John Cox

Blogs · @wyome

Tagged macos · everything

www.makeuseof.com

Your Mac has a powerful automation tool most people never open

macOS's built-in Shortcuts app offers a no-code way to automate tasks through a drag-and-drop interface that rivals Windows automation tools, making it accessible to users without programming experience. The app works by letting you stack pre-built actions together and then trigger them based on conditions like time of day or device connections, with support for third-party apps expanding what you can control beyond just system settings. The author demonstrates practical examples like auto-detecting keyboard connectivity to switch display layouts and launching focus modes when opening work apps, while noting the community at r/shortcuts showcases even more advanced automation possibilities.

Permalink productivityaiapplemac

GitHub

omlahore/RemoveMacAI: Debloat macOS: turn off Apple Intelligence, analytics, ads and pop-ups. A native app and CLI, and every change can be undone.

RemoveMacAI is a tool that lets users selectively disable Apple Intelligence features, analytics, ads, and various system annoyances on macOS while preserving changes that can be undone. It offers both a graphical app and command-line interface with preset configurations (Recommended and Maximum Privacy) that show users exactly what will change before applying modifications. The tool also recovers disk space by removing AI models, old installers, and cached files, and can export configuration profiles for enterprise deployment via MDM systems.

Permalink aiprivacyautomationtools

secretive.dev

Secretive

Secretive is a macOS application that stores SSH keys in the device's Secure Enclave, making them impossible to export and thus protected from malware that might steal key files stored on disk. Version 3 adds support for post-quantum cryptographic keys, improves security through out-of-process request handling and application hardening, and redesigns the interface with new management features for better usability.

Permalink securitytoolsmacosopensource

Current

Current - A River of Reading

Current is a premium RSS reader ($9.99 one-time purchase) for Apple devices that organizes feeds by content velocity—breaking news expires within hours while essays remain for weeks—so your reading stream stays fresh without manual curation. It groups feeds into customizable "Currents" for different topics, highlights individual writers as distinct voices rather than faceless sources, and offers nine carefully designed reading themes alongside features like keyboard navigation, offline saving, and sync with multiple backend services. The app prioritizes a serene reading experience with no subscriptions, ads, or tracking.

Permalink productivitydesigniosmacos

GitHub

Releases · glouel/AerialCompanion

Aerial 4, a macOS screensaver, has been released with support for macOS Tahoe and fixes for numerous long-standing bugs. The update is available through the project's official website and GitHub repository, with additional details about the changes available on the developer's blog.

Permalink softwaremacosopensource

App Store

Unread: An RSS Reader App - App Store

Unread is a fast, typography-focused RSS reader app for iPhone, iPad, and Mac that syncs across devices and integrates with multiple feed services like Feedly, Inoreader, and Miniflux. Version 5.0 adds improved image handling for article thumbnails that intelligently crop around faces and salient details, expands syncing support to FreshRSS and Miniflux via their native APIs, and includes a bulk "mark old articles read" feature to manage feed backlogs. The app is free with optional $29.99/year subscription for advanced features like saving to read-later services, caching for offline access, and custom shortcuts.

Permalink productivitysoftwaremacos

www.zdnet.com

5 MacOS command line tools I swear by over their GUI counterparts

Rounds up five free command-line tools worth installing on MacOS via Homebrew, aimed at users who assume the terminal is unnecessary on a GUI-driven OS: pandoc for file format conversion, taskwarrior for a lightweight to-do list, Ollama for running local AI models privately, ag (the silver searcher) for fast multi-file text search, and yt-dlp for downloading YouTube video or audio. Each entry includes the actual install and usage commands, making it a quick reference for practical CLI utilities rather than a general appeal for terminal adoption.

Permalink productivitysoftwaremacos

Furbo.org by Craig Hockenberry

discoveryd Clusterfuck • furbo.org

This post chronicles the author's frustration with discoveryd, a network service Apple introduced in OS X Yosemite that caused widespread connectivity problems, CPU overload, and forced frequent reboots across multiple devices. Despite reporting extensive bugs during beta testing, Apple released the flawed software anyway and provided no official troubleshooting guidance, leaving users to discover workarounds like rebooting Apple TVs or manually killing processes. The irony, the author argues, is that these network stability issues disproportionately affect Apple's most loyal customers with multiple devices, forcing them to buy new hardware to work around defective software.

Permalink applenetworkingmacososx

cord.sourceforge.net

CoRD: Remote Desktop for Mac OS X

CoRD was a free, open-source remote desktop application that allowed Mac users to connect to Windows computers via the RDP protocol, offering features like multi-window session management, full-screen mode, clipboard synchronization, and saved server profiles for quick access. The project was discontinued in 2020 with a recommendation that users switch to Microsoft's official clients or the cross-platform FreeRDP alternative.

Permalink remote worktoolswindowsmacos

macgapproject.github.io

MacGap

MacGap is a framework that lets web developers build native macOS applications using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript instead of Swift or Objective-C, running code within OS X's WebView engine. It provides a lightweight JavaScript API for OS X integration features like native notifications and file system access, while remaining under 1MB in size and fully compatible with Mac App Store submission requirements. The project includes an Xcode template and documentation to help developers get started converting web projects into standalone Mac applications.

Permalink developmentmacosopensourceframework

Telerik Blogs

JavaScript for OS X Automation by Example -Telerik Developer Network

Apple's OS X Yosemite operating system includes JavaScript as an automation tool for OS X, a feature that received little attention from tech journalists but proved significant enough for developer tools company Telerik to highlight through practical examples. The post demonstrates how developers can leverage JavaScript for system-level automation tasks on Mac computers, expanding the scripting capabilities beyond traditional AppleScript approaches.

Permalink developmentautomationtutorialmacos

tylergaw.com

Building OS X Apps with JavaScript by Tyler Gaw

OS X Yosemite's JavaScript for Automation feature allows developers to write native Mac applications using JavaScript instead of AppleScript, with full access to Objective-C frameworks through a bridge that lets you import and use classes like Cocoa for building GUIs. The post provides a detailed walkthrough of building a complete example app that lets users select and display images, explaining the syntax conversions needed to use Objective-C methods in JavaScript, how to create UI elements, handle button clicks through subclassing, and work with file dialogs. The author argues this is significant because it removes barriers to Mac app development by letting anyone with JavaScript knowledge build native applications without additional tools or installations.

Permalink developmentautomationtutorialmacos

Google Online Security Blog

Google Online Security Blog: Cleaning up after password dumps

I don't see an article here to summarize. Your message appears to be a question or complaint about Google's app password instructions for Mac and iOS devices, describing confusion around whether the same app password works across multiple Macs and whether separate passwords are needed for different Google services. If you've saved an article about this topic, please share the text or link and I'll be happy to summarize it.

Permalink securityadvicemacos

hiltmon.com

SonicWall NetExtender for OS X Mavericks - The Hiltmon

This post explains how to obtain an updated version of SonicWall's NetExtender VPN client for Mac when your company's outdated VPN device doesn't provide a compatible version for newer operating systems. The author describes downloading version 7.0.752 from SonicWall's public demo site instead of the company's internal portal, then switching the connection settings back to your actual company network after installation. Additional updates note that OS X 10.9+ users should use the Sonicwall Mobile Connect app from the Mac App Store, and that companies can access latest versions through MySonicwall.com registration.

Permalink remote worktutorialmacosvpn

Macworld

How the NSA snoop-proofs its Macs | Macworld

This article updates the NSA's 2010 Mac security recommendations for OS X Mountain Lion, translating agency guidance into practical steps for average users while candidly noting which measures would severely degrade usability. The author covers account security, automatic updates, firewall configuration, encryption via FileVault, and various system-level hardening techniques, assessing the real-world cost of each precaution so readers can decide which trade-offs between security and convenience suit their needs.

Permalink privacysecuritymacos

BrettTerpstra.com

Cheaters - BrettTerpstra.com

Cheaters is a customizable system for creating and displaying quick-reference cheat sheets in a floating OS X window, built around HTML files that can be written in Markdown or HTML and served locally. It integrates with Automator or the Fluid app to create a menu-bar accessible reference tool that supports deep linking, fast navigation with keyboard shortcuts (including vim-like navigation), and the ability to search external sources like Stack Overflow directly from within the interface. The sheets are styled automatically and support custom CSS, metadata configuration, images, and PDFs, making it easy to build a personal knowledge base without much technical overhead.

Permalink productivitytoolsmacosopensource

OS X Daily

21 Useful iTunes 11 Keyboard Shortcuts

This guide compiles keyboard shortcuts for iTunes 11, organized into three categories: general playback and navigation controls (like spacebar to play/pause and arrow keys to skip tracks), feature access shortcuts (for the MiniPlayer, Equalizer, and Up Next queue), and library navigation shortcuts (Command+1 through Command+7 to jump between Music, Movies, TV Shows, Podcasts, iTunes U, Books, and Apps). The shortcuts won't function for library categories you don't have content in, and the post invites readers to share any additional useful shortcuts they've discovered.

Permalink productivitytipsmacos

OS X Daily

9 Command Line Tricks for Mac OS X You Should Know

This article offers practical command-line tricks for Mac users of varying skill levels, covering utilities like `caffeinate` to prevent sleep, `pkgutil` to extract package contents without installing, and `purge` to free up memory. It also explains how to launch multiple app instances, update OS X from the terminal, search your download history through Quarantine Services, hide files from Finder, and create password-protected zip files, along with the handy tip that dragging files into Terminal automatically inserts their full paths.

Permalink productivitytipsmactutorial