With the Mac and MacOS being bigger than ever, isn't it a bit weird that quirky
utility applications seem far more sparse?

In The Good Old Days there were lots of such applications, like Konfabulator that
was "ripped off" by Apple themselves and called Dashboard. it was removed a few
versions ago and there is nothing similar to it these days. Sure, widgets as a
concept lives on in OSX, but that's from apps, Konfabulator/Dashboard was
javascript/html widgets that just about anyone could develop.

DragThing was another app I used to death. It was a launcher where you could
create palettes of different uses, for apps, servers, bookmarks or whatever. Very
useful. It started it days pre-OSX but even with the Dock I found it really handy.

Quicksilver is still around but spotlight does most of what it did, at least what
I used it for.

So why aren't apps like these developed any longer? Or am I missing their
alternatives?

--
Sandman

On Tuesday, March 1, 2022 at 3:45:51 AM UTC-5, Sandman wrote:
> With the Mac and MacOS being bigger than ever, isn't it a bit weird that quirky
> utility applications seem far more sparse?
>
> In The Good Old Days there were lots of such applications, like Konfabulator that
> was "ripped off" by Apple themselves and called Dashboard. it was removed a few
> versions ago and there is nothing similar to it these days. Sure, widgets as a
> concept lives on in OSX, but that's from apps, Konfabulator/Dashboard was
> javascript/html widgets that just about anyone could develop.
>
> DragThing was another app I used to death. It was a launcher where you could
> create palettes of different uses, for apps, servers, bookmarks or whatever. Very
> useful. It started it days pre-OSX but even with the Dock I found it really handy.
>
> Quicksilver is still around but spotlight does most of what it did, at least what
> I used it for.

I see some stuff written up in reviews in the one Mac-centric magazine that I
still get (MacLife .. used to be MacAddict); might be worth a browse to see
what they have.

What I've generally found is that I mostly only go looking for something when
I run into a specific problem.

For example, Apple has dropped support in MacOS for keyboard-controlled
brightness for external monitors. This might not be a big deal if you're using
a 3rd party display, but it screws their customers who bought an Apple OEM
Thunderbolt or LED Cinema Displays, as they lack manual adjustment controls.

Apparently, Apple's rationale is that a $1K display isn't worthy of even OS support
of its brightness controls on Apple keyboards after just 5 years, as per their
"Obsolete/Vintage products" approach, even though these displays are rock-solid
reliable and can honestly be expected to last a decade. This Apple failure is
certainly influencing my customer decisions for future purchase decisions
(I wonder how an Apple Store Rep will respond when I ask for a written 10 year
support warranty as a condition for purchase if the rumored new $2500 Apple
display ships? /s).

In any event, the 3rd Party solution I found was a product called 'Lunar':
<https://lunar.fyi/>

> So why aren't apps like these developed any longer? Or am I missing their
> alternatives?

I'd say that much of the apparent decline probably has to do with the Mac becoming
much less of a 'power user' platform for many of its installed base, at least from a
non-narrow niche standpoint. In other words, specialty areas like video & photo
have specific workflows which are much more contained within the App, so going
out to the OS level for various manipulations/transformations aren't as common
(and thus as important) as they used to be.

-hh