Friday, September 12, 2025

AirPods Live Translation Blocked for EU Users

Tim Hardwick (Hacker News):

Apple says on its feature availability webpage that “Apple Intelligence: Live Translation with AirPods” won’t be available if both the user is physically in the EU and their Apple Account region is in the EU. Apple doesn’t give a reason for the restriction, but legal and regulatory pressures seem the most plausible culprits.

In particular, the EU’s Artificial Intelligence Act and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) both impose strict requirements for how speech and translation services are offered. Regulators may want to study how Live Translation works, and how that impacts privacy, consent, data-flows, and user rights.

This implies that it’s not because of DMA-related antitrust concerns. I would have expected those to come into play since, as far as I’m aware, live translation doesn’t work with headphones from other brands.

Previously:

iPhone Satellite Features Remain Free for Another Year

Adam Engst:

When Apple first introduced Emergency SOS via satellite with the iPhone 14, it promised two years of free service. Later, Apple extended the free service by another year (see “Apple Extends Free Emergency SOS via Satellite for iPhone 14 Users for Another Year,” 15 November 2023). That extension was set to expire in November, but Apple has—in a footnote on the press releases for the new iPhones—moved the free access expiration date again[…]

I’m glad to have this feature, but after recently trying it out when hiking I wouldn’t plan to rely on it. It took a long time and a fair amount of moving my feet and orienting my body and the phone in order for it to acquire a signal in an area that had some light tree cover and rock. I had to concentrate on holding the phone and making sure it remained aimed at the satellite, as it moved overhead. Then I would have to keep at it while waiting for a reply. Chances are that in a real emergency, if I were stuck or injured, I wouldn’t be able to do all of this. It’s great that maybe it would help when you need it, but if you were thinking about carrying a dedicated messenger device or locator beacon you should probably still do that.

Previously:

Dataless macOS File Versioning

Howard Oakley:

When an app that supports versioning saves a file, the current version is added as a dataless file to a folder in AllUIDs, with its UUID as its name, its data are added to the ChunkStoreDatabase, and its details are added to the database in db-V1. Chunk sizes typically range up to just over 20 MB. The service responsible for versioning is revisiond, and the subsystems you’ll encounter in the log are com.apple.foundation.filecoordination and com.apple.chunkinglibrary.

Retrieving a version thus consists of looking it up in the db.sqlite database, and reconstituting that version as a file, using the dataless file with its attributes and metadata in the file UUID, and its data restored from the ChunkStore.

[…]

The most common cause of problems with the version database is excessive size. Although its size isn’t readily discoverable, it can be a major contributor to that attributed to System Data in Storage settings and third-party utilities, and in some cases can exceed 100 GB.

[…]

My free utility Revisionist has a version crawler that will list all files in a volume or folder with the number of versions they currently have stored in that volume’s .DocumentRevisions-V100 folder.

Howard Oakley:

In recent discussions here about the version system built into macOS, two potential problems were raised: first that a file’s versions don’t go with it wherever the file goes, and second that versions wouldn’t preserve datestamps. This article demonstrates how you can easily work around the first, and how the second isn’t correct.

Previously:

Thursday, September 11, 2025

Memory Integrity Enforcement

Apple (Ivan Krstić, Hacker News):

Arm published the Memory Tagging Extension (MTE) specification in 2019 as a tool for hardware to help find memory corruption bugs. MTE is, at its core, a memory tagging and tag-checking system, where every memory allocation is tagged with a secret; the hardware guarantees that later requests to access memory are granted only if the request contains the correct secret. If the secrets don’t match, the app crashes, and the event is logged. This allows developers to identify memory corruption bugs immediately as they occur.

[…]

Our analysis found that, when employed as a real-time defensive measure, the original Arm MTE release exhibited weaknesses that were unacceptable to us, and we worked with Arm to address these shortcomings in the new Enhanced Memory Tagging Extension (EMTE) specification, released in 2022.

[…]

Today we’re introducing the culmination of this effort: Memory Integrity Enforcement (MIE), our comprehensive memory safety defense for Apple platforms. Memory Integrity Enforcement is built on the robust foundation provided by our secure memory allocators, coupled with Enhanced Memory Tagging Extension (EMTE) in synchronous mode, and supported by extensive Tag Confidentiality Enforcement policies. MIE is built right into Apple hardware and software in all models of iPhone 17 and iPhone Air and offers unparalleled, always-on memory safety protection for our key attack surfaces including the kernel, while maintaining the power and performance that users expect. In addition, we’re making EMTE available to all Apple developers in Xcode as part of the new Enhanced Security feature that we released earlier this year during WWDC.

[…]

Both approaches revealed the same conclusion: Memory Integrity Enforcement vastly reduces the exploitation strategies available to attackers. Though memory corruption bugs are usually interchangeable, MIE cut off so many exploit steps at a fundamental level that it was not possible to restore the chains by swapping in new bugs. Even with substantial effort, we could not rebuild any of these chains to work around MIE. The few memory corruption effects that remained are unreliable and don’t give attackers sufficient momentum to successfully exploit these bugs.

Victor Wynne:

MIE represents what Apple calls “the most significant upgrade to memory safety in the history of consumer operating systems.” That’s a bold claim, but when you dig into what they’ve built, it does not at all seem like an exaggeration. This isn’t just a security patch or minor improvement. It’s the culmination of five years of hardware and software work that fundamentally changes how iPhones protect themselves.

The key insight here is that Apple didn’t just push some new software protection. Instead, they redesigned their approach from the ground up, creating a system where the hardware and software work together in ways that weren’t possible before. The new A19 and A19 Pro chips dedicate an extraordinary amount of silicon resources to security, more than ever before, including special areas for storing security tags and processing power dedicated entirely to checking memory access.

Patrick Wardle:

Apple seems very salty that Google shipped MTE first, dropping shade several times about how Android’s isn’t ‘comprehensive.’ 😂

True, but when have Apple’s mitigations ever been flawless?

That said, yeah…Apple’s version looks way better.

GrapheneOS:

Pixels have provided hardware memory tagging (MTE) support since the Pixel 8. GrapheneOS deployed it in production around a month after the launch of the Pixel 8 and we use it for the kernel and nearly the entire base OS. We use it for some third party apps and users can opt-in to using it for all.

There have been multiple revisions of ARM MTE. FEAT_MTE4 (Enhanced Memory Tagging Extension) is the 4th generation of ARM MTE improvements, not the beginning of it. The baseline feature was already a game changer for defending devices. The improvements will make their way to devices providing it.

[…]

Unlike iPhone users, GrapheneOS users have been well protected by attacks from Cellebrite and other exploit development companies.

[…]

ARM shipped MTE support multiple years before Apple in their Cortex cores. Yes, it was discovered to have a side channel usable by local attackers. This doesn’t ruin it. MTE only has 4 bit tags which is a bigger weakness than the side channel. MTE still paves the way for stronger future features.

Apple has far more severe side channels in their hardware which leak user data. It’s strange to portray leaking tags as a severe issue ruining a feature when they’ve consistently downplayed the impact of endless side channels vulnerabilities directly leaking sensitive user data on iPhones and Macs.

Previously:

Final Cut Camera 2.0

Apple:

Final Cut Camera 2.0 unlocks unprecedented recording capabilities on iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max, the first smartphones capable of capturing ProRes RAW. This allows users to record pristine RAW data directly from the camera sensor for maximum creative freedom in post-production. The update also introduces open gate recording, which uses the full camera sensor to capture a wider field of view at resolutions greater than DCI 4K. This gives editors ultimate flexibility to reframe shots, stabilize footage, and set final aspect ratios, all without compromising image quality or performance.

[…]

Final Cut Camera 2.0 also supports genlock, allowing creators to precisely synchronize iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max with other recording devices to the same reference signal, ensuring each frame is perfectly in sync. This technique lets creatives achieve professional, frame-accurate edits without hours of manual frame-by-frame alignment. Genlock API support is available to third parties and is already being used with the new Blackmagic Design Camera ProDock.

Leveraging the all-new Center Stage front camera available on iPhone 17, iPhone Air, iPhone 17 Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max, Final Cut Camera 2.0 also allows users to capture horizontal or vertical orientation without rotating their iPhone.

Previously:

Campfire Now Open Source

Basecamp (via Lobsters, Hacker News, Reddit):

Campfire is web-based chat application. It supports many of the features you’d expect, including:

  • Multiple rooms, with access controls
  • Direct messages
  • File attachments with previews
  • Search
  • Notifications (via Web Push)
  • @mentions
  • API, with support for bot integrations

[…]

Campfire’s Docker image contains everything needed for a fully-functional, single-machine deployment. This includes the web app, background jobs, caching, file serving, and SSL.

I guess the Once idea didn’t work, business-wise. Most software these days, especially running on servers, seems to be either free or a subscription.

Previously:

Wednesday, September 10, 2025

macOS Tahoe 26 RC

Juli Clover:

Apple today provided developers and public beta testers with the release candidate of macOS Tahoe 26 for testing purposes, with the RC coming after nine rounds of betas.

Who can tell from the release notes what’s changed in the last few builds?

Steve Troughton-Smith:

I don’t honestly know why Apple provides OS release notes to developers, because it doesn’t remotely reflect either the known issues or the fixes/changes build to build. It’s like some tiny subset of the issues known internally before WWDC, and whether they fixed them or not since (spoiler: most of the bugs that were mentioned in the release notes doc in June are apparently still present)

Juli Clover:

iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS Tahoe 26, tvOS 26, watchOS 26, and visionOS 26 will be released to the public on Monday, September 15, Apple announced during today’s “Awe Dropping” Apple event.

Time to start taking screenshots for my app releases.

Marcin Krzyzanowski:

I was not prepared for macOS 26 on Sep 15.

it is not ready. it is definitely not ready. please don’t ship it like that.

just yesterday, I had a laugh at how SwiftUI layout is broken on macOS 26, in entirely new ways. But I assumed they still have few months to fix it.

Steve Troughton-Smith:

The OSes included in the Xcode 26 release candidate are ‘basically’ the same as the beta 9 seeds. I think a huge pile of bugs are about to ship; macOS and visionOS especially are in a really bad state right now.

Ahnaf Mahmud:

yep found some last minute bugs… the textbox is literally hidden on Mac Image Playground and look at how the sidebar behaves when running an iOS app on macOS lol (in my next reply), sadly couldn’t test those on a VM

Mario Guzmán:

So yeah, #macOSTahoe killed all my apps.

PDX Transit for macOS, in the 7 years as an #AppKit app, the toolbar & sidebars worked perfectly. Now the toolbar just gets fucked up when you switch tabs AND the inspector sidebar now fails to remember its position between launches.

As for all my Music-related apps. They no longer work because Apple Music sends far less info in the NSDistributedNotificationCenter dictionary.

So yeah, I’m done. I am taking these down. I’m not having fun anymore.

Mario Guzmán:

And also this. All of my #AppKit bugs I’ve been reporting since Beta 1 were mostly not addressed and around Beta 6 or 7[…] No way will I take the hit for Apple’s bugs. They worked fine for the better part of 7/8 years and broke as of #macOSTahoe beta 6 or 7. I logged bugs in Feedback app.

John Siracusa:

Even after using Tahoe for months, I’m still regularly struck by something on my screen that I instinctively interpret as some kind of graphical glitch only to realize that it’s “working as intended” and that someone thought this design was a good idea.

For example, check out the weird smudges at the top of this Finder window. Surely some kind of error, right? But then you notice the text competing with the window title. And then you connect the text to the smudges and realize what’s going on.

This is not a “staged” screenshot, BTW. This is something that organically appeared on my screen while using my Mac with Tahoe RC, and my legitimate reaction was to do a double-take because it looked like an error to me.

Zac Hall:

macOS Tahoe will be the first release to support Repair Assistant, adding the ability to install calibration data to complete repairs.

[…]

For Mac repairs through the self service repair program, this will allow used parts and previously replaced parts that were not calibrated to be calibrated to ensure the best reliability and security standards are met.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-11): Kirk McElhearn:

I’ve been running Apple’s betas on my iPad, and just updated my MacBook Air. I played around with early betas on the Mac, and it’s stunning how ugly it is now, in the release candidate. It actually doesn’t look too bad on the iPad; slightly bad on iPhone; but on Mac, it’s just trash.

And, yes, this is with the “reduce transparency” setting on, because otherwise it’s hard to see anything.

Update (2025-09-12): Mitchell Hashimoto:

One of the macOS 26 bugs I’ve had to workaround is that a plain old NSAlert doesn’t render its “OK” button (but it can be clicked still) if it isn’t shown as a sheet. Nothing exotic. Standard modal window. Missing an OK button. Hard to believe this is going to ship.

I find it odd that alerts, with their transparent backgrounds, look so much different from regular dialogs. But then, in screenshots, the alert backgrounds look much darker gray than dialogs.

Steve Troughton-Smith:

I don’t tend to file bugs on system apps, but if I did, I would be very busy on this RC seed.

You don’t have to go far to find things breaking in bizarre ways, like this giant empty toolbar item in Podcasts on Tahoe[…]

Xcode 26 RC

Apple (downloads):

Xcode 26 RC includes SDKs for iOS 26, iPadOS 26, tvOS 26, watchOS 26, macOS Tahoe 26, and visionOS 26. The Xcode 26 RC release supports on-device debugging in iOS 16 and later, tvOS 16 and later, watchOS 8 and later, and visionOS. Xcode 26 RC requires a Mac running macOS Sequoia 15.6 or later.

This is up from beta 7, which worked on macOS 15.5. Other than that, it didn’t seem to break anything with my projects. Again, it’s really hard to see from the release notes what’s new in this build.

Tony Arnold:

Xcode 26.0 RC 1 also cannot compile my asset catalog + icon composer icon.

I filed feedback (FB20183399), but this feels completely pointless. As far as I can tell, there’s no workaround so I cannot ship an update using Xcode 26.

Craig Hockenberry:

Incredibly, the concentric corner APIs don’t have the correct radii on the new iPhone models.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-12): Ken Case:

Wow, FileMerge not only has a new icon, but someone finally fixed the “Use Selection for Find” (Command-E) menu item that’s been raising an “unrecognized selector” exception for several years.

Thank you to the team at Apple for giving this ancient NeXT-era tool some love!

iPhone 17 Accessories

Mitchel Broussard:

Apple today announced the newest generation of iPhone with the iPhone Air, iPhone 17, and iPhone 17 Pro. Alongside these devices, there’s a bunch of new compatible accessories, including TechWoven Cases, Clear Cases, Crossbody Straps, and Silicone Cases, all of which we’re recapping below.

Dan Moren:

There were no doubt some shouts of joy when Apple mentioned it had a new version of its MagSafe Battery, but if you want one of those to boost your phone’s longevity, be aware: it’s an iPhone Air exclusive.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-11): Federico Viticci:

I got Apple’s TechWoven case for the 17 Pro Max.

  • Immediately feels much nicer and more premium than FineWoven
  • iOS 26 doesn’t recognize it, but the 16 Pro Max fits inside it and all the buttons work 😅

Design Is How It Works

Jordan Golson:

10:01 am: We start with a quote: “Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” — Steve Jobs

How many of us groaned at that? This has got to be the worst invocation of Steve Jobs’ memory given how this year’s redesign seems to be pretty much the opposite of that ideal.

Dan Moren:

Always good when the keynote stream starts with me doing a spit take.

M.G. Siegler:

I’m not really sure why Apple chose to open their 2025 iPhone event with the famous “Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” quote. It preceded a video focused on design elements of Apple products that I guess was meant to show case how well all their products work together? It was a nice little video. But overall, I don’t think this year was more about design than any other Apple keynote.

Dave Wood:

I’m still shocked Apple completely glossed over #iOS26 / #LiquidGlass. The event was short, so I bet they had planned for 30 minutes on it and were too embarrassed to even show it.

Adam Overholtzer:

Imagining constantly repeating a quote without ever taking its meaning to heart.

rasputin:

They’re trolling us

Rebecca Sloane:

I feel like we were watching in real time Tim Cook convince himself that liquid glass is the right direction

Saagar Jha:

We care a lot about design which is why we are about to introduce the worst designed OS in years

René Fouquet:

Quoting Steve Jobs with “Design is how it works” and then shitting the bed with #LiquidAss is bold.

Mario Guzmán:

Ballsy for Tim Cook to say “design is how it works” because Liquid Glass is absolute crap for usability and accessibility. Stacking views just for effect is consideration for Apple and not its users.

Jeff Johnson:

This “design is how it works” shit seems like a recognition of how bad Liquid Glass is and an attempted cover-up.

Marcin Krzyzanowski:

I don’t understand how can you put this on the slide, and ship macOS 26 like that at the same time

See also: Accidental Tech Podcast.

Previously:

Tuesday, September 9, 2025

iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max

Apple (video, MacRumors):

Both models feature A19 Pro, the most powerful and efficient chip for iPhone yet, enabling the advanced camera systems, next-level mobile gaming, and Apple Intelligence. Built with an Apple-designed vapor chamber that is laser-welded into a strong, light, and thermally conductive aluminum unibody, iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max deliver Apple’s best-ever performance and an enormous leap in battery life. Three 48MP Fusion cameras — Main, Ultra Wide, and an all-new Telephoto — offer the equivalent of eight lenses, including the longest optical-quality zoom ever on iPhone at 8x, and the innovative 18MP Center Stage front camera takes selfies to the next level. With new industry-first video features built for pro filmmakers and content creators, including ProRes RAW, Apple Log 2, and genlock, iPhone integrates even more seamlessly into the largest and smallest of productions. Both models feature the Ceramic Shield 2 front cover with 3x better scratch resistance, and for the first time, Ceramic Shield protects the back of iPhone.

iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are available in three beautiful new finishes — deep blue, cosmic orange, and silver.

Finally, some good Pro colors.

Deionized water is sealed inside the vapor chamber, which is laser-welded into the aluminum chassis to move heat away from the powerful A19 Pro, allowing it to operate at even higher performance levels. The heat is carried into the forged aluminum unibody, where it is distributed evenly through the system, managing power and surface temperatures to deliver incredible performance while remaining comfortable to hold.

I wonder how much faster the A19 Pro will be in the Pro vs. the Air due to the better thermals.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-10): See also: Hacker News.

Hartley Charlton:

Apple introduced titanium to the iPhone with the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max back in 2023, with the change even becoming the device’s marketing tagline. While the devices were said to be more durable, they also suffered from complaints about overheating.

The titanium frame provided excellent rigidity and durability, but aluminum is lighter and offers better heat dissipation, which Apple has prioritized alongside the introduction of the A19 Pro chip and a new vapor chamber cooling system. Aluminum’s thermal conductivity is substantially higher than titanium’s, helping to distribute heat away from critical components under heavy workloads.

Titanium’s machining complexity, slower production speeds, and higher scrap rates may have also contributed to the decision. Titanium frames require specialized tooling and precise CNC milling, while aluminum is less expensive and easier to produce at scale.

Andrew Abernathy:

So the new iPhone 17 Pro has a 4x optical zoom at 48 MP (as opposed to the 5x / 12 MP optical on the 16 Pro), and it center-crops to achieve the touted 8x?

Center-cropping 48 MP yields 12 MP optical, so from that perspective, identical optical resolution as on the 16 Pro, yet higher zoom.

Still, the 12 MP crop is probably fundamentally noisier; I doubt the physical sensor is 4x the size of the 16 Pro sensor. Which means relying on improved cleanup of the capture.

iPhone Air

Apple (video, MacRumors):

Apple today debuted the all-new iPhone Air, the thinnest iPhone ever made, with pro performance. iPhone Air features a breakthrough titanium design that is elegant and light yet strong, with an innovative internal architecture that enables the latest iPhone experiences. The back of iPhone Air is now protected with Ceramic Shield, and the front cover uses Ceramic Shield 2, delivering 3x better scratch resistance, making iPhone Air more durable than any previous iPhone. iPhone Air also features a stunning 6.5-inch Super Retina XDR display with ProMotion up to 120Hz. With the most Apple-designed chips in an iPhone — the powerhouse A19 Pro, N1, and C1X — iPhone Air is the most power-efficient iPhone ever made. Paired with the redesigned internal architecture and software optimizations, iPhone Air has fantastic all-day battery life. A powerful 48MP Fusion Main camera enables the equivalent of four lenses with incredible image quality, and the innovative 18MP Center Stage front camera takes selfies to the next level.

[…]

iPhone Air is the thinnest iPhone ever made at 5.6mm, and it is incredibly light, with a large, stunning display. The grade 5 titanium frame is strong, with an elegant high-gloss mirror finish, and a new plateau on the back that is precision-milled on both sides to house the cameras, speaker, and Apple silicon. This maximizes space for the battery to deliver remarkable all-day battery life. The thin design also features the Action button, so users can easily access a variety of functions with just a press, and Camera Control, to quickly launch the camera or enable visual intelligence.

It’s $999 vs. $799 for the iPhone 17 and $1,099 for the iPhone 17 Pro. It’ll be interesting to see whether this is popular. To me, it’s impressive but not very appealing. Looking for a smaller phone, it seems like they shrunk the wrong dimension (and increased the other two). I’m more interested in the Pro camera and battery life than the Pro processor. Even if the prices were the same, I would probably choose the iPhone 17 over the iPhone Air.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-10): See also: Hacker News.

Rui Carmo:

And yes, all the iPhones in the US are now eSIM-only, and that worries me. Fortunately that is (for now) not the case in the EU.

[…]

You become completely dependent on your carrier’s ability to issue an eSIM–which can be a painfully contrived process requiring you to go to a store or scan a QR code that is mailed to you days later.

Even if you can have multiple eSIMs in a phone, switching carriers on the fly becomes effectively impossible (which is a big thing for carriers, and harks back to when US carriers did not use GSM).

Hartley Charlton:

Following today’s “Awe dropping” special event, Apple’s iPhone lineup now contains seven models at different price points.

Hartley Charlton:

This guide offers a detailed look at every difference—dimensions, design, cameras, battery life, and pricing—so you can make an informed choice.

BasicAppleGuy:

The iPhone Air is all battery. The entire brains of the phone is essentially smushed into the camera plateau! 🤯

Joe Rossignol:

The first benchmark results for the A19 Pro chip in the iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, and iPhone Air surfaced in the Geekbench 6 database today.

Juli Clover:

The iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max have a higher-end A19 Pro chip with a 6-core GPU, and the iPhone Air has an A19 Pro chip with one less GPU core.

Marco Arment:

17: less cache
17 and Air: more cache, 5 GPU cores
17 Pro: more cache, 6 GPU cores

I wonder if they maybe clocked them differently, too.

Marco Arment:

iPhone 13 Mini: 141g
iPhone Air: 165g
iPhone 16: 170g
iPhone 16 Pro: 199g
iPhone 17 Pro: 206g

Update (2025-09-11): Kuba Suder:

The iPhone Air is:

  • 21 g heavier than the last iPhone SE (which I use)
  • 36 g heavier than iPhone 6
  • 30 g heavier than iPhone 12 Mini
  • and 52 g heavier than original iPhone SE 🫠

He has a table that shows all the dimensions.

Update (2025-09-12): Adam Engst:

Although the iPhone Air may not match the battery life of the iPhone 17 or iPhone 17 Pro, it surpasses the iPhone 16e and iPhone 16 and is similar to the iPhone 16 Plus.

He has a table.

iPhone 17

Apple (video, Hacker News, MacRumors):

Apple today announced iPhone 17, featuring the new Center Stage front camera that takes selfies to the next level; a powerful 48MP Fusion Main camera with an optical-quality 2x Telephoto; and a new 48MP Fusion Ultra Wide camera that captures expansive scenes and macro photography in more detail. The 6.3-inch Super Retina XDR display with ProMotion is bigger and brighter, enabling supersmooth scrolling, immersive gaming, and improved efficiency. And with the new Ceramic Shield 2, the front cover is tougher than any smartphone glass or glass-ceramic, with 3x better scratch resistance than the previous generation and reduced glare. It is all powered by the latest-generation A19 chip for higher performance and longevity.

iPhone 17 will now be available starting with 256GB of storage — double the entry storage from the previous generation — and a 512GB option, in five beautiful colors: black, lavender, mist blue, sage, and white.

[…]

iPhone 17 introduces N1, a new Apple-designed wireless networking chip that enables Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread.

It looks like they’re getting rid of the Plus.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-10): See also: Hacker News.

Apple Watch Ultra 3

Apple (video, MacRumors):

Designed to keep users more connected and safer wherever they are with built-in satellite communications, Apple Watch Ultra 3 allows users to text emergency services, message friends and family, and share their location, all while they’re off the grid. The ultimate sports and adventure watch now features the largest screen of any Apple Watch, a display with a 1Hz always-on refresh rate, 5G cellular capabilities, the most accurate GPS in a sports watch, and up to 42 hours of battery life — with up to 72 hours in Low Power Mode.

[…]

With Find My via satellite, users can send their location once every 15 minutes to contacts previously added to Find My. In addition, with Messages via satellite, users can send and receive texts, emoji, and Tapbacks to friends and family — including anyone they’ve been in touch with over the last 30 days — while keeping the messages end-to-end encrypted. Users can also send SMS messages via satellite.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-10): See also: Hacker News.

Apple Watch SE 3

Apple (video, MacRumors, Hacker News):

Apple Watch SE 3 delivers a more advanced set of health features than the previous generation — including sleep score, retrospective ovulation estimates, sleep apnea notifications, and wrist temperature sensing for richer Vitals app data — plus a robust set of fitness features to provide daily motivation. The S10 chip powers an Always-On display, the double tap and wrist flick gestures, on-device Siri, and fast charging. Apple Watch SE 3 also offers 5G cellular capabilities and a cover glass that is more durable than ever.

[…]

Even with the addition of the Always-On display, Apple Watch SE 3 offers all-day, 18-hour battery life, and also features fast charging for the first time. Apple Watch SE 3 now charges up to 2x faster than the previous generation; charging for 15 minutes can add up to eight hours of battery for daily use, and it can charge to about 80 percent in 45 minutes.

This is probably the only hardware from today’s announcements that I’ll buy. My first-generation Apple Watch SE is just feeling really slow, and now that its OS is several versions behind my iPhone’s the complications have become unreliable.

Previously:

Apple Watch Series 11

Apple (video):

Apple today introduced Apple Watch Series 11, offering the most comprehensive set of health features yet, longer battery life, an even more durable cover glass, and 5G cellular capabilities, all in its thinnest and most comfortable design. Apple Watch Series 11 is the ultimate health and fitness companion, empowering users with notifications for signs of chronic high blood pressure — also known as hypertension — plus new insights into sleep quality with sleep score, adding to the robust suite of health features included in the device. Featuring up to 24 hours of battery life and Ion-X glass that’s 2x more scratch-resistant, Apple Watch is more convenient than ever to wear throughout the day and night.

[…]

If users receive a hypertension notification, it is recommended that they log their blood pressure for seven days using a third-party blood pressure cuff and share the results with their provider at their next visit, which is consistent with the latest American Heart Association guidelines for the diagnosis and management of hypertension.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-10): Tim Hardwick:

Apple has announced that its new hypertension detection feature, initially exclusive to the Apple Watch Ultra 3 and Apple Watch Series 11, will be expanded to include earlier Apple Watch models.

Update (2025-09-11): matejamm1 (via Meek Geek):

So Apple is hyping the Watch Series 11 as having 24 hours of battery life compared to 18 hours on the Series 10. That looks like a huge 33% improvement, moving away from their 18h goalpost for the first time ever since the very first Watch. But if you read their testing methodology in the footnotes it’s not really what it seems.

[…]

The “extra 6 hours” is just Apple finally including sleep tracking in the test. But sleep tracking barely sips power, and previous Apple Watches have already been able to easily surpass their 18 hour claims and go through a night of sleep tracking on top.

[…]

So here, not only is the difference just 2 hours (38 vs 36), a measly 5% increase, but even then Apple also quietly lowered the “active usage” assumptions for the new model. Fewer checks, fewer notifications, less app time. Again, not really an upgrade, just a shift in methodology.

They also (long ago) changed their methodology for measuring phone thickness.

AirPods Pro 3

Apple (video, MacRumors, Hacker News):

AirPods Pro 3 deliver unbelievable sound quality and the world’s best in-ear Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) — removing up to 2x more noise than the previous-generation AirPods Pro, and 4x more than the original AirPods Pro. The updated design helps AirPods Pro 3 fit even better and provides greater in-ear stability during activities like running, HIIT, yoga, and more. For the first time, users can utilize AirPods Pro 3 to measure heart rate and track over 50 workout types with the new experience in the Fitness app on iPhone. Live Translation also comes to AirPods, making face-to-face conversations easier by helping users connect even if they don’t speak the same language.

Still $249.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-10): Tim Hardwick:

Apple’s Live Translation feature, unveiled during its AirPods Pro 3 announcement, is expanding to older models including AirPods 4 with Active Noise Cancellation and AirPods Pro 2.

Cabel Sasser:

a reminder that if you use the Apple Store app — not the Apple website — you can engrave AirPods with your Memoji.

Update (2025-09-12): Juli Clover:

There were rumors that the AirPods Pro 3 Charging Case would get smaller, but that didn’t happen. It’s actually bigger than before, but it is a little less heavy. There’s no button on the back, with Apple swapping to the same hidden capacitive button that’s on the AirPods 4 case.

Audio quality is clearly better on the low end, with better balance. Active Noise Cancellation is also 2x better, though Dan wasn’t able to test the AirPods long enough to definitively confirm Apple’s claims.

Live Translation is available for in-person conversations, and it worked during a test with a Spanish speaking Apple employee.

Monday, September 8, 2025

macOS Icon History

BasicAppleGuy:

With macOS 26, Apple has announced a dramatically new look to their UI: Liquid Glass. Solid material icon elements give way to softer, shinier, glassier icons. The rounded rectangle became slightly more rounded, and Apple eliminated the ability for icon elements to extend beyond the icon rectangle (as seen in the current icons for GarageBand, Photo Booth, Dictionary, etc.).

With this release being one of the most dramatic visual overhauls of macOS's design, I wanted to begin a collection chronicling the evolution of the system icons over the years.

I linked to this in an update before, but I wanted to highlight it again since he’s been posting updates on social media and this post collects everything in one place. The new 26 icons will be GM very soon.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-10): Adam Engst:

Of them, I think only the new Stickies icon has improved (though I still prefer the 2000–2020 version), but many other app icons are notably worse.

Fake Mac Apps on GitHub

Maxdme124:

To be very clear this is not another post of “Breaking news malware exists on the internet” (or it may be depending on how you want to look at it) but I feel like it’s important that I leave a small PSA as I have recently seen an influx of seemingly convincing GitHub repo replicas for decently popular Mac apps. They are so similar that they almost fooled me. Thankfully I quickly spotted some anomalies and I nearly avoided getting infected. Unfortunately these are the sort of red flags I don’t expect an average Joe to know about. Which is why I’m explaining what the malware is, and how to spot it.

[…]

By far the easiest way to avoid this is to simply look for the app online and track down the original developer. This will let you kill 2 birds with one stone by A: Looking for the original source of the app and avoid impostors and B: See if the App or the developer had any previous reputation to begin with.

[…]

The second discrepancy is that the size of the fake app is ridiculously small. For instance the original app is 13mb in size while the fake one is less than 2mb. Now this is not necessarily a red flag (For example some viruses do the opposite and fill their dmg with a lot of useless data to make the file larger than what VirusTotal can handle.) but it’s still important to raise an eye brow for installers with suspiciously small sizes.

I recently had this problem with EagleFiler. Someone had made a decently convincing GitHub repo using the official icon and screenshots and similar marketing text. It ranked highly in Google searches, I guess because GitHub itself has lots of PageRank. The page tried to get users to paste a Base64-encoded snippet into Terminal, which would download and run a shell script that would prompt the user for a password and save it to a cleartext file.

GitHub has ways to report abuse, as well as DMCA and trademark violations, and they got rid of the repo promptly.

Previously:

Mac Layout Guidelines

Mario Guzmán:

The following sections are general guidelines that describe fundamental Mac layout principles of center equalization, text and control alignment, appropriate use of white space, and visual balance. Following these guidelines will help you create functional and aesthetically pleasing windows that are easy for Mac users to understand and use.

[…]

When labels and controls are stacked in a group, they should line up with each other vertically. Note the right alignment of the colons for the main category labels and the left alignment of the checkboxes and radio buttons. The vertical alignment of the first control in each section is also first baseline aligned with the section title label.

A pet peeve of mine is that some apps put the section title labels in bold.

In such cases, you may use a label below the control with additional information as to how it will alter the application’s behavior.

  • These labels are small-sized multi-line labels.
  • The text color for these labels is “secondary text color” so they appear more muted than the actual control itself.

[…]

For any labels you add, they’re typically left aligned with the control they’re describing. However, for controls such as Checkboxes and Radio Buttons, they must be left-aligned with the label (title) of the control.

Previously:

Android Tracking Switch Privacy Lawsuit

Peter Hoskins & Lily Jamali (via Nick Heer):

A US federal court has told Google to pay $425m (£316.3m) for breaching users’ privacy by collecting data from millions of users even after they had turned off a tracking feature in their Google accounts.

The verdict comes after a group of users brought the case claiming Google accessed users’ mobile devices to collect, save and use their data, in violation of privacy assurances in its Web & App Activity setting.

They had been seeking more than $31bn in damages.

[…]

Google says that when users turn off Web & App Activity in their account, businesses using Google Analytics may still collect data about their use of sites and apps but that this information does not identify individual users and respects their privacy choices.

AP:

That means the total damages awarded in the five-year-old case works out to about $4 per device.

Rodriguez v. Google:

Plaintiffs in this lawsuit sued Google alleging that when someone turned off or “paused” Google’s Web & App Activity setting and/or supplemental Web & App Activity setting, Google lacked permission to collect, save, and use the data concerning their activity on non-Google apps that have incorporated certain Google software code into the apps (such as Uber, Venmo, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, etc.). Plaintiffs allege that regardless of whether Class Members had these settings paused or turned off, Google collected app activity data using certain code embedded within many non-Google apps. This embedded code includes the Firebase Software Development Kit and the Google Mobile Ads Software Development Kit, which are written and distributed by Google and placed on apps by third party developers who own the apps. Plaintiffs allege Google used this code to unlawfully access their devices and collect, save, and use data from their activity on non-Google apps for Google’s own benefit.

This seems kind of like the Incognito lawsuit. Technically, it doesn’t really make sense that flipping a switch on an Android phone would turn off Google Analytics across the Web and third-party apps. But some customers expected this, I guess because it’s all Google tech and because the wording in the settings screen was not clear:

Google’s employees recognize, internally and without disclosing this publicly, that WAA is “not clear to users” (GOOG-RDGZ-00021182), “nebulous” (GOOG-RDGZ-00014578), “not well understood” (GOOG-RDGZ-00020706), “completely broken” (GOOG-RDGZ- 00130745 at -46) and “confuses users” (GOOG-RDGZ-00015004), where people “don’t know what WAA means” (GOOG-RDGZ-00021184) and Google’s promise of control is “just not true” (GOOG-RDGZ-00020680). Google employees accordingly describe WAA as a “terrible control” (GOOG-RDGZ-00130416) and a “loser” (GOOG-RDGZ-00144760), and lament how “Web & App Activity is the worst name ever” (GOOG-RDGZ-00089546).

It sounds to me like the switch did work in the sense that it did what it could reasonably do at the system level, but this was poorly explained and didn’t do as much as users wanted. In comparison, the Apple lawsuits are about how turning off a system-wide “share analytics” switch did not prevent system apps from sending personally identifiable data to Apple. This seems more directly bad, although Google is surely collecting more data overall.

Previously:

Friday, September 5, 2025

reMarkable Paper Pro Move

Hartley Charlton (Hacker News):

reMarkable today unveiled the Paper Pro Move, a compact color E Ink tablet that brings its minimalist writing experience to a more portable form factor aimed at those seeking a focused alternative to full-featured tablets like the iPad mini.

The Paper Pro Move features a 7.3-inch Canvas Color display based on E Ink Gallery 3 technology, offering improved color reproduction and a paper-like texture optimized for handwriting. The tablet measures 7.7 inches tall, 4.24 inches wide, and 6.5 millimeters thick, weighing 235 grams, making it significantly smaller and lighter than the 11.8-inch Paper Pro introduced in 2024. The iPad mini, on the other hand, measures 7.69 inches tall, 5.3 inches wide, and 7.2 millimeters thick, weighing 293 grams.

[…]

The Paper Pro Move supports PDFs and ePub documents but does not provide access to digital bookstores or third-party apps.

[…]

Pricing begins at $449 with the standard Marker stylus, while a $499 configuration includes the Marker Plus with an integrated eraser.

Previously:

One Size Does Not Fit All

Craig Hockenberry (Mastodon):

If you’re someone who’s only using email, a web browser, and some messaging apps to get stuff done, changes to your desktop appearance aren’t going to be disruptive. It’s also likely that you’ll appreciate changes that make it look like your phone.

If you’re doing anything more complex than that, your response to change will be much different.

[…]

Professionals on the Mac are like truck drivers. Drivers have a cockpit filled with specialized dials, knobs, switches, microwave ovens, refrigerators, and pillows that are absolutely necessary for hauling goods across country. Those of us who are making movies, producing hit songs, building apps, or doing scientific research have our own highly specialized cockpits.

And along comes Alan Dye with his standard cockpit, that is beautiful to look at and fun to use on curvy roads. But also completely wrong for the jobs we’re doing. There’s no air ride seat, microwave oven, or air brake release. His response will be to hide these things that we use all the time behind a hidden menu.

John Gruber (2010):

It’s the heaviness of the Mac that allows iOS to remain light.

After mocking the Toaster-Fridge, it turns out that’s kind of where Apple’s taking us. I think they’ve done OK at keeping iOS and iPadOS light, but a lot of the Mac changes seem aimed at achieving a foolish consistency.

Jason Snell:

The iPhone has utterly changed Apple’s priorities as a company. It generates, directly or indirectly, most of Apple’s revenue and profit. But it’s also had knock-on effects: The popularity of the iPhone has driven more people to the Mac. The proportion of Mac users who are “using email, a web browser, and some messaging apps” has risen, probably markedly.

[…]

In many ways, it makes good financial sense for Apple to steer the Mac in a direction that feels familiar to iPhone users and pleases those casual Mac users. They’re probably the majority of Mac users! But what about the Mac as a platform for professional users, who use the Mac as a truck, not a car?

Marco Arment:

Dye’s “consistency” poorly attempts to solve a problem no Mac users had, by radically redesigning the Mac to be utterly unlike itself, carelessly discarding decades of thoughtful design, function, and delight without bothering to understand any of it, and lacking adequate resources to replace it with anywhere near the quality and consideration that it once had.

It’s the sad conclusion of macOS’ takeover, under Tim Cook, by people who seem to kinda hate the Mac.

Brent Simmons (Mastodon):

I seriously dislike the experience of using a Mac with Liquid Glass. The UI has become the star, but the drunken star, blurry, illegible, and physically unstable. It makes making things way more of a struggle than it used to be.

We had pretty good Mac UI, but Apple took the bad parts of it — the translucency and blurriness already there — and dialed it way up and called it content-centric. But it seems to me the opposite. Liquid Glass is Liquid-Glass-centric.

Norbert Heger:

Why menu icons are a terrible idea on macOS?

Here’s a photo showing them side by side on an iPhone and on a MacBook Pro screen.

On iOS, menu icons can work quite well to communicate the meaning of menu items. They’re reasonably sized, displayed on screens with very high pixel density (around 460 ppi), and typically viewed from a fairly close distance.

But this doesn’t translate to macOS at all. On macOS 26 Tahoe, the icons are ridiculously small (about one-quarter of the physical area), displayed on screens with much lower pixel density (e.g. 254 ppi on the latest MacBook Pro), and usually viewed from about twice as far away.

Steve Troughton-Smith:

If you already think Liquid Glass looks bad on macOS, try running apps fullscreen and take a look at the botch job they’ve done to shoehorn it in and get it over the line. You get a mostly-opaque toolbar that intersects the sidebar that no app is designed for, bleed-through of shadows and other chunks of off-white areas, and a miserable bleached sidebar that removes any sense of Liquid Glass and just looks pale and awful.

Michael Flarup (Hacker News):

With iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and watchOS 26, icons are now, for the first time, shared between platforms. Liquid Glass is attempting a unification of the design language across all of these platforms (but curiously not VisionOS).

This also means that the Macintosh now shares the constraints of these other platforms.

[…]

With Liquid Glass, iOS gains personality and macOS loses some of its soul.

While I mourn the loss of transparency and unique app icon shapes on the desktop, I also fear that applying a single visual effect consistently across a big system is problematic.

Steve Troughton-Smith:

My two theses of the summer beta period remain:

  1. iPadOS 26 has crossed the rubicon on the way to becoming a ‘real’ desktop OS
  2. Classic/traditional Mac apps no longer feel fully native on macOS

Pierre Igot:

It’s actually macOS itself that no longer feels fully native on the Mac.

I support all the Mac developers out there who are resisting this bulldozing of decades of carefully built software environments, by buying their products and software subscriptions. And I refuse to support “Mac” developers who drink Apple’s tasteless Kool-Aid and keep embracing this relentless destruction of real Mac software, version after version. Nothing makes up for it.

Michael Flarup:

Into the squircle jail it goes.

Jeff Johnson:

The Tahoe squircle jail is in the crApp Store too!

Previously:

OmniFocus 4.7

Ainsley Bourque Olson:

OmniFocus 4.7 introduces three powerful enhancements: a new “Planned” date type (for specifying the date an item is scheduled for work), the ability to create mutually exclusive tags (handy in a variety of workflows, like prioritization and energy level assignment), and improved repeat functionality (including new support for setting a repeat to end after a specific date or set number of repetitions).

[…]

We’ve also tested and polished the database migration flow, substantially updated our Help content (and integrated it directly into the app), localized the app more thoroughly for non-English speakers, and implemented additional features which do not require a database migration (new Forecast functionality, Time Sensitive Notification support, improved shortcut actions, and more!).

I’ve been running mostly on Defer Dates for so long, often putting the date when I intend to start working on an action directly into its text. Obviously, that’s a design smell. Planned Dates seem like a better way to handle this, though I haven’t yet had a chance to get a feel for how they work in practice. I think a key will be learning how to leverage the Forecast view, which I’ve mostly ignored thus far.

With OmniFocus 3, I was a bit concerned that we were losing something with the switch from contexts to tags. An action can have multiple tags, which has proved to be very handy. But sometimes I want to treat tags more like folders, where assigning one tag automatically unassigns another. Mutually exclusive tags are a way to have the best of both styles. I can still assign multiple tags, e.g. for different locations where I might work on an action, but at the same time OmniFocus can enforce that certain groups of tags are treated like contexts:

I’ve added my “Today/Radar/Back Burner” tags to a mutually exclusive “Priority” tag group, and I can bump something up or down a priority list by simply assigning a single tag.

Task prioritization is just one example of a workflow streamlined by the introduction of mutually exclusive tags: we think this feature will also be a great fit for folks who use tags to assign energy level (high/low/medium), time of day (morning/afternoon/evening), or even appropriate weather (rain/sun) to their tasks.

The Omni Group:

To avoid breaking compatibility with earlier versions of the app, OmniFocus will only prompt you to migrate your database format once it detects that all active OmniFocus sync clients are capable of supporting the new database format.

Version 4.7 can still use the old database format, but some of the new features require migrating.

OmniFocus’s syncing has been rock solid almost the entire time I’ve been using the app. However, after finally updating to iOS 18 last month, version 4.6.1, which had never given me any trouble, suddenly kept getting out of sync with my Mac. Changes on the phone would sync to the Mac, but not vice-versa. The phone would say that it has synced yet still show itself as being many changes behind, as if the changes were stored locally but not yet integrated into the database. This continued with 4.7 and the old database format as well as after migration. Omni is looking into it. For now, I’ve found that force quitting seems to unblock whatever is preventing the app from integrating the changes.

Ken Case:

My OmniFocus tip is to use the parts of the app that actually help you, and ignore or even hide the parts that you don’t yet need.

We designed the app with a lot of depth so that people could reach for that depth when they need it. But we’ve tried to design the app with progressive disclosure, so you can start simple, ignoring those deep features until such a time as you might actually need them.

PoorBC:

I am edging toward the conclusion that OmniFocus with Planned date, Today view, and Forecast view could be the simplest task manager available if you just want to see what’s on your plate today without seeing tasks that are not available. That’s assuming you ignore the advanced features, which is certainly doable. You don’t have to have projects or tags if you choose not to.

Previously:

SQLite on macOS Not ACID

Jonathan Johnson (2022):

From my investigation, Apple’s version of SQLite instead replaces PRAGMA fullfsync = on’s implementation to use F_BARRIERFSYNC.

SQLite users who are expecting PRAGMA fullfsync to provide durability guarantees in the event of power failures or kernel panics can override xSync via a custom VFS or build SQLite from source.

[…]

Apple’s documentation clearly states that for any guarantees about data loss due to power loss or kernel panic, you must use the fcntl() API with the F_FULLFSYNC command.

[…]

For most consumer applications, F_BARRIERFSYNC will be enough to provide reasonable durability with the benefit of performing much more quickly. However, there are some situations where true ACID compliance is desired.

[…]

It’s very confusing when a feature that’s documented to be specific to macOS doesn’t behave as documented on macOS.

Although, SQLite itself is open-source, as are many parts of macOS and iOS, he says that the source for Apple’s SQLite is not available.

Andrew Ayer (Hacker News):

Unfortunately, SQLite’s documentation about its durability properties is far from clear. I cannot tell whether SQLite is durable by default, and if not, what are the minimal settings you need to use to ensure durability.

[…]

A Hacker News commenter who agrees with my reading of the documentation asked Hipp how his comment is consistent with the documentation, but received no reply.

Hipp also says that WAL mode used to be durable by default, but it was changed after people complained about poor performance. This surprised me, since I had the impression that SQLite cared deeply about backwards compatibility, and weakening the default durability setting is a nasty breaking change for any application which needs durability.

[…]

My takeaway is that if you need durability, you’d better set the synchronous option explicitly because who knows what the default is, or what it will be in the future. With WAL mode, FULL seems to suffice. As for DELETE mode, who knows if FULL is enough, so you’d better go with EXTRA to be safe. And if your application might be used on macOS, enable fullfsync.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-08): Sherief, FYI:

I was bitten by this in production! my advice would be to bundle your own SQLite and in general, bundle your own code as much as you can on macOS / iOS, never rely on OS claims of correctness.

However, this is not possible if you’re using SQLite through Core Data or SwiftData.

Thursday, September 4, 2025

Atlassian Acquires The Browser Company

Atlassian (tweet, Hacker News):

We’ve entered into an agreement to acquire The Browser Company of New York, the team behind the incredible Dia and Arc browsers.

By combining The Browser Company’s passion for building browsers people love with Atlassian’s deep expertise on how the world’s best teams operate, we have the opportunity to transform how work gets done in the AI era.

David Pierce:

Atlassian is paying $610 million in cash for The Browser Company, and plans to run it as an independent entity.

Manton Reece:

As a VC-backed company, perhaps The Browser Company was always going to need to sell. My initial reaction is Atlassian seems a weird fit. But maybe not?

Adam Engst:

Overall, I believe this is a positive move for users of the Arc browser. The acquisition gets The Browser Company out of the venture capital rat race and moves it under the oversight of Atlassian, best known to TidBITS readers for its 2017 acquisition of Trello, the task management tool we used extensively during the Take Control days (see “Trello Offers Compelling Collaboration Tool,” 9 July 2012). Atlassian also develops Jira, a project management platform, and Confluence, a collaborative documentation tool, both primarily targeted at developers.

Previously:

ASUS ProArt 6K Display

ASUS:

ProArt Display PA32QCV is a 31.5-inch 6K HDR monitor designed for professional content creators. This Calman Verified display boasts a wide gamut with 98% DCI-P3 coverage and Delta E<2 color accuracy. The ProArt Preset feature now includes the new M Model-P3 mode to deliver seamless and consistent colors when working with MacBook devices. Dual Thunderbolt™ 4 ports support daisy-chaining and enable superfast data transfers and 96-watt power delivery via a single cable.

Unlike the LG and Dell 6K displays, this has the same 6016x3384 resolution as Apple’s Pro Display XDR, which hasn’t been updated since it was introduced more than 6 years ago. The ProArt costs $1,399, whereas the XDR is still priced at $5,999 (with stand).

Juli Clover:

ASUS doesn’t have the same design aesthetic as Apple, so the ProArt 6K’s design isn’t impressive. There’s a square-shaped base, an arm that attaches to the display, and thin bezels at the top and the sides. There’s a thicker bottom bezel that houses some quick access control buttons.

ASUS’ display has the same 218 pixels per inch as the Pro Display XDR, and text looks crisp. Colors are accurate out of the box and can be further tweaked in the Settings menu with different profiles. HDR10 support is included, but peak brightness maxes out at 600 nits, which limits HDR performance. It also does not have individual local dimming zones, which means it is lacking several of the pro features that set Apple’s XDR display apart.

The ProArt 6K has a matte display coating that’s meant to cut down on reflections, but it does impact some of the color vibrancy and contrast.

Fabien Sanglard (2023, Hacker News):

According to Intel’s Thunderbolt-3 technology brief, the interface has a bandwidth of 40 Gbps. With the 6,016 x 3,384 @ 60Hz / 10bpc plugged into a calculator, the display requires roughly 38.2 Gbps.

This means Thunderbolt 3 bandwidth is nearly maxed out with only 40-38.2 = 1.8Gbps left.

[…]

Thunderbolt 4 was released in 2020 along with Intel’s 8000-series controllers called Maple Ridge. It did not increase the bandwidth, which stayed at 40 Gbps, but it made support for DisplayPort 1.4 (and therefore DSC) mandatory.

This version allows supporting display configuration such as 8K@60Hz.

Previously:

AppKitUI

Darren Ford:

An AppKit UI toolkit help you create and manage NSView content easily

  1. Remove dependence on using XIBs when creating UI views
  2. Reduce boilerplate code when manually creating NSView UI content.
  3. Easily bind data between controls
  4. Easily attach actions to your controls (no more delegates or target/actions!)
  5. Use Xcode’s preview pane to view your designs!!

There’s a demo.

Previously:

Writing Mac and iOS Apps Shouldn’t Be So Difficult

Brent Simmons (Mastodon):

A scripting language plus key bits implemented in C was more than fast enough for an app. Even all those years ago.

[…]

I’m not writing this article to praise Frontier — I’m talking about it to make a point, which I’ll get to.

But I wanted to bring up a second aspect to this: it’s not just frictionless iteration that was so great, it was also the scripting language and environment.

[…]

I’m not saying apps these days need to be Frontier-like in any details. But it seems absolutely bizarre to me that we — we who write Mac and iOS apps — still have to build and run the app, make changes, build and run the app, and so on, all day long. In the year 2025.

I was just listening to a Larry Tesler interview where he talks about live editing the Xerox Alto’s Smalltalk code in the middle of a demo to Steve Jobs. This was in 1979.

And it seems retro in the worst way that we’re still using anything other than a scripting language for most of our code. We should be using something simple and light that can configure toolbars, handle networking callbacks, query databases, manage views, and so on. And maybe with a DSL for SwiftUI-like declarative UI.

[…]

And at some point I suspect these things are going to be table stakes for any platform that wants to attract developers. If you were a new developer right now, would you pick Xcode’s build-and-run, edit, build-and-run, edit — plus the growing complexity of Swift — over something like Electron and JavaScript?

Manton Reece:

I also used Frontier a lot during that time. It was great. Personally, instead of Swift, I would’ve loved to see RubyCocoa taken to the next level.

Frontier was great, and I was excited about Apple’s initial embrace of PyObjC, RubyCocoa, and other bridges, but they’ve now gone completely in the other direction. AppleScriptObjC is still there, but it doesn’t work with the newer Swift-based APIs, and the initial hopes that Swift would lead to a successor scripting language seem to have completely evaporated.

Kyle Howells:

This idea, a higher level, live reloading, scripting language built on top a compiled, fast core language you can drop down to when needed was my hope when Apple released Swift.

Previously:

Substack IAP

Substack (Hacker News):

The Substack app drives more than 30% of all paid subscriptions, making it a major source of discovery and discussion. Until now, however, it hasn’t always been possible to upgrade to a paid subscription directly in the app.

That’s changing. Apple now allows Substack to include external links for paid subscriptions in the iOS app in the U.S., while also requiring that all publications offer in-app purchase (IAP) as an option.

Subscriptions purchased via Apple’s IAP have different fees, payout timing, and billing controls compared with web-based subscriptions. This FAQ explains those differences and the tools Substack has built to help you protect your revenue, maintain your subscriber relationships, and stay in control.

[…]

To protect your earnings, Substack will automatically set your price in the iOS app higher for subscriptions purchased through Apple’s in-app purchase (IAP) system. This increase offsets Apple’s fee, so you receive approximately the same payout you would for a web-based subscription.

You can opt out of the price adjustment, but you can’t opt out of IAP. So payments that go through Apple will be delayed, and there’s a bifurcated refund system.

Previously:

Wednesday, September 3, 2025

WhatsApp and Instagram for iPad, Finally

WhatsApp:

Bringing all your favorite features to a larger screen, WhatsApp for iPad makes keeping in touch with friends and family even easier. Make video and audio calls with up to 32 people, share your screen, and use both front and back cameras.

We’ve made WhatsApp for iPad ideal for multitasking so you can get more done. Take advantage of iPadOS multitasking features such as Stage Manager, Split View, and Slide Over to view multiple apps at once, so you can send messages while browsing the web, or research options for a group trip while on a call together.

John Gruber (Mastodon):

One of the weird things about Meta’s companywide obstinate refusal to adapt its iOS apps for iPadOS is that for WhatsApp, they’ve had a fairly decent Mac app for years. Surely it was less work to adapt their iOS app for iPadOS than it was to create a passable Mac app using Catalyst.

Instagram (MacRumors, Hacker News):

Today, we’re excited to announce we’re bringing Instagram to iPad. People have asked for this for a while, and we’ve taken the time to design an experience that optimizes your favorite parts of Instagram for a bigger screen.

Instagram has always been the place where people connect over creativity, and Reels has become a primary way people discover and share entertaining content. With Instagram for iPad, we’ve redesigned the experience to reflect how people use bigger screens today – for lean back entertainment. Now, when you open the app, you’ll drop into Reels, so you can get the entertaining content you love on a bigger screen. You’ll also see Stories at the top, so you can easily connect with the people that matter to you, and messaging is one tap away.

BasicAppleGuy:

15 Years for Instagram to come to iPad! We’re talking going back to the days of Steve Jobs, iTunes Ping, the era of iPods, AirPort, & the iPhone 4.

Warner Crocker:

The folks at Meta must have something up their sleeve. The reason I say that is they have finally, after all of these years released an iPad version of the app, long after most folks just figured it would never happen.

Jason Snell:

While messages, notifications, and reels do feel more expansive on the new app, the standard view still feels… pretty empty. I’m glad the app is fully iPad native now, but it would sure be nice if Instagram considered what might be an elevated tablet experience. (I guess we can stop waiting for the app and start waiting for it to be better instead!)

Christina Warren:

Sadly the app is not good

Previously:

Google Search Remedies

Adam Engst:

After years of legal proceedings, the Google antitrust case has finally resulted in a ruling with real-world impact—though perhaps not in the way many expected. Rather than forcing dramatic changes, the ruling preserves key aspects of how users currently engage with Google’s products.

Lauren Feiner (PDF, MacRumors, Slashdot):

Google will not have to sell its Chrome browser in order to address its illegal monopoly in online search, DC District Court Judge Amit Mehta ruled on Tuesday. Over a year ago, Judge Mehta found that the search giant had violated the Sherman Antitrust Act; his ruling now determines what Google must do in response.

[…]

In his 230-page ruling, Mehta explained that even though Google’s default status as the search engine on Chrome “undoubtedly contributes to Google’s dominance in general search,” forcing Google to sell it is ultimately “a poor fit for this case.” The DOJ failed to prove that solutions less extreme than a break-up would not be enough to restore competition, he wrote. Furthermore, he says, the DOJ did not prove a causal connection between its monopoly power and Chrome defaults.

[…]

Declining to ban Google from paying for defaults actually “heightened” the need to adopt a remedy that forces Google to share some of its search data with competitors, Mehta noted. “Qualified Competitors will have to continue to compete with Google on price to gain distribution. So, their competitive advantage will have to come from innovation and differentiating their search services from Google’s,” he wrote. To do that, search competitors need scale that they have largely been denied by Google’s search monopoly. So Mehta agreed to let qualified competitors buy at marginal cost a one-time snapshot of a variety of search data that Google collects, which he says will let those rivals “identify and crawl more web pages with valuable content and do so more efficiently.”

Jay Peters:

Google will be able to keep making search deals like its $20 billion agreement to be the default option in Apple’s Safari browser, a federal district court judge ruled in the US v. Google antitrust case on Tuesday. Executives from both Apple and Firefox developer Mozilla have defended their search deals with Google, with Mozilla’s CFO testifying that Firefox might be doomed without the deal in place.

[…]

Google also won’t have to show choice screens on its products, according to the ruling.

Steven Vaughan-Nichols:

This ruling marks the most significant monopoly case since the Microsoft trial nearly 30 years ago.

[…]

Google’s search advertising business, which generated over $198 billion last year, remains under pressure from ongoing antitrust scrutiny even as AI-driven search alternatives, such as Perplexity, grow.

In the meantime, the market is overjoyed at what it sees as a Google win. Google stock jumped 8% as the news quickly spread. Nevertheless, Google is widely expected to appeal the decision, and the judge’s orders will be paused pending appeal. This process will take years.

Matt Stoller:

Today, the decade-long campaign to stop big tech from dominating our society took a significant step backwards, as the judge hearing the search case against Google, Amit Mehta, chose not to meaningfully constrain the firm’s illegal behavior. And to engage in such deferential behavior, he openly ignored Supreme Court precedent.

[…]

Mehta found that Google was doing illegal things to maintain its monopoly, but he didn’t force the company to stop doing those illegal things.

Why not? Well, he said that new companies like OpenAI had emerged to potentially challenge Google, and he didn’t want to, and I’m not kidding, hinder Google’s ability to compete with them.

[…]

This remedy, by contrast, is obviously going to fail. And the main reason is that, unlike Microsoft, Google’s leadership is utterly unchastened. Google CEO Sundar Pichai and chief legal officer Kent Walker will get bonuses for what they did. They see this conflict as one in which they fought bitterly, and kept at it, and shredded documents, and the result was… victory.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-04): Vlad Prelovac:

[Judge Mehta] showed very deep understanding of the matter and didn’t fall for meaningless remedies such as breaking up Google, or divesting Chrome but went for search index access, just as we recommended.

[…]

The mandatory license will be for five years, not the ten years plaintiffs requested. The court views this as a temporary measure to help competitors become independent, not a permanent reliance on Google.

[…]

In the first year, competitors can only use Google’s syndicated results for a maximum of 40% of their total annual queries. This cap is intended to ensure competitors develop their own capability for the majority of searches and rely on Google only for the most difficult “long-tail” queries.

[…]

Google will be allowed to place “ordinary commercial restrictions” on how competitors use the syndicated search results. This means competitors will be prohibited from activities like scraping, crawling, or indexing the results to protect Google’s intellectual property.

[…]

The court explicitly rejects the plaintiffs’ proposal to force Google to offer syndication at its marginal cost.

Mike Masnick:

So Google can still pay Apple and Mozilla, just not exclusively? That seems like a distinction that might not make much practical difference. If Google can outbid everyone else (which they can), and Apple/Mozilla have admitted users get pissed when they don’t use Google as default, what exactly changes here?

[…]

Mehta isn’t requiring Google to hand over everything—which would raise legitimate privacy and security concerns—but specifically the datasets that flow from the scale advantages Google gained through its anticompetitive conduct. It’s an elegant solution that addresses the actual harm without creating new ones.

[…]

When the DOJ first filed this lawsuit, Google’s search dominance seemed unshakeable. By the time Mehta was crafting remedies, generative AI had created the first credible alternative to traditional search in decades. Suddenly, preventing Google from extending its search monopoly into AI distribution became just as important as addressing its existing dominance.

[…]

The question remains whether any of this will actually create more competitive search engines. But at least it’s not actively making things worse, which, honestly, was my biggest fear going in. I had feared that the court wouldn’t properly thread the needle on remedies, and yet… this seems to have been done very thoughtfully and strikes what is likely a good balance.

Cory Doctorow (Hacker News):

Judge Mehta turned his courtroom into a Star Chamber, a black hole whence no embarrassing information about Google’s wicked deeds could emerge. That meant that the only punishment Google would have to bear from this trial would come after the government won its case, when the judge decided on a punishment (the term of art is “remedy”) for Google.

Yesterday, he handed down that remedy and it is as bad as it could be. In fact, it is likely the worst possible remedy for this case[…]

[…]

This will not secure competition for search, but it will certainly democratize human rights violations at scale.

Doubtless there will be loopholes in this data-sharing order. Google will have the right to hold back some of its data (that is, our data) if it is deemed “sensitive.” This isn’t so much a loophole as is a loopchasm.

Matt Stoller:

Today, the decade-long campaign to stop big tech from dominating our society took a significant step backwards, as the judge hearing the search case against Google, Amit Mehta, chose not to meaningfully constrain the firm’s illegal behavior. And to engage in such deferential behavior, he openly ignored Supreme Court precedent.

[…]

Mehta found that Google was doing illegal things to maintain its monopoly, but he didn’t force the company to stop doing those illegal things.

Why not? Well, he said that new companies like OpenAI had emerged to potentially challenge Google, and he didn’t want to, and I’m not kidding, hinder Google’s ability to compete with them.

[…]

This remedy, by contrast, is obviously going to fail. And the main reason is that, unlike Microsoft, Google’s leadership is utterly unchastened. Google CEO Sundar Pichai and chief legal officer Kent Walker will get bonuses for what they did. They see this conflict as one in which they fought bitterly, and kept at it, and shredded documents, and the result was… victory.

Tim Wu:

Confusing part is: The opinion says G “cannot secure exclusivity for its GenAI products…” yet allows Google “to pay distributors for default placement.” But the judge himself found that defaults end up mimicking exclusives!

What if Google now offers Samsung billions to preinstall Gemini as its operating AI -- yet in a way that technically can be switched? Is that a banned exclusive, or is that paying for default placement?

Previously:

macOS Tahoe 26 Developer Beta 9

Juli Clover:

Apple today provided developers with the ninth beta of macOS Tahoe 26 for testing purposes, with the update coming a week after the eighth beta.

The release notes don’t call out any changes since beta 5.

Norbert Doerner:

I mean, that Spotlight search icon isn’t even vertically centered.

It looks to me like this was finally fixed in beta 9. They also made the icon larger.

Mario Guzmán:

Going back to the new Settings window for FaceTime in #macOSTahoe again.

Yes, they added SO much text in this view that it scrolls. Yet, since scrollbars auto-hide, you wouldn’t know by just looking at this view.

I wonder if Apple knows about Tab Views. If your pane for a specific tab has too much content, split them into groups inside a tab view.

John Voorhees:

I’m curious whether any developers have gotten custom controls for macOS Tahoe’s redsigned Control Center to work.

I saw a couple in the very early betas but they disappeared and haven’t reappeared yet.

Mario Guzmán:

For Betas 1-6, my toolbar in #AppKit has been working perfectly fine as it has since 2018. But Beta 7, 8, & now 9, it is so broken. Aside from all the other AppKit bugs I have submitted since betas 1-3, things are just getting more and more broken rather than less.

Seems super late in the game to have none of my AppKit reports addressed but also making things even worse this late in the game.

Poor app devs (Apple + 3rd party) are paying the price of this overly complex redesign.

Steve Troughton-Smith:

macOS is in a pretty rough state even in beta 9, with lifecycle issues, Dock hangs, Dark Mode rendering issues, and more. This might have to be one of those years where macOS comes in October instead.

Matthias Gansrigler-Hrad:

Thought this was dirt on my screen, when in reality they’re the ticks of the slider.

Jeff Johnson:

This is what Safari 26 Extension Settings looks like with no internet connection.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-05): For some users, the Spotlight icon is not fixed. They are seeing a taller search field than I am, and the icon is not centered.

Update (2025-09-09): Craig Hockenberry:

If you are on Tahoe and finding that you’re constantly resizing windows accidentally, it’s not your fault.

The hysteresis on the double-click detection is much too long - two clicks in the title bar a second apart will trigger the resize, no matter how you’ve configured your Mouse Double-Click Speed.

It took me several attempts to figure out how to disable this “feature”, but here it is[…]

iOS 26 Developer Beta 9

Juli Clover:

Apple today provided developers with the ninth betas of iOS 26 and iPadOS 26 for testing purposes, with the updates coming a week after Apple seeded the eighth betas.

The release notes don’t call out any changes since beta 5.

Mario Guzmán:

Not everything needs to have round end caps 🙄 look how close the album artwork now is to the edges. But move it in any closer, now the labels become useless. Concentricity is total bs.

Why are these designers creating more problems for themselves and us with dumb things like concentricity — which is something literally no one asked for.

Louie Mantia:

Verifiably been sounding the alarm for a month on effects bugs with OS 26 and Icon Composer. No fixes. They’re gonna ship it.

Steve Troughton-Smith:

I don’t see progress on any bugs of mine in beta 9, so I think it’s time to wait for 26.1. I suspect the things they are fixing are to support their apps and new iPhones only, and it has been like that for a while now

Just to be sure, I re-checked everything I’ve filed since June. Even the SpringBoard crashers are still unresolved 😶

Adam Bell:

Beta 9 and UINavigationBar’s backButtonItem still doesn’t respect -hidesSharedBackground or -sharesBackground.

:(

Effectively means you’re SOL if you do any custom back button designs and don’t want a glass background (or you end up doing weird workarounds with leftBarButtonItems)

Nick Heer:

I have never had a problem sending photos to contacts over iMessage until I upgraded to iOS 26, which is a cool indication of where we’re at in early September.

Marc Palmer:

Given that we make an app that frames screenshots, I would very much like it if Apple fixes the bugs in iOS 26 where sometimes the system screenshot UI just doesn’t show.

Nico Reese:

iOS fails to render icons as they are displayed in Icon Composer when using blend mode Screen on a layer.

This is bad. You cannot know for certain if what you put into your icon looks exactly like what you ship. This is even worse for designers who are not developers and have no idea why this happens. They should not have to think about this stuff.

Louie Mantia:

I am not surprised. I am disappointed.

Icons made in Icon Composer do not render identically on home screens as they do in Icon Composer. This is a complication that never existed for my job before, where I deliver an icon to a client, and the deliverable is broken through no fault of my own. A bug. I’m an icon designer, not a developer. For the first time, I have to deal with bugs.

Marc Palmer:

So on iPad at least, it seems like everybody’s keyboard is broken in 26. Remember to take your iPad back to the Apple Store to the keyboard repaired.

Adrian Schönig:

iOS 26 call screening is incredibly good. I had my phone muted for unknown calls the last few years thanks to all those data leaks from various big Aussie companies, that had lead to tons of spam calls.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-08): Dave Polaschek:

I’ve written up some of my iOS whines and why I won’t be moving to iOS or macOS 26. In fact, I think I’m done buying things from Apple. I’ve got a Chromebook I’m using in an attempt to replace my iPad (the Chromebook is too heavy, and I hate the touchscreen on it, but I’m USING it), a MNT Pocket Reform to explore the world of Unix on ARM, and multiple RPis. I’m also seriously considering a Murena Fairphone 6, which will be out this month.

Mario Guzmán:

Look, I get that Liquid Glass UI is going to need a LOT of refinement over the next few OS releases across all platforms. Fine.

But literally no one asked for this Liquid Glass effect. There are thousands of existing years-old bugs in your backlog -- maybe spent the effort there?

Update (2025-09-09): Marc Edwards:

The new iOS 26 and macOS app icon shape looks like it is based on the iOS 7 app icon shape with a larger radius, rather than a superellipse. Here’s an image diff with my best attempt matching a superellipse. It’s not quite the same.

Rob:

Are Liquid Glass enabled apps supposed to have such ugly icon corners on iPadOS 17?

Tuesday, September 2, 2025

Carbon Copy Cloner 7.1.3

Version 7.1.2:

CCC has a new “glass” icon that looks great on macOS Tahoe! Big thanks to our UI designer Enelia at Abacus Finch who was able to find a way to keep our beloved page curl with the new glass material.

[…]

Tahoe users: If you disable the CCC menubar icon via the new System Settings > Menu Bar > Allow in the Menu Bar interface, CCC cannot be aware of that setting. For the best experience, we recommend that you use the settings inside of CCC for controlling whether the CCC menubar icon is visible.

[…]

In lieu of a separate button, you can now hold down the Option key while clicking the Start button if you would like to have CCC rescan the entire source and destination (i.e. suppress Quick Update). Additionally, you can hold down the Control key to perform an ad hoc Backup Health Check.

[…]

Added yet another workaround for Apple’s restriction on access to the current WiFi network name for the macOS Sequoia 15.6 update. CCC uses the WiFi network name only in support of the option to limit a scheduled task to running when the system is connected to a specific WiFi network.

Version 7.1.3:

CCC will now more effectively dissent requests to unmount the source volume snapshot when the task is actively using that volume for the duration of a task event. Requests to unmount that snapshot are pretty rare, but that can happen if free space on the source volume is very low, or during a logout event. This change resolves the errors that would ensue in those cases when the source is unmounted while we’re using it.

Previously:

Google to Require Developer Verification for Android Sideloading

Abner Li (Hacker News):

To combat malware and financial scams, Google announced today that only apps from developers that have undergone verification can be installed on certified Android devices starting in 2026.

This requirement applies to “certified Android devices” that have Play Protect and are preloaded with Google apps. The Play Store implemented similar requirements in 2023, but Google is now mandating this for all install methods, including third-party app stores and sideloading where you download an APK file from a third-party source.

It sounds like this is checking the person behind the developer account rather than checking the content of the submitted apps.

Sominemo:

I’m struggling to see the benefit of this new policy. While it’s presented as a security measure, the requirement to fill out these forms seems like a trivial barrier for actual malware creators, who will easily abuse the system. The real impact will be felt by legitimate developers who either value their privacy or don’t want to be tied to Google’s centralized ecosystem.

My primary concern is the potential for mismanagement, which could disproportionately harm independent developers. We’ve already seen how Google’s automated systems can randomly ban established developers from Google Play with little to no feedback. A system like this, which grants Google even more oversight, could easily make this problem worse.

Rui Carmo:

The new Android security measures are an interesting piece of revisionist thinking—“developer verification” is now set as the gatekeeper for sideloaded apps in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand by September 2026, with what looks like full side-loading lockdown coming 2027.

Regardless of the malware angle, this seems to effectively kill side-loading on Android in the near future, making it as hobbyist-hostile as iOS and very likely spelling doom for open ecosystems like F-Droid (which I rely upon to customize every Android device I get my hands on).

Rosyna Keller:

What’s the problem with Google becoming a CA for all apps that want to interface with Google Play Services?

Steve Tibbett:

Apple has shown that they’ll use that capability to enforce policy decisions, guess the Android folks don’t want anyone being able to do that.

Sameer Samat:

Sideloading is fundamental to Android, and it’s not going anywhere. As we said in our blog, our new developer identity requirements are designed to protect users and developers from bad actors, not to limit choice. We want to make sure that if you download an app from a developer, regardless of where you get it, it’s actually from them. That’s it.

[…]

We are working on a flow for devs, hobbyists, etc that won’t interfere with your workflow.

Terence Eden (Hacker News):

No rational user would install a purported battery app with that scary list of permissions, right? Wrong!

[…]

There is no UI tweak you can do to prevent users bypassing these scary warnings. There is no amount of education you can provide to reliably make people stop and think.

[…]

Given that sideloaded Android apps are clearly a massive vector for fraud, it obviously behoves Google to find a way to secure their platform as much as possible.

[…]

This is quite obviously a bullshit powerplay by Google to ensnare the commons. Not content with closing down parts of the Android Open Source Project, stuffing more and more vital software behind its proprietary services, and freezing out small manufacturers - now it wants the name and shoe-size of every developer!

[…]

I remember The Day Google Deleted Me - we cannot have these lumbering monsters gatekeeping what we do on our machines.

Hugo Tunius (Hacker News):

When Google restricts your ability to install certain applications they aren’t constraining what you can do with the hardware you own, they are constraining what you can do using the software they provide with said hardware. It’s through this control of the operating system that Google is exerting control, not at the hardware layer. You often don’t have full access to the hardware either and building new operating systems to run on mobile hardware is impossible, or at least much harder than it should be. This is a separate, and I think more fruitful, point to make.

kristov:

I think the conversation needs to change from “can’t run software of our choice” to “can’t participate in society without an apple or google account”. I have been living with a de-googled android phone for a number of years, and it is getting harder and harder, while at the same time operating without certain “apps” is becoming more difficult.

For example, by bank (abn amro) still allows online banking on desktop via a physical auth device, but they are actively pushing for login only via their app. I called their support line for a lost card, and had to go through to second level support because I didn’t have the app. If they get their way, eventually an apple or google account will be mandatory to have a bank account with them.

My kid goes to a school that outsourced all communication via an app. They have a web version, but it’s barely usable. The app doesn’t run without certain google libs installed. Again, to participate in school communication about my kid effectively requires an apple or google account.

See also: Louis Rossmann (Hacker News).

Previously:

iTorrent Removed via Notarization Due to Sanctions

Ernesto Van der Sar (Hacker News, MacRumors, Slashdot):

Under EU law, Apple is required to give its users more freedom to install apps that are not listed in the official App Store. This allows for easier access to software that’s typically prohibited by Apple, including the popular iTorrent BitTorrent client. The iTorrent client built a steady user base over the past year, but that came to an abrupt end when Apple decided to revoke the developer’s alternative distribution rights.

[…]

In July, several users complained that they were unable to download iTorrent from AltStore PAL. Initially the cause of the problem was unclear but the app’s developer, XITRIX, later confirmed that Apple itself had stepped in.

Apparently, Apple had revoked the developer’s “alternative distribution” right, which is required to publish apps in alternative stores, including AltStore PAL.

Jess Weatherbed (Hacker News):

In a statement to The Verge, Apple spokesperson Peter Ajemian said, “Notarization for this app was removed in order to comply with government sanctions-related rules in various jurisdictions. We have communicated this to the developer.”

Apple did not reach out the developer before revoking the app and took more than a month to provide any explanation.

I did some quick searches and was not able to find any specific information about countries sanctioning BitTorrent or any recent changes that might have prompted Apple’s actions.

Rick Findlay:

The app’s developer says the move was carried out without notice, without explanation, and with no way to appeal, effectively cutting off access to a legal torrenting tool that had been gaining popularity across Europe over the past year.

Ryan L. Clancy:

The technology behind torrenting is lawful, and you can use it for legitimate purposes. However, its misuse can lead to severe penalties. Torrenting copyrighted material, for example, can lead to fines and potentially even jail time.

Riley Testut:

Really hard to run a marketplace when apps can disappear randomly without our control and we can’t do anything about it 😓

Kuba Suder:

I don’t like this vision of computing where some governments can decide what apps you’re allow to run on your device…

Previously:

Colombia Investigates App Store

Hartley Charlton:

The Superintendence of Industry and Commerce (SIC) announced the probe yesterday (via MobileTime), stating that its Delegation for the Protection of Competition had reached a preliminary conclusion that Apple may have engaged in exclusionary practices that restrict free competition in the Colombian market.

The SIC case is focused on two primary concerns. First, the agency alleges that Apple contractually prevents developers from creating or operating alternative app stores on iPhones and iPads, ensuring that all software distribution takes place exclusively through the App Store.

[…]

The second issue involves Apple’s handling of in-app purchases. The SIC said developers are compelled to use Apple’s proprietary In-App Purchase system, which applies commissions of 15% to 30% on each transaction. Apple also allegedly prohibits developers from informing users of cheaper alternatives outside the app, a practice known as anti-steering.

Previously:

Monday, September 1, 2025

Documentation for App Store Business Model Changes

Craig Hockenberry (Mastodon):

The source code example using in Supporting business model changes by using the app transaction does not work if you’re using current Xcode and App Store conventions. Additionally, the sandbox environment uses the same outdated conventions.

And when you use that sample code, that you cannot test in the Xcode transaction simulator or in the TestFlight sandbox environment, it will fail spectacularly on launch day. You will be inundated with support requests from people who are expecting to see a payment for the previous version AND you’ll be in a state of panic because YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON. And did I mention that you can’t test this in production?

The sample code implies that the originalAppVersion is a string that’s separated by periods (“.”). The sandbox environment returns a value of “1.0” which reinforces this notion that it’s a value that separated by periods.

It is not.

Sarah Reichelt:

If Apple allowed their people to write and publish their own apps, they would learn all this. As it is, they are totally isolated from the situation.

Typepad Shutting Down

Typepad:

After September 30, 2025, access to Typepad – including account management, blogs, and all associated content – will no longer be available. Your account and all related services will be permanently deactivated.

Please note that after this date, you will no longer be able to access or export any blog content.

The FAQ:

The export will produce a single TXT file for each blog. The file format is MTIF which is supported by some other blogging platforms, including WordPress.

Warner Crocker:

This blog is named Life on the Wicked Stage: Act 3. I may be a theatre geek, but I’m not a fan of the three-act structure. The name came about because there were first and second acts preceding it. The first act was on Windows Live Spaces (long since dead and gone) back in the day before I ever thought of this as something I’d enjoy doing. Then there was a Life on the Wicked Stage: Act 2 on Typepad.

Well all plays, regardless of act structure have an ending. The curtain is coming down on that second act in the same way it did on the first one.

[…]

Everything in the corporeal world reverts back to dust. So do all the bits in the digital one.

The Tim Cook Era

Jason Snell:

But here we are, living in an era where Cook has now served as Apple CEO longer than Jobs did. The Apple of 2025 is quite different from the company Cook took control of back in 2011. Today’s Apple generates nearly four times the revenue that the company did when Cook took over, driven by more-than-quadrupling iPhone revenue. Back in 2011, there was one iPhone; now there are five, along with several iPad models, a wearables business that basically didn’t exist, an experimental headset, and a revitalized Mac powered by iPhone chips.

[…]

The toughest part to follow of Steve Jobs’s many acts was his role as a guider of product development. Jobs had taste and intuition, and it enabled Apple to do some remarkable things. Cook is not that guy, and the fear was always that under his tenure, Apple would falter.

Did it? Depends on how you view things. From the perspective of investors looking for growth and profit, Cook has taken everything to a higher level. If you focus on product innovation, it’s more of a mixed bag.

[…]

I’d also say that, surprisingly for someone who was once in charge of the Mac at Apple, part of Cook’s legacy is his allowing the Mac to lose its way in the mid-2010s, a time when it seemed like Apple was trying to build the iPad up so that the Mac could be put out to pasture as a legacy device. The addition of USB-C and the controversial “butterfly” keyboard added to the sense of malaise. But to Cook’s credit, Apple pulled the Mac back from the abyss, transitioning to chips originally designed for iPhones and iPads and ushering in the most successful era (by revenue, anyway) in Mac history.

People seem to agree that Apple Silicon saved the Mac, but it’s interesting to consider why. Apple had made a series of bad hardware design decisions. Couldn’t it simply reverse them? After switching to Intel processors, the theory was that Apple no longer had a chance of being ahead in performance, but at least it would never be behind. You’d think that on-par performance plus Apple’s design chops and the superiority of macOS would lead to success.

The post-butterfly Mac notebooks were a reprieve, but they didn’t exactly take the world by storm. Having skipped the butterflies, my 16-inch Intel MacBook Pro was arguably the worst Mac I’ve owned: noisy, hot, random shutdowns, unusable without the failing and non-replaceable SSD, the Touch Bar. Without superior hardware, the Mac had to rely more on its software advantage, but throughout the Tim Cook era macOS has in large part become harder to use and less reliable. Most of the new features have been half-hearted ports from iOS rather than expanding its unique capabilities.

The software problems remain, but with the Apple Silicon processors they’re now offset by a hardware advantage, at least for notebooks. Yes, this is innovation, but I get frustrated whenever Apple is judged based on its innovation—meaning discontinuities like this or whole new product lines. This is what Wall Street likes because it affects the company’s growth potential. To me, what matters is the software. How well is it designed and how well does it work? Everything else—how pleasant the hardware, services, accessory products are—follows from there.

And forget about what wonders “fantasy Steve Jobs” might have accomplished. Just look at what’s happened with music.

Previously:

The Anatomy of a Mach-O

Olivia A. Gallucci:

The Mach Object (Mach-O) is the binary format used on Apple’s operating systems for executables, libraries, and object code. It was created for the Mach kernel (hence the name) and introduced in NeXTSTEP, the predecessor to macOS, as a replacement for the a.out format.

[…]

In this post, we’ll explore Mach-O’s layout and history. Then, we will examine how macs use Mach-O for code signing integrity and for Pointer Authentication Codes (PAC) on ARM64e systems.

Previously:

Friday, August 29, 2025

SpotTest 1.1

Howard Oakley:

Spotlight is so substantial, almost silent in the log, and impenetrable that the best approach to diagnosing its problems is to test it out in a controlled way. Mints has been doing that by creating a folder of files containing an unusual word, then searching for that. Although that’s still useful for a quick test, we need something more focused and flexible, and that’s what SpotTest aims to deliver.

Following deep dives into how Spotlight indexes and searches metadata and contents of files, and how it can search text extracted from images and the results of image analysis, I’ve realised that different test files are required, together with alternative means of search. For example, the standard approach used in compiled apps, with NSMetadataQuery, is incapable of finding content tags obtained using Visual Look Up, which only appear when using the mdfind command. SpotTest takes these into account.

[…]

A perfect 13/15 result from NSMetadataQuery is only possible after waiting a day or more for background mediaanalysisd processing to recognise and extract the text in file I, a PNG image.

Howard Oakley:

As promised, this new version of my Spotlight indexing and search utility SpotTest extends its reach beyond the user’s Home folder, and can now test and search any regular volume that’s connected to your Mac and mounted in /Volumes.

Previously:

Sizes of Adobe Reader Installers Through the Years

Alexander Gromnitsky (via Hacker News):

At the time of writing, the most recent Adobe Reader 25.x.y.z 64-bit installer for Windows 11 weights 687,230,424 bytes. After installation, the program includes ‘AI’ (of course), an auto-updater, sprinkled ads for Acrobat online services everywhere, and 2 GUIs: ’new’ and ‘old’.

It looks like a steady, pretty linear increase until you realize that the graph use a log scale…

Previously:

Update (2025-09-02): Nick Heer:

The installed size of the latest version of Acrobat is, on my Mac, 2.18 GB — or, to spell it out as Gromnitsky did, 2,176,053,007 bytes. Of course, over 435 MB of that is because it includes a copy of the Chromium web browser engine. I primarily use this application to view, edit, and add form fields to text-based documents, and to dismiss ads for A.I. features and Adobe services. Gromnitsky is describing only Reader, which is far more limited than Acrobat, even more so than Apple’s own Preview software; you cannot even split a PDF into multiple files with Reader.

PaperVault 2.0

Miguel Arroz (Mastodon):

PaperVault stores information as sequences of QR Codes you can print and scan easily, protected by a password only you know. Data is secured using industry-standard robust encryption algorithms.

[…]

Vendor lock-in is a bad thing. Your data is yours and I don’t want to hold it hostage. Therefore, I’m publishing the data format used when printing to QR Codes. View the data format technical documentation ≫

Neat idea, seems to be easy to use and thoughtfully implemented, and it’s free. Scanning—and verification—can be done using an iPhone controlled from the Mac via Continuity. Larger documents get split into multiple QR codes, printed in a grid, but I was surprised how much one QR Code can store.

Vintage Macintosh Programming Book Library

VintageApple:

Nick R. was generous enough to send me his entire vintage Mac programming library to be destructively scanned and shared with the community. We’ve added a few of our own for a pretty huge collection (over 150) of vintage Mac programming related books.

Via Rui Carmo:

[This] is a great resource for people interested in vintage Mac programming, including the original Think Pascal and Think C books I used when I was hacking away at 68k Mac apps.

The books are mostly from the 1980s and 1990s, so it doesn’t have the Rhapsody Developer’s Guide or the early books on Carbon, Cocoa, and the other technologies from NeXT.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-02): John Gruber:

These evoke nostalgia both for the classic Mac era and for the entire notion of “programming books”.

Dave Mark’s 1989 Learn C on the Macintosh was, I think, the first book I read about Mac programming.

Ken Kocienda:

A nostalgic list of books for me. I was first learning to write programs in the middle of this era, a time before programming documentation or open source code was available online. Books were it. Printed material was my only way to learn, and it wasn’t easy. In the early 1990s, I wanted to be a programmer, but I wasn’t, and I struggled with that hard truth. That was a long time ago, but I remember, and I kept a few of my old books because I couldn’t bear parting with them.

Update (2025-09-04): Chris Hanson:

In addition to scans of Mac programming books, VintageApple.org has a complete archive of Apple’s develop magazine, which is exemplar of how a platform vendor should communicate with developers.

Between being run by Caroline Rose and Louella Pizzuti and featuring articles about system technologies written by the system software engineers and developer technical support engineers directly responsible for them, it really was an incredible publication.

Chris Hanson:

The original Dylan book was actually converted to HTML back in the very early days of the web. Rainer Joswig has an archive of it as well as an archive of the Dylan Design Notes that clarify, amend, and clean up the language (at least before its syntax was ruined to make it palatable to developers who would never use it anyway).

Previously:

Thursday, August 28, 2025

Xcode 26 Beta 7

Apple (downloads, releases, MacRumors, Hacker News):

Claude in Xcode is now available in the Intelligence settings panel, allowing users to seamlessly add their existing paid Claude account to Xcode and start using Claude Sonnet 4.

When using ChatGPT in Xcode, users can now start a new conversation with either GPT-4.1 or GPT-5, with GPT-5 set as the default.

ChatGPT in Xcode provides two model choices. “GPT-5” is optimized for quick, high-quality results, and should work well for most coding tasks. For difficult tasks, choose “GPT-5 (Reasoning)”, which spends more time thinking before responding, and can provide more accurate results for complex coding tasks.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-02): Steven Woolgar:

I don’t often have the use the Settings window in Xcode, but when I do I cry because of how it is now just as awful as the system settings app.

Marcin Krzyzanowski:

Xcode beta 7 has signed in to Claud with the claude account, that is not API key. is this the exclusive gateway for Apple? I don’t see api for that.

Marcin Krzyzanowski:

Xcode 26 release is imminent. in the meantime, it fails to compile Metal

wizard (via Fatbobman):

The animations and design of Xcode have never been better, a testament to Apple’s polish. Yet, interacting with the new intelligence features felt… different. This wasn’t just a tool; it felt like a ghostly Apple spirit nudging every decision.

[…]

Xcode 26’s intelligence features are powered by a structured planner-executor agent designed for deep integration within the Apple development ecosystem. Analysis of its internal prompts and service reflections reveals a system that prioritizes deterministic behavior, adherence to Apple’s technology stack, and carefully managed context.

Rudrank Riyam:

Xcode AI uses 2 planner prompts with one for GPT 5. I cannot invoke search_additional_documentation in GPT 5 but it is so easy in Sonnet 4 🤔

Rudrank Riyam:

There are so many prompts to go through. It gives a good idea on how Xcode AI works

Rudrank Riyam:

Xcode still goes 100% CPU and crashes when the context window goes like 30-40K+ tokens in beta 7.

I mentioned this on 9th June when it crashed my MacBook twice just for pasting a 30K token file.

Joachim Kurz:

Today’s quality of development for Apple platforms report:

Since Xcode 15 (?) colors and images in assets catalogs are generated as extensions on (UI/NS)Color, (UI/NS)Color and friends, so you don‘t have to load them by string name and fail at runtime but het a compiler error instead. Great!

But:

  • the advertised build setting for enabling disabling the setting doesn‘t do anything. Instead you have to explicitly turn ok the extension generation in the asset catalogs file inspector (not the individual asset’s attributes inspector)
  • this way also works in Swift packages and since some time Swift packages can contain resources and SwiftPM has an asset catalog compiler. Nice!
  • But the generated extensions are all internal and there is no way to make them public. So they get generated and all, but you can‘t use them from outside the package and instead have to explicitly add the extension as a public property manually again. 🤦🏻‍♂️

The Steve Ballmer Interview

Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal:

We sit down with Steve Ballmer, the legendary former Microsoft CEO and owner of the LA Clippers, for an epic conversation covering his 34 years at Microsoft. Steve listened to our Microsoft episodes and had some thoughts to share — and boy, did he deliver. Steve takes us point-by-point through the original IBM DOS deal that started everything, how he built Microsoft’s enterprise business from scratch, and offers his candid reflections on missing mobile and search. We also cover the story behind “developers, developers, developers”, the complexities of his relationship with Bill Gates (including a year where they didn’t speak), and why he ultimately decided to step down as CEO.

I found this really interesting. He has a few comments about Apple:

You might create something that goes nowhere. You might create what’s essentially a feature for somebody else’s business and get acquired. You might. I call that zero tricks. Then you get a one-trick pony. One-trick ponies are amazing. People should be in awe of one-trick ponies.

[…]

Apple’s two-tricks. […] Mac and mobile, if you want to say it’s high power consumption and low power consumption.

I consider [services] just part of the trick. […] It’s like us adding things to Office and redoing the EA. […] It’s an additional monetization model, but it’s not a new locomotive. A locomotive is the business that can pull the cabooses, and the locomotive remains the phone. The services business go away pretty quick if the phone volume fell apart. It’s additional, very important… […] I think Mac versus everything iOS is also uncorrelated.

Dan Luu:

There’s a common narrative that Microsoft was moribund under Steve Ballmer and then later saved by the miraculous leadership of Satya Nadella. This is the dominant narrative in every online discussion about the topic I’ve seen and it’s a commonly expressed belief “in real life” as well. While I don’t have anything negative to say about Nadella’s leadership in this post, this narrative underrates Ballmer’s role in Microsoft’s success. Not only did Microsoft’s financials, revenue and profit, look great under Ballmer, Microsoft under Ballmer made deep, long-term bets that set up Microsoft for success in the decades after his reign. At the time, the bets were widely panned, indicating that they weren’t necessarily obvious, but we can see in retrospect that the company made very strong bets despite the criticism at the time.

In addition to overseeing deep investments in areas that people would later credit Nadella for, Ballmer set Nadella up for success by clearing out political barriers for any successor. Much like Gary Bernhardt’s talk, which was panned because he made the problem statement and solution so obvious that people didn’t realize they’d learned something non-trivial, Ballmer set up Microsoft for future success so effectively that it’s easy to criticize him for being a bum because his successor is so successful.

Brad Silverberg:

Today is the 30th anniversary of the release of Windows 95.

Previously:

Update (2025-09-02): See also: Hacker News.

SwiftUI WebView

Sarah Reichelt:

In the WWDC video, they demonstrated how to track the navigation events. The code in the video does not work - it doesn’t even compile. But after some trial and error, I worked out how to track these events.

[…]

If you want your WebView to load custom pages, create a custom scheme. In my Man Reader app, I use a custom scheme to load HTML versions of man pages, so I decided to try something similar here.

[…]

In macOS Tahoe 26 beta 7 and Xcode 26 beta 6, this external navigation prints what appears to be a crash log in the console, but the app does not crash.

[…]

I have included the replaceDisabled(true) modifier but it doesn’t work in a WebView. The modifier doesn’t stop the replace interface from appearing, but replacing doesn’t actually work[…]

[…]

At first, I assumed that page.load() required a URL or a URLRequest, but then I realized that I could also ask it to load a WebPage.BackForwardList.Item directly. […] I had a problem with the back and forward menus which made me think that the history was not updating correctly. After temporarily re-purposing the refresh button to list the history items, I worked out that history list was correct but the menus were not being updated when the list changed.

Previously:

What Xcode 26’s AI Chat Integration Is Missing

Cihat Gündüz:

I ended up running Claude Code in Cursor’s terminal instead – getting Cursor’s editor awareness with Claude Code’s superior tools like web search, planning mode, and the generous 5-hour usage window.

[…]

Request queuing was the first limitation I noticed in Xcode right away. When I’m developing, thoughts and questions come fast. Having to wait for each response breaks my rhythm completely.

[…]

Without automatic context loading, all the work I’ve done on context engineering – teaching the AI my coding standards, architectural patterns, error handling approaches, and more – simply isn’t possible in Xcode. I have to repeatedly explain my guidelines in every conversation.

[…]

The AI can’t validate its own code changes by running builds or even access build output when I run them. It can’t even read console logs when I explicitly ask it to.

[…]

Claude Code can search my git history, bring back working code from previous commits, and create properly formatted commits by analyzing the actual changes and finding a good message that follows my commit guidelines. It can even help update documentation by comparing what changed since the last version.

Running on the server, Xcode’s AI can’t search the local documentation files, and it doesn’t know about the online Swift evolution proposals, either.

Previously:

Wednesday, August 27, 2025

Archaeology 1.4

Mothers Ruin Software (Mastodon):

Enhanced the decoding of Saved Application State to extract a couple of categories of data that were previously being ignored:

  • For a sandboxed, document-based app, the security-scoped bookmarks that are associated with an NSDocument will now be shown, usually as an additional archive labeled _NSDocument [Security-Scoped Bookmarks]. This is an array of bookmark data blobs, and is where AppKit squirrels away the security-scoped URL for a document, such that the app can re-open it upon restoration.
  • For an NSResponder that opts into the +restorableStateKeyPaths mechanism, the associated data will now be shown as an archive with the suffix [Keyed State Data]. This is a dictionary of saved values, by key path.

[…]

When showing Mach-O information (after opening a bundle or a bare executable), if the executable is part of a Universal binary, Archaeology now shows the offset and size of the architecture slice within that binary (since we can never remember the right otool(1) incantation for this). Archaeology also now shows the linker-assigned UUID for each Mach-O architecture (which is even more arcane to extract).

Previously:

Apparency 2.3

Mothers Ruin Software (Mastodon):

Changed the info pane to show Quarantine rather than Downloaded. Modern macOS likes to quarantine files that are opened by a sandboxed app, seemingly resulting in more non-download quarantines than actual downloads. You can still click on the quarantine date here to see what app triggered it and how — for example, “Downloaded by Safari” (for a true download) or “Opened by Hex Editor” (for a sandboxed app). If the quarantine has already triggered a Gatekeeper prompt (and you proceeded with opening the item anyway, in whatever tortured way macOS now requires), the quarantine text is grayed out.

[…]

Added the linker-assigned UUID to the Executable Information inspector.

This is what Local Network Privacy uses.

The appy command line tool has a new ‑‑show-components (-c) option, to show the details of an app’s components right in Terminal, without launching the Apparency app. This gives information such as bundle identifiers, versions, signing identities, and various flags (Gatekeeper, notarization, etc), all in a single plain text table. You can customize which columns are included using the ‑‑add-column (-C) option.

Previously:

iOS Simulator Files.app Broken by Symlink

Jeff Johnson:

I found that the Apple Files app was broken in the simulator, which prevented me from setting up my app properly for my screenshots. I couldn’t share a file on my Mac with the simulator. I couldn’t save a file on the simulator, for example from my own app or from the Apple Photos app, in the Files app. I couldn’t even create a new folder in the Files app.

[…]

The cause was that I had created a symbolic link from ~/Library/Developer/CoreSimulator to /Users/Shared/Developer/CoreSimulator on my Mac. Apparently the Simulator app did not like that now, even though it worked before: my symlink is not new. Perhaps the Xcode 16.4 update broke it. The solution was to delete the symlink and go back to keeping the CoreSimulator directory inside the ~/Library/Developer directory.

JavaScript Runtimes of the Last Decade

Whatever, Jamie (via Hacker News):

This last decade has seen an inundation of new JavaScript runtimes (and engines in equal measure), enabling us to run JavaScript in all manner of contexts with precise fitness for task. Through these, we’ve seen the language spread to the Cloud, the edge, Smart TVs, mobile devices, and even microcontrollers.

In this article, we’ll explore what’s driving this diversity, and why no one runtime or engine suffices for all purposes.

[…]

The earliest polyglot engine was Rhino, which was made in 1997 as an effort to write Netscape Navigator – JavaScript engine and all – fully in Java. Rhino supports two-way interop between Java and JavaScript, based on the JVM. That is to say, it allows JavaScript to implement Java interfaces and call Java class methods, while allowing Java to define JavaScript classes, run scripts, and more. By 2006, it was included in JDK 6, and by 2008, it was the basis of the Helma runtime, nowadays known as RingoJS.

[…]

While Deno and CloudFlare Workers (which run on the workerd runtime) continue Node.js’s tradition of using V8, we see Bun employing JavaScriptCore, WinterJS using SpiderMonkey, and LLRT on QuickJS. No longer is the backend solely a stage for Node.js and V8 – it’s now fashionable to pick a runtime and engine optimised for the task.

Tuesday, August 26, 2025

The “trash” Command

Benjamin Esham:

Every iOS and Mac developer is familiar with the situation: Xcode has gotten itself wedged somehow and the only solution is to blow away the DerivedData folder in ~/Library/Developer/Xcode.

[…]

But rm needs to enumerate every file and directory within DerivedData in order to delete them. The more files there are, the longer this will take.

It’s faster to move the DerivedData folder to the Trash. You could do this from the Finder, but I prefer to install Ali Rantakari’s trash utility.

macOS 14 added a built-in /usr/bin/trash command.

Peter N Lewis:

The good: they added a unix trash command to macOS. Nice! The bad: The Finder completely wigs out when you use it - disappears a different folder from the parent folder, leaving the trashed folder showing. The Finder display is borked, if you close and reopen the window the window is correct and the command worked as expected.

Previously:

FileUtils 1.5

ZigZag:

Added script actions to execute your own custom scripts (with selected files as input arguments and optional textual output). FileUtils can execute UNIX scripts/binaries, AppleScript scripts and Automator workflows.

I’ve been using FastScripts for running scripts on the Finder selection, because I already use it for running scripts in other apps. However, one benefit of using FileUtils for this is that your script can be simpler—the selection is passed in automatically—and the same script can also be executed directly from Terminal.

There is an unfortunate limitation:

FileUtils (or any other Finder Sync extension, for what it matters) related menu commands in Finder’s contextual and toolbar item menus cannot be shown for folders, which are locations for some syncing services. These include iCloud Drive, as well as some major cloud services providers, like Dropbox, Microsoft OneDrive, Google Drive, Synology Drive and there may be others I’m not aware of. And if you decided to sync your ~/Desktop and ~/Documents folders in iCloud, this apples to them as well. The reason for this limitation is all those (Dropbox, Microsoft OneDrive and Google Drive in the recent versions of their desktop applications) use Apple’s technology/API called File Provider Extension and this technology collides with the older Finder Sync technology/API if applied to a same folder and the newer technology takes the precedence. The new technology doesn’t offer what it takes to implement FileUtils’ current feature set, but even if it had, that wouldn’t solve the problem (essentially only one File Provider Extension can operate on a particular folder).

[…]

Fortunately, you can still use FileUtils provided Finder Services with those syncing folders and execute FileUtils operations on them that way.

But the static system services don’t work with a dynamic list of user-provided scripts.

Previously:

SwiftData’s ModelActor Is Just Weird

Matt Massicotte (Mastodon):

So, no doubt there’s lots of historical stuff going on here.

But, that still doesn’t explain how much trouble people have with ModelActor. I’m not sure anyone has ever used ModelActor without at least some surprises.

[…]

Actors exist to protect mutable state. The purpose of a ModelActor is to own and isolate the ModelContext. It does that! But if we start to dig into how exactly it does it, we will discover something very bizarre.

[…]

Somehow, we are on our custom, minimal, SwiftData-defined actor and also the MainActor at the same time.

[…]

It is bad because consumers of this API have a very reasonable expectation that this will execute off the main thread. This type doesn’t do that. But worse, its relationship with the main thread isn’t visible in the type system. These things are not marked MainActor, so the compiler doesn’t know what’s going on. This means even though you are on the main thread here, you cannot access MainActor stuff.

Matt Massicotte:

Anyone know if SwiftData’s ModelActor still has weird concurrency behavior in OS 26?

[…]

Based on some limited testing, no, not fixed. ModelActor types can still ultimately execute on the main thread, depending on calling context.

Rick van Voorden:

AFAIK the legit workaround will continue to be to ensure the ModelActor is created off main. Which leads to workarounds like what we do in ImmutableData sample products when we “box” the ModelActor with a lazy property in another actor that is created on main.

Matt Massicotte:

Someone proved that init off main is insufficient. I have a theory on what’s happening, and I think this workaround you suggest will always work. But yeah I’m hoping this all just goes away.

Previously:

How PlugInKit Enables App Extensions

Howard Oakley:

App extensions or appexes perform a wide range of tasks, from providing support for file systems like ExFAT to generating thumbnails for QuickLook and enabling Spotlight to index the contents of files. Although they’re relatively old, macOS made major changes in their management in Ventura, and they’ve become popular in many third-party apps. Despite that, there’s remarkably little information about how appexes are managed. As a result, when they play up it’s not clear what you should do. This article tries to disperse that cloud of unknowing.

[…]

Although old versions are registered during discovery, PlugInKit normally only offers the most recent version and, if there are multiple copies of that, the last registered by its timestamp in the registry. It’s also more conservative about which appexes it recognises: while LaunchServices will happily add apps that aren’t stored in an Applications folder and have never been opened on that Mac, PlugInKit appears more cautious in those it registers.

[…]

Damage to or dysfunction of the LaunchServices database can therefore block or impair PlugInKit registration, in turn preventing correct function of the appex.

Resetting the LaunchServices database will inevitably delay PlugInKit’s discovery, and could lead to malfunction of appexes, such as failure to generate QuickLook thumbnails.

Howard Oakley:

With well over 400 app extensions and plugins managed by PlugInKit in Sequoia 15.4.1, this article tries to give an overview of their management and control, as well as the diversity of their functions.

Previously:

Monday, August 25, 2025

macOS Tahoe 26 Developer Beta 8

Juli Clover:

Apple today provided developers with the eighth beta of macOS Tahoe 26 for testing purposes, with the update coming a week after the seventh beta.

The release notes don’t call out any changes since beta 5.

Previously:

Update (2025-08-26): Mario Guzmán:

How is this good design? It is so busy. Way too much clashing. Blobs of low contrast. JFC… why?!

They were so concerned with if they could pull off liquid glass that they didn’t stop to think if they should or shouldn’t DO liquid glass globally.

😵‍💫

I hate using my Mac now.

Steve Troughton-Smith:

The new macOS Tahoe seed has new ‘order front’ and ‘order out’ animations for windows, including some physics springs and a little bit of bounce. It’s not as dramatic as on mobile, but it’s a lot more like iOS than before. I hope they go further, though.

I’m also hearing that the MEDecodedMessageBanner API for Mail extensions is broken,

Update (2025-09-02): Tuomas Hämäläinen:

Apple love to preach “the UI gets out of the way of your content” with each new redesign, but how true is that in practice? Let’s compare the total height of the Safari UI with a toolbar, favourites bar and tab bar visible, across the three latest Mac OS design languages – Yosemite, Big Sur and now Tahoe. I’ve added a red line for emphasis.

It sure looks to me like the UI is eating more into my content with each redesign.

Craig Grannell:

Just installed dev 8 on Mac. If the suggestions are true and this is the final design, it’s still shit. The window corners are ludicrous. The massive drop shadows make window buttons in eg Finder the most visually prominent thing in view. All these elements (incl the sidebar) sit ABOVE your content, rather than being deferential to it, thereby becoming a visual distraction.

Oddly, Reduce Transparency now knocks out most of the shadows. The result isn’t pretty or coherent but it’s more usable.

Craig Grannell:

I just don’t get this design. At all. The eye is distracted by the drop shadows, which lift the sidebar and buttons ‘above’ the content (ie the icons) and the title of the window. From a visual hierarchy standpoint, it makes no sense.

The menu bar also just feels weird without a background.

Mario Guzmán:

I saw @stroughtonsmith mention that Beta 8 typically is the last beta before the RCs… okay but wait, Beta 7 completely broke my toolbar. The toolbar where my code hasn’t changed since like -- 2018… And worked in Tahoe Betas 1-6 just fine. lol broken in Betas 7-8.

[…]

And I am not blaming engineering. I am blaming this full-height sidebar design and Liquid Glass that creates all these crazy edge cases in apps.

No one ever asked for full-height sidebars where we have to the split toolbars into sections and create movement along with the width of said split view panels… no one asked for invisible toolbars either… so many little issues that need to be addressed because the design is fundamentally complex and broken.

Norbert Heger:

Is there a single person at Apple who thinks: “Hey, this looks cool, let’s keep it that way”?

Mario Guzmán:

Okay, someone pointed out to me the #macOSTahoe controls window I posted yesterday was Beta 1.

I went ahead and recreated it myself with additional controls using Beta 8.

I will point out a few things I DO LOVE…

1. The text field actually looks nicer. Sequoia and older had sharp corners & the bottom edge was darker.

2. The Search field FINALLY has rounded ends again! Like in Mac OS X Tiger! Little visual cues like this go a long way!

Mario Guzmán:

What have they done to my boi in macOS Tahoe!?

Mario Guzmán:

I just realized that Mac always had centered window titles since the original Macintosh and Alan Dye just came in and changed all of that out of nowhere.

BasicAppleGuy:

Look how they massacred my boy…

BasicAppleGuy:

No more creative edges; macOS Tahoe forces all icons to stay trapped within the squircle.

Mario Guzmán:

The state of Mail in macOS Tahoe.

Mario Guzmán:

A while back, I reported feedback for FaceTime on macOS because the Settings window was so long and not resizable, some controls would be behind the Dock and were inaccessible.

I finally got a reply that it should be addressed now in #macOSTahoe… This was their solution.

Did Apple forget their own HIG for macOS app layouts? You might be saying, “but it is Catalyst.” So. And? They make this technology, it should be perfect.

Mario Guzmán:

This makes me so sad; this is why you need a proper HIG.

Checkbox labels should succinct (short, to the point). If you need a description, it goes as a secondary label under it and aligned with the checkbox’s title.

What you DO NOT DO is put the checkbox title to the left of the checkbox and the whole ass description to the right.

Trying to figure out how they got some right and some just super wrong in the FaceTime app Settings window… The left side is for section titles only.

Zsolt Benke:

The dynamic background adaptation is broken. Buttons shift from black to white as the background changes, and it’s jarring every single time. Toolbar consistency is all over the place too. Photos and Mail use progressive blur with gradients while Safari keeps the old blurred rectangle, with no apparent logic to which apps get which treatment. Scrolling through Photos is particularly painful as the interface flips from black to white and back again as you move through your library. This isn’t a minor polish issue. It’s a fundamental problem with how the adaptive system responds to content, and Apple should fix it.

When the general public gets their hands on Liquid Glass, I’m sure people will complaint. The current state is too buggy to survive contact with millions of users. I expect iterative improvements throughout the OS 26 cycle as the design gets tweaked based on user feedback.

Marcin Krzyzanowski:

the new icon for http://notepadexe.com embodies the macOS26 shape. it had to happen. but I'm not parting with the original icon. now it's available as an alternative dock icon 🖼️ - maybe add more in the future.

Matthias Gansrigler-Hrad:

I don’t know, but I feel like this grey artwork on the zip file icon makes it look like the file is not available yet, like when copying or something.

Matthias Gansrigler-Hrad:

It’s weird you have to hold down option (⌥) to edit widgets in Notification Center, but command (⌘) in Control Center to edit control widgets on macOS 26 “Tahoe”.

Previously:

iOS 26 Developer Beta 8

Juli Clover:

Apple today provided developers with the eighth betas of iOS 26 and iPadOS 26 for testing purposes, with the updates coming a week after Apple seeded the seventh betas.

The release notes don’t call out any changes since beta 5.

Steve Troughton-Smith:

Historically, since iOS 13, beta 8 has been the last beta of the summer cycle before the release candidate builds. That suggests that today’s seed is as good as it gets before release — this is it, folks, this is iOS 26.

Previously:

Update (2025-08-26): Steve Troughton-Smith:

From a user standpoint, iOS 26 is fiiine. As a developer, though, this thing is shipping pretty broken. I feel like Apple has done the bare minimum to ensure that their own apps can get out the door and support their marketing, and tread water with the long tail of apps from the App Store that barely go beyond simple layouts and controls, but there are major framework crashers and SpringBoard killers lurking in the weeds. You can bring SpringBoard down with just the Music app, for example.

John Brayton:

Sometimes when opening a Safari View Controller on iPadOS 26, its toolbar covers the status bar.

Update (2025-09-02): Marco Arment:

Beta 8 somehow broke .navigationTransition even more 🤣

Looking forward to when I can actually use all of what they showed off about Liquid Glass.

Mario Guzmán:

I feel like even the nav bar buttons in CarPlay command way too much attention. They look out of place.

At least in the current beta, taking a screenshot on your iPhone won’t include CarPlay’s screenshot anymore — hence a picture.

Mario Guzmán:

What’s the point of having accent colors to highlight selections? They’ll just get washed out anyway by media heavy apps like Music because all of the content shining through the UI competes with the accent color.

Mario Guzmán:

You don’t need to read anything. All good. Humans are resilient. They’ll figure it out.

It’s okay to have smudged text behind labels. It’s okay to not see pagination labeling or glyphs for buttons. You’ll see it eventually.

Adrian Schönig:

Upgraded to iOS 26 beta 8 this morning. App Library search didn’t work. App banners in Safari glitch into the tab bar. In the window behind, the background in Mail app’s sidebar keeps flickering.

Ryan Jones:

Home is the iOS 26 app icon champion. So clean.

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