I just started with one desk drawer. I already knew it, but oh, how awesome is that! I definitely won’t get out of this rabbit hole anytime soon. BTW thanks to Gridfinity Extended, you can easily click together all sorts of things with OpenSCAD.
🎙️ MacStories has added two new podcasts to its family. The pilot episodes were entertaining. However, based on their teasers, I honestly expected a little more than using the Reminders backend in Fantastical or playing games on the iPad with a controller to get the hosts out of their Comfort Zone 😈.
🗣️ German-speaking readers should try the dialect test from the Swiss Tages-Anzeiger, which has made its rounds on the web. I’m still unsure how they fake it, but the precision of the results is amazing.
🇪🇺 This weekend are European elections. Go vote! (And vote for a democratic party!)
🍏 Next week is the WWDC. It will not be a bug fix year once again. I hope so much that Apple can resist the urge to integrate pointless AI functions into every little app. (I just want a PDF reader that doesn’t mess up my annotations and a more stable system in general 😢.)
🙋♂️ I’ve received my fist feedback email to a blog post I wrote. Friendly shout-out to Darren!
😮 Apart from that, this week in my filter bubble I learnt once again that we are all just people with feelings and that they can be hurt very quickly. I hope that the apologies were sincere and, above all, that they are accepted. Being able to forgive is also a very important trait in a tolerant community.
Have a great week! 🙋♂️
whatever they are calling it now ↩︎
Sunday, June 2, 2024
In continuation of week 21, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 22. week of 2024:
🚴♂️ This week was relatively quiet in terms of tech-related news, partly because my wife had a bicycle accident in the middle of the week. I have borrowed a car, transported her 100 km from one hospital to the local one, she had surgery, and now she is hopefully recovering quickly at home and will soon be back on her feet (and back on the bike).
🌦️ CARROT Weather has been released in version 6.
💻 The trick on how to Get ChatGPT for Mac and skip the waitlist actually works seamlessly.
⏯️ This week, I repeatedly1 came across IINA - the modern media player for macOS - which I amusingly already had in my bookmarks collection but hadn’t looked at yet. While I was at it, I finally connected Transloader with Downie. BTW: Papertube - Turn any YouTube podcast, TED Talk, or chat into easy-to-read text with real speaker names: I need to take a closer look at it when I get the chance. And while I’m at it, cobalt also looks like an interesting service.
📝 pixelgraphix pointed out Bebop. If Drafts is an overkill (or maybe too expensive) for you, you might be able to quickly and easily push texts to Obsidian with this really nice app.
📅 I use Dato, but if you’re only interested in the Week Number in the menu bar, you can install the app of the same name from the same developer for free.
📱 I completely overlooked that there is now a sister application for iOS for Carbon Copy Cloner. I need to check it out when I get the chance.
🎥 Kino - Pro Video Camera from the makers of Halide has been released. It also looks very promising.
🎮 In a quiet moment, I need to take a closer look at this: Another Majora’s Mask PC Port Is Here.
🎮 I wasn’t aware until now that you can even run Android on the Steam Deck. I’ll keep that in mind until I figure out what I would actually use it for 😎.
💻 Recently, I wanted to find out what a specific setting is called in English in macOS System Settings, so I set up a virtual macOS installation with UTM - Virtual machines for Mac. Wow, that was easy. (Unfortunately, I can’t manage to access external USB devices/hard drives yet.) Next, I should get into Docker…
🎮 This week, after more than two months, my “repaired,” i.e., replaced Playdate arrived. It’s now the third one. Maybe this one will last a bit longer 🤞.
🎮 I also acquired an old Nintendo N64 console. The picture quality of PAL games on the PAL version of the console is abysmally bad on my LG LED TV. Interestingly, NTSC games, started from the Everdrive, look good 🤷♂️.
🌐 I was happy to hear from Adam again.
Have a great week and take care 😇
Sunday, May 26, 2024
In continuation of week 20, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 21. week of 2024:
⌨️ In week 37 of 2023 I bought a Keychron K1 SE Wireless Mechanical Keyboard and have been trying to learn to type on the keyboard since then. My error rate was extremely high, and I found it exhausting to have to lift my fingers significantly higher than I am used to with other keyboards. I actually really like the keyboard, but this week I finally pulled the plug and bought a Logitech MX Keys for Mac. I should have done this six months ago. I get along with it unbelievably better.
📱 And in week 01 I was tempted to order a Clicks Keyboard for my iPhone. Glad I did not do this.
💻 Speaking of devices I find interesting but won’t buy: Daylight - A More Caring Computer. If there was just an affordable Android-based e-ink reader I could use Readwise Reader on. (570 € for an PocketBook InkPad Eo is too much.)
🔍 &udm=14 is the suffix you want to use for Google searches. This AI stuff is really getting bananas and completely out of control it seems.
📦 I am waiting now for almost two months for Panic to ship a replacement for my broken playdate. It seems the first package was lost and maybe I’ll receive the next one.
🎮 Fortunately, this parcel did not get lost and I have I received my GB Operator and went through my ROMs collection. I was irritated to find out that my “Super Mario Advance 4” is on a rewritable unofficial ROM cartridge. It cost about $20 and looks absolutely genuine to me. Why do people go to so much trouble to fake these not-so-rare and not-so-expensive cartridges?
🎨 Sean Fletcher is currently working on another Delta Skin, this time for the NDS: Delta Duo (Preview). I really like it.
📱 And if someone has lost track of all the iOS emulators, the Beginner’s Guide To iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV Emulators might help, and for newcomers to Retroarch, the iPhone & iPad Starter Guide on YouTube could be helpful.
🎬 Andre mentioned Switch TV ON - TV shows and movies in detail. It seems to be a great source for finding information about shows, actors, etc. Like Callsheet but without a subscription.
⏲️ If you are looking for a simple and free focus / Pomodoro timer, Breaks: Focus Timer might be the right iOS app for you.
🔒 Little Snitch — Network Monitor and Application Firewall for macOS has been upgraded to version 6.
Nice set of rules from Lou and Alexandra. I would say that you absolutely can’t go wrong with it in your life.
Have a nice week! 🙋♂️
Monday, May 20, 2024
In continuation of week 18, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 19. - 20. week of 2024:
🚴♂️ I was cycling with my wife for a few days along the former East-West German border. The weather was fantastic, the inclines were not to be underestimated but manageable. A bit of a shame, but we tried to take it with humour: Once again, we had to realize that the concept of Deutsche Bahn has unfortunately totally failed. Train travel is an absolute disaster in our country, and that makes me very sad and angry at the FDP (the party that provides our transport minister). But that’s a topic for another time.
📵 During the bike tour, I decided to take a one or two-week break from social media. I deleted my Mastodon clients from my devices (I already don’t use Threads, Instagram, X, Facebook, etc.) and also avoided YouTube. I still read a few posts in my RSS reader, though. So, do I feel better now? I don’t think so, but it was good anyways, I think.1
What else was interesting to me?
🚴♂️ Hammerhead Karoo 3 In-Depth Review: Worth the Upgrade?: there’s a successor to my current bike computer. Since my two biggest criticisms, battery life and responsiveness, have obviously not been addressed, I am not in danger of wanting to spend the 500 € (!) for it for now.
🎮 RetroArch has been released for iOS and similar platforms. For those who aren’t totally into retro gaming, dedicated emulators like Delta, PPSPPP are probably the much more convenient way to enjoy some old games. Nevertheless, it’s wonderful to see that RetroArch now runs on the iPhone and especially on the AppleTV! (I use a dedicated Raspberry Pi with Batocera or my Analogue Pocket with its dock for the TV, though.)
📑 PDF Squeezer is now also available for iOS.
💾 Carbon Copy Cloner has been released in version 7, and I took the opportunity to support the developer by purchasing the upgrade.
🖼️ If you have an old, currently unused iPad lying around (I’ve heard there are new ones 😇), you might want to check out Synced Photo Frame by Re-Frame and repurpose it as a digital photo frame.
🖼️ Photo Tape - Connect Images: the app looks like a pretty neat way to simply merge images.
🔖 Plinky - Easily Save Links: there’s another bookmark manager. I just bought the lifetime license for Anybox and therefore my search (for now) is over.
⏳ Time - Ring - the elegant and fun way to count down to your most anticipated events! For those interested who haven’t yet paid for Pinning, Up Ahead (which has resumed development), Countdowns, or one of the many other apps and are looking for a simple, free option.
🎮 I installed chiaki4deck on my Steam Deck and can now effortlessly do PS5 Remote Play. However, I fear that someone might empty half the PSN Store with my account, but certain risks have to be taken 😬
🎮 Due to the early access release of Hades II, the first one was very cheap, so I bought it for the Steam Deck and started playing it. Actually, I wanted to keep my hands off these rogue-like games, but it’s just too good.
🌞 Have a great week!
That was also the reason why there was no blog post from me last week. I assume almost no one noticed ;-) ↩︎
Sunday, May 5, 2024
In continuation of week 17, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 18. week of 2024:
🚀 Carlo just released a beta of UI Actions. It follows his awesome Actions for Obsidian, but with this you can script macOS apps that lack native shortcut integration. Definitely an app to keep an eye on, as an addition or alternative to Keyboard Maestro.
🕹️ It seems like every week a handful of new retro handhelds hit the market. Whether interest will wane due to Delta, I don’t know, but for those like me who have long lost track of all the different devices, take a look at Handheld List.
🐰 Following the humane AI pin disaster, the second AI gadget, rabbit R1, doesn’t fare much better: Rabbit R1: Barely Reviewable. But at least it’s orange, costs only a fraction of its sibbling, and looks totally cute on a shelf next to a playdate console. Speaking of which, in week 12 the crank handle of mine broke, I sent it in for repair, and now the replacement device has been waiting somewhere in America to be shipped for over 4 weeks 😢. I’m curious to see if I will ever see my playdate again 🤞.
📦 On Bento3D you can easily click together boxes for your 3D printer according to your needs and download the corresponding .stl files. I wish it were compatible with Gridfinity.
⌨️ I am a long-time Typinator user and there are a bunch of other alternatives for text expansion, but someone1 mentioned Espanso. So, this might be worth checking out if you’re still on the hunt.
🖱️ As previously mentioned, I own a KeyCue license, which I don’t really utilize, but a nice feature is its ability to add your own shortcuts to menu entries. If you only want to use this feature and have so far not employed the cumbersome method of doing it via the Settings app, you might want to take a look at the free app CustomShortcuts – Customize menu keyboard shortcuts.
⌚ For months, the capacity display of my Apple Watch S7 stood at exactly 80%. Apple replaces the battery for free if it drops to 79% and you are paying for Apple Care. I was about to file a class-action lawsuit because I was sure the value would never drop to 79% 😇. However, this week it finally happened and my watch was replaced. It’s great not to risk the watch refusing to work in the afternoon. I think this also means I can get by with my current model for another year and not be in a bind wanting a new one in the fall. What I found interesting was that despite a backup, not all settings were transferred to the new one. So, I had to search in vain in the Watch app on my phone and then in the settings directly on the watch for where to set that a simple swipe on the watch face switches to another. I couldn’t find it and had to consult the internet. I’ve had better experiences with Apple’s UI in the past I must say. A few other little things were also not set correctly. It’s as if an intern at Apple had quit, and now the latest settings are no longer included in the backup routine 🤷♂️.
🎮 I had actually forbidden myself from buying games for other platforms if I already own them for one. Well, buying Hades for less than 9 EUR for the Steam Deck, even though I already have the PS5 version, was definitely the last exception 🤦♂️. Luckily, Nintendo stubbornly prevents me from logging into their eShop with my mobile phone (despite the disabled ad blocker and paused pi hole), so at least I’m not in danger of acquiring the Switch version as well.
📚 I wish it wouldn’t cost 300 € to have Reader running on an E-Ink Android device.
📖 Anyone who has ever wanted to test how well they can type can do so by copying a book: Practice typing by retyping ENTIRE novels — TypeLit.io.
💾 The small 88x31 icons in the website footer are enjoying great popularity again. BTW those by Andy are awesome. If you want to take a look at the originals from GeoCities, you’ll find them here: THE 88×31 ARCHIVE.
🎮 I don’t own a Nintendo 64 console, but I’ve already ordered an EVERDRIVE-64 X5 just in case 🤷♂️.
🎥 Watched The Terminator with my sons. Also, I resubscribed to trakt.tv. I think the service is worth supporting.
🚴 Finally got to ride my bike outside several times this week 🥰.
Have a great week! 🙋♂️
Sunday, April 28, 2024
In continuation of week 16, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the seventeenth week of 2024:
🖱️ Logitech’s Mouse Software Now Includes ChatGPT Support, Adds Janky ‘ai_overlay_tmp’ Directory to Users’ Home Folders: It seems to be a good time to reconsider using SteerMouse or BetterMouse – Comprehensive mouse utility for macOS instead. In addition, lots of people seem to like Mac Mouse Fix. Guess, I have to evaluate “mouse drivers” now 🤦♂️.1
🎮 The enthusiasm for retro gaming continues to hold on. Delta received its first update in the AltStore PAL (installation went absolutely smoothly) and a native iPad version has been announced for non-Europeans. Moreover, Sean Fletcher has released absolutely great skins for Deltas GBC und GBA cores.
🖥️ macOS can also be beautified, as Louie Mantia, Jr. has updated his beautiful Time Machine icons. Thanks to Harshil Shah for bringing this to my attention.2
🎮 And for all those who have now rediscovered their love for Pokemon thanks to Delta, BenRiceM has released the appropriate app: Ketchup for Pokémon.
📝 As you might know, I switched from Apple Notes to Obsidian as my main notes app some time ago, but those who still use Apple Notes as their App Defaults now have in addition to NotesOllama another extensions available, ProNotes, which hopefully further improves working with it.
📊 Speaking of Obsidian, for those still looking for new plugins, the current episode of AppStories Obsidian Setup Check-In and the blog post 10 Lesser Known But Super Useful Obsidian Plugins by Lou Plummer might be worth checking out. Additionally, Brett Terpstra has released a plugin for his brilliant Markdown Preview App Marked 2.
⌨️ I own a KeyCue license and use the app less than I thought I would. The app is not exactly cheap, but fortunately, there are a number of alternatives for those interested, including KeyClu.
🏋️♂️ Donovan has released a free Bodyweight exercises tracker for iOS.
🍏 Apple users are being locked out of their Apple IDs with no explanation - fortunately, I have not been affected so far.
🕹️ I also played a lot of Dead Cells on the Steam Deck OLED this week but couldn’t get past the penultimate level. I also briefly looked at Hades on the PS5. It looks very nice, but I need to play something other than RogueLi[kt]e games before I dive into this. I really long to be able to load a game save to progress in a game.
📚 I know I definitely shouldn’t do it, but I’m thinking about whether or not I should spend 150 € on a book 🤦♂️.
🎬 Watched Sterben, a German movie, in the cinema - very intense 3 hours.
🤒 I’ve been sick with a cold for two weeks now and feel unable to exercise and in general struggling through the day. I’m really looking forward to hopefully getting over this next week.
Wishing you a beautiful week! ☀️
2024-04-29: Fix credentials for Time Machine Icons
Sunday, April 21, 2024
In continuation of week 15, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the sixteenth week of 2024:
🎮 This week was an exciting one for retro gaming on iOS. After some initial debacle with a ripoff GB emulator, which was pulled after a few days by Apple, another one, Bimmy, was pulled by its developer just a day after it was approved. But then the well-known Delta emulator developed by Riley Testut, which was previously only available via the AltStore was released worldwide in the App Store, except for Europe. Here you can get it exclusively via the AltStore PAL, an alternate iOS Appstore.1 Its developer wrote a little about the availability of Delta and the AltStore PAL in general. Installing the AltStore and downloading Delta went as smoothly as Apple currently allows, and the app is just great. Very nicely designed, customizable through skins and comprehensive. However, I see myself rather less playing GB[AC]* games on my iPhone, as they bring more fun on the Analogue Pocket or one of my other devices with a built-in gamepad. However, the situation is similar to photography, you know, the best camera is the one you have with you …
🕹️ If you’ve now gotten a taste for it and also want to play some of your legally acquired Roms on your Mac but don’t want to install an all-in-one solution like RetroArch or even ES-DE right away, you can also pick up some tips on stand-alone emulators here: Emulators aren’t new; here’s the great ones on the Mac. More emulators are also apparently in the starting blocks, and I also downloaded a C64 emulator, but I haven’t looked at it yet and therefore don’t know if this a valid recommendation.
🧠 This week, MetaAI unveiled its new Llama 3 models, which can be easily downloaded to the Mac using Ollama with commands such as ollama pull llama3:8b or ollama pull llama3:70b. If you prefer not to use the command line to interact with the LLM or any of the GUIs mentioned in Week 8, you might consider exploring Enchanted LLM. This app offers a free and slick interface to interact with Ollama’s LLMs.
💻 I mainly use Rectangle Pro for window management on macOS, which also offers the possibility to throw windows into predefined areas via mouse gestures (Window Throw), but if you are looking for an alternative, you might want to check out the free Loop.
🤖 This is so f*%king incredible: Farewell to HD Atlas. But of course that can still be topped: All New Atlas 🤯.
🦉 As already mentioned on my little Site Project, DropScout for iOS / iPad is out of beta and available for free: DropScout tracks your Amazon products and alerts you when prices drop! Also mentioned there, since version 3.11, Soulver once again includes an iOS version that can be unlocked with a one-time purchase. After years of incompatibility, you can finally exchange files between macOS and iOS again. Did I mention before, that I love Soulver?
💻 Lou blogged about apps that Open at Login on his Mac, and two apps were new to me. As Mission Control Plus - Put the “control” back in Mission Control - is included in my Setapp subscription, I started evaluating it. The app does mainly two things, it adds an X-button to Mission Control’s windows and several keybard shortcuts managing them. The other one was Backup Status - View the status of Time Machine right from your desktop or Notification Center. Bookmarked but not tried myself yet.
💻 On A Better Computer, I stumbled across 10 useful Mac apps you may not have heard of and found Cleft quite interesting. However, it absolutely did not want to work for me and instead of transcribing my spoken text, it bombarded me with error messages and just deleted everything. Well, I might look at it again in version 1.1 or maybe 2.x.
🛠️ Whether I spend a lot of time troubleshooting to get something running that I would like to accomplish depends strongly on the platform I’m doing it on and my expectations of the project/product.2 With Apple products or other commercial services, my tolerance for having to spend a lot of time to make something work as it should is quite low, for example. This was also one of the reasons why I switched from Windows to macOS about 20 years ago. I just didn’t feel like dealing with the fiddling anymore. With Linux projects, it’s different for me. I almost expect it to be difficult, and it’s fine with me because in general it’s open source and I heavily benefit from the hard work from others. So, I spent countless hours trying to set up a WLAN access point on a Raspi that is connected to my network via LAN and brings the connected devices into the network via VPN. (My regular router can’t do this, and I have one or two devices that I’d like to connect to the network via VPN, but I can’t install a client on them.) I ultimately failed and gave up a few weeks ago. Last week, I stumbled across the BerylAX GL-MT3000 and it took me no more than 5 minutes to get it up and running with NordVPN. This really blew me away.
⏺️ The Stream Deck Neo was announced and looks really compelling to me.
📺 Continued watching Palm Royale - still not sure about this TV series.
🎥 Watch Riders of Justice - enjoyed that one.
🕹️ Spent way too much money for discounted games on Steam and played a lot of Dead Cells. Really hard but I like it a lot.3
Have a nice week! 🙋♂️
BTW I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple’s spontaneous change of direction regarding emulators was related to the AltStore PAL to take some wind out of the sails of the alternative app store, but maybe I’m going too far with that. Perhaps others can unravel this. ↩︎
This paragraph was obviously inspired by a section of Clockwise. ↩︎
BTW as of writing this, Dead Cells is no longer on sale on steam but for Nintendo Switch. So, if you own one, go and check it out. ↩︎
Monday, April 15, 2024
In continuation of week 14, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 15. week of 2024:
🎮 I was briefly excited when I read that the first GBA emulator had landed in the iOS App Store. Unfortunately, it was not a legitimate app, and it was subsequently removed (again too late and why at all approved?) from the store: Apple Removes Game Boy Emulator iGBA From App Store Due to Spam and Copyright Violations - MacRumors.
🛠️ Jarod Blundy released another great shortcut: Simple MB Image Uploader.
🏎️ I’ve learned that in Mario Kart 8, you can choose from 703,560 driver, kart body, tires, and glider combinations, but you can still be more clever than others: Mario meets Pareto 🤯.
📱 At first, I was skeptical, but Simple Scan • Quick Scanner gets updated regularly and has reached a stage where it is definitely much more useful than a simple one-step shortcut or going into the Files app and initiating the scan from within there.
💻 I am a long-time Bartender 5 user and don’t see a reason to switch. However, for those who don’t already have a Setapp subscription or don’t want to pay that much money for a “simple” utility app, iBar-Menubar icon control tool might be worth a look. However, you have to more or less blindly trust the developers, as their website will probably remain incomprehensible to many people.
🛑 If it also bothers you that every App Store link in Safari directly opens the store instead of just calling up the overview page, maybe this will help: StopTheMacAppStore - Mac app that stops Safari from automatically opening the App Store app.
🖥️ I used to have a version of iStat Menus (Setapp) running on every Mac, but nowadays I do without. However, there is also a number of alternatives, for example, the freshly updated Usage, which, for instance, also allows access to the status of the Mac from a mobile device, or the free Stats - macOS system monitor in your menu bar.
📁 In week 9, I mentioned Manila, a free app that lets you change the color of a folder’s icon. There seems to be a similar paid upfront app called Foldery, that might be easier to set up and is regularly updated; bookmarked for the case that Manila stops working someday. If just a color is not enough, Folderizer might be worth a try, too. So far, I was occasionally using the Setapp version of Image2icon but might give the former a shot.
🎮 I fell in love with Gamery - Game Tracker and switched to the app from GameTrack. Actually, I was looking for an app that runs both on iOS and macOS, but I am not very satisfied with the macOS version of GameTrack. The developer of Gamery has mentioned that he plans to enable the iPadOS version on macOS and is working on a native macOS version, too. That all sounds very good.
🗓️ Sindre Sorhus makes so many great apps, and many of his programs are free. To support him, I bought the Mac App Store version of Dato even though it was available via Setapp, too. Anyways, if you’re looking for a free alternative, Itsycal for Mac or Calendrx might be worth a try.
📸 I briefly looked into the new app from Aptonic, the developers of Dropzone (Setapp), called ScreenSnapAI - AI Powered Screenshot Manager. But that’s not for me. I will definitely stick with CleanShot X (Setapp) for the time being. By the way, did you know that pressing space to switch to window capture from capture area mode also works with CleanShot X and not only with the built-in macOS tool?
🌐 The one and only master of the indie web, Robb, released EchoFeed. You have most probably already heard of his service to pipe an RSS feed to open web endpoints, like Mastodon or Micro.blog, etc. Love it.
📲 Did you know that you can change the iOS wheel picker to a number pad by just clicking on it? I did not!
🌍 Marcus reminded me that it is a very good idea to support OpenStreetMap. I am now an associated member.
📺 Watched the Pilot of Palm Royale with my wife. Not yet sure what it will turn into.
Sunday, April 7, 2024
The week before Easter was once again very quiet in terms of new software and tech-related stuff. This was probably also because there was a lot to do at work before we went on our Easter vacation. For a few years now, we have been traveling more or less regularly during the Easter holidays together with my wife’s family. She has three siblings, all of whom have partners and children, and our dog joins us as well. This year we went to Belgium, the weather was quite rainy and gray, but that’s okay. We were 15 people and, of course, it was very bustling but also very nice. There was a lot of hiking, eating, reading, playing, and laughing. Especially for the younger ones, who let it show more, the fact that there was almost no functioning internet in the area and in the vacation apartment was quite noticeable. Wi-Fi and mobile networks were unusable. It took several minutes just to retrieve a single email. Social media, game streaming, YouTube, etc. were completely unthinkable. Digital detox par excellence. Actually, it did quite good and that was the reason there was also no post here on the blog last week. 🐣
Therefore, in brief and in continuation of week 12, here are very few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 13th and 14th week of 2024:
📘 During the vacation, I finished my first novel 1 in a long time and read a second book within another day. The third one is also already half done: DOOM Guy: Life in First Person by John Romero. I wouldn’t have thought it, but I find the autobiography very interesting so far. (Doom actually had a big impact on me during my school years.)
📷 Also not a novel, but already noted, a new Take Control Book: Take Control of iPhone Photography.
✍️ I couldn’t resist playing with Vincent’s Scribbles; I “secretly” played with a small side project there, which Habit immediately discovered.
💻 Alongside Rectangle Pro and Superkey, I started trying out another app by Ryan Hanson: Charmstone - The quicker switcher launcher for macOS.
🖥️ I asked on Mastodon for Terminal alternatives and three were mainly mentioned: Warp: Your terminal, reimagined, WezTerm - Wez’s Terminal Emulator, and iTerm2 - macOS Terminal Replacement. I haven’t had the chance yet, but hopefully, I will be able to take a closer look at them over the next week(s).
🎮 I was not aware of how easy it can be on macOS to get Windows games purchased from the Epic Game Store or GOG to run: Heroic Games Launcher - An Open Source Epic, GOG, and Amazon Prime Games Launcher.
Speaking of games: Played Slice & Dice and Balatro. (It’s all Daniel Santos' fault! 😎)
🛠️ Chris Hannah released a CLI Tool to Post to Micro.Blog.
🌱 Spring is coming and we took this as an opportunity to completely reseed our lawn; it was more of a field than a lawn and therefore urgently needed; we are curious to see if it will turn out well.
📺 No television, no movies, no series in the last two weeks.
Have a pleasant week ahead!
I thought I’d start with a Stephen King novel since his books always captivated me in the past; however, I was not so convinced by Holly; the book is quite repetitive and long-winded. ↩︎
Monday, March 25, 2024
In continuation of week 11, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 12th week of 2024:
😴 Actually, this week was a very quiet week in terms of tech-related stuff. It was probably because I was very busy at work and in the evenings, I preferred to relax with a game of Balatro1 instead of surfing the net a lot.
🛠️ This week, many things just broke. It started with dishes, not just once, followed by a PS5 controller that wouldn’t turn on anymore and got dangerously hot while charging and started to smell. Then, the power supply of the old MacBook simply quit working, a 256 GB USB stick made my Mac crash reproducibly as soon as I tried to access it, the crank handle of my Playdate just broke without any external force2, our eCargo bike suddenly refused to go any further (Error E010), the coffee machine at work gave up the ghost, and my knee is broken. Well, it’s been messed up for 30 years, it just hurts more this week than usual. I think that’s a good sign for next week. It can only get better.
🔄 The developer of Anybox has released a new app: Event countdown & up - Pinning app. I was a long-time user of Countdowns before I switched to Up Ahead because the latter was much more fun to use. However, there has been no update for over ten months, and I’m somewhat reluctant to pay a subscription price for that. I’ll take a look at Pinning, although there is no macOS version yet and it also has a subscription model behind it. Otherwise, I should dig out Countdowns again. It works wonderfully, it just doesn’t look nice at all.
🎉 Robb announced that his Podcast Ruminate joined MacStories. Congrats!
🤔 I was curious and also signed up for Scribbles. I definitely don’t need another way to blog, but I kind of like the projects by Vincent.
🧩 Table of contents — for Safari on the App Store: A funny little plugin that does exactly what it promises.
❤️ I was absolutely impressed that I sent a feature request to the developer of Default Folder X and he replied on the same day that he had implemented the feature and it will be included in the next release.
🐶 Besides, I was pleased that you can now use Siri in German without saying “Hey.” This solves our biggest mistake in dog training. We chose “Hey” as a stop signal (“no”) for our dog, and therefore we could only ask the Homepods to do things via voice very limitedly, otherwise, we would completely confuse our dog every time 😅.
🎮 I’ve finished Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins (GB) on my Analogue Pocket and started playing Mario vs. Donkey Kong (GBA). The next real Mario game will be Super Mario 64. I’ve been thinking a bit about how and on which system I want to play it. I’ve decided to buy the Nintendo 64 bluetooth controller and try it on the Switch via Nintendo Switch Online Plus.
🎥 We watched The Shawshank Redemption (1994) (again) with our sons. What a damn good movie.
🎸 I was at an IDLES concert 🤘.
Have a wonderfull week ahead!
Somehow I really like the game, although I’m not really into card games otherwise. I’m still failing at the first deck of cards, at the latest at ante 8/8, but what the heck 🤷♂️. ↩︎
Thanks to my 3D printer, I was able to print a temporary replacement. ↩︎
Monday, March 18, 2024
In continuation of week 10, here are a few thoughts and things that caught my attention in the 11. week of 2024:
🏦 IndieAppSales 2024 was going on last week and I bought some new apps.
📱 Just like for iA Presenter, there is now also an iOS version of Deckset. I had hoped that it might do without a subscription, but far from it.
🖥️ Nitro for macOS might be something to keep an eye on.
📆 Currently, I also have no use for this, but I can imagine that might change: Rules Shortcuts based on Event.
💎 Here I found a few Homebrew gems: Hidden FREE Mac Apps!. Especially interesting I found mailsy, speedtest-cli, ata, wifi-password, mas, and yt-dlp.
🎵 There are media control apps for macOS now like sand by the sea, but this one is free and looks quite nice: Tuneful - Control your music with ease.
🎮 Summerhouse (Steam) looks cozy, and thanks to Daniel I stumbled upon Balatro. In addition there were (are?) significant discounts on VVVVVV and Celeste on Steam . I especially suck at the latter on the pico-8 but I adore its aesthetic and am excited to play it on my MacBook.
🕹️ For the Playdate, I stumbled upon Quandino and bought Mars After Midnight.
📺 I did not know now that Retro Gaming on the Amazon Fire TV Stick is a thing.
🎥 Wikiflix: an interface to browse, search, and view movies published as public domain at Wikimedia Commons, the Internet Archive, or YouTube.
🚀 Nice idea and cool implementation, for which, however, I have no necessity: iPulse - Monitor Your Device.
😓 Habib wrote about Overwhelming Tech Fatigue. I too have been feeling an increasing kind of dissatisfaction with technical devices in general lately. I am becoming more intolerant regarding shortcomings, especially of the system’s software. I yearn for things to simply function and find myself increasingly reluctant to invest significant time in troubleshooting things that have been implemented with minimal effort and, as a result, are prone to errors. (Although I still like trying out new software and starting new projects 🤷♂️.) I suspect that this actually has to do with age. In the past, I passionately tinkered with (Windows) PCs but eventually had no more desire to spend more time making things work than using them.1 I then switched to Apple because its OS and software was (seemingly) much more thoughtful, functional, stable, and beautiful. This love is massively being lost in recent months, and since there seem to be no real alternatives, turning away from the enthusiasm for technology itself would be the next logical step - even though I don’t actively pursue that of course.
✨ There seem to be only two opinions about Asteroid City, and I belong to the fraction that had a lot of fun watching it.
🎉 Celebrated my birthday, had a lot of good food and nice people around me.
🪙 Last but not least, go and check out the One a Month Club and become a member of all those great blogs listed there 😎
Have a nice week! 🙋♂️
Although that also seems to be a pattern in my life: as soon as something works (reasonably) or I master it (reasonably), I (unfortunately) often lose the interest in it. ↩︎
Tuesday, March 12, 2024
Indie App Sales! is running from 12. to 13. March 2024
Here are some Apps I’ve looked into so far:
Update 2024-03-12T13:00: add Everlog and SharePal; update note for Bridges
Update 2024-03-12T21:35: add Text Workflow