Version 5.7.2 of Default Folder X is available, addressing several problems when using Stage Manager. Flaky behavior of Default Folder X’s drawer in the Finder has been fixed – it now correctly appears and disappears as Stage Manager shows and hides the Finder’s windows.
And when using Default Folder X’s Finder-click feature (which lets you click on the Finder’s windows to switch to that window’s folder in an Open or Save dialog), Default Folder X now takes Stage Manager into account. Normally, the Finder’s windows aren’t “clickable” when they’re not showing on the screen. Since that’s pretty much always the situation when using Stage Manager, Default Folder X will now allow you to click where the windows would be if the Finder weren’t hidden by Stage Manager. As you move the mouse around, DFX will highlight the areas where Finder windows would be if they were visible.
The shadowed rectangle shows a Finder window displaying “Creative Cloud Files”
This release also fixes a bug that could cause Default Folder X to ask for Security & Privacy permissions on macOS 10.15 Catalina even though they’re already set. And it corrects a few minor user interface bugs and a problem creating aliases for files and folders that contain the ‘/’ character in their names.
Details and download links for English, French, Japanese, German and Danish versions are available on the Default Folder X release page, or if you’re already running DFX, just choose “Check for Update…” from its menu.
Version 2.7.3 of App Tamer is now available, fixing a couple of problems.
First, my apologies to folks using versions of macOS older than Big Sur: Changes in the last App Tamer update tightened up the spacing of its menu bar icon to comply with modifications Apple made to Monterey and Big Sur. Unfortunately, it also did that on pre-Big Sur systems, often making its icon too close to adjacent ones in the menu bar. I’ve fixed that in 2.7.3.
Second, internal changes that Apple made in macOS resulted in App Tamer reporting the CPU usage of one particular process – kernel_task – incorrectly. App Tamer would show either zero or astronomical values for kernel_task’s processor use, neither of which was correct. In App Tamer’s defense, the system’s approved public API was supplying those numbers and it dutifully reported them without prejudice. Some hunting around in the macOS source code (thank you Apple for making darwin Open Source!) revealed an alternate method that correctly reports the CPU usage of all processes, including kernel_task. So that fix is now available in App Tamer, making it a reliable source of CPU information for all processes again.
As usual, release notes and download links are on the App Tamer release page, or if you’re already using App Tamer, just choose “Check for Update” from its menu. This update is free if you’ve already purchased an App Tamer 2.x license.
Version 1.3 of Go64 is now available, adding some convenient controls for sorting through Intel vs Universal apps in addition to displaying which of your apps are 64-bit compatible (and which aren’t).
There’s also a new German localization, courtesy of Eberhard Woentz. Thanks Eberhard! 👋🏼 And a couple of bug fixes which may impact you if you use the contextual menus within Go64 or have backups of old iPhone apps laying around (I’m looking at you, Thomas Tempelmann). Thanks, Thomas, for bringing the problems to my attention.
I also changed the text in the UI to read “Not 64-bit ready” and “64-bit ready” rather than “32-bit” and “64-bit”. It better reflects the purpose of Go64, and also takes care of that gray area where really old stuff like PowerPC apps were being listed as “32-bit” – which wasn’t really technically true, but served the purpose of letting you know they wouldn’t run on Catalina or Big Sur.
Version 5.4.6 of Default Folder X is now available. For new users, it offers a Quick Start dialog that quickly shows you a few of Default Folder X’s primary features.
For those of you already familiar with Default Folder X, this release is more about bug fixes. At the top of the list is a fix for an elusive problem that could cause the “Save all attachments” dialog in Apple Mail to respond very slowly or get stuck on-screen. There are also corrections for some fairly minor, but annoying issues.
Version 5.4.5 of Default Folder X is now available to enhance your Open and Save dialogs even more. Default Folder X has always provided hierarchical menus that let you very quickly navigate to a folder or file you want, but sometimes those menus aren’t sorted the way you want them. To switch between sort-by-name and sort-by-date, just hold down the Option key before mousing over a menu or submenu – that can make it much faster to find what you’re looking for.
This release also addresses some performance issues if you’re using ARCHICAD or if you’re using screen-sharing while working from home. And there are bug-fixes, including a fairly common one for folks who access files on a NAS or server.
HistoryHound 2.2 is now available, giving you the option to add its icon to your menu bar so you can search your browsing history even faster.
HistoryHound still finds text in all the pages you’ve visited in any of the major Mac web browsers, but now handles Chrome and Firefox power users better. If you use multiple user profiles or run both Firefox and Firefox Developer Edition, HistoryHound will now track and search your history more efficiently and accurately.
This release also eliminates delays that could occur when you have HistoryHound set to “search as you type,” and adds a contextual menu to its error window so you can quickly add filters to keep certain pages from being added to your search index.
Version 5.4.3 of Default Folder X, our app for managing files and folders in Open and Save dialogs and the Finder, is now available. This release speeds things up when opening items in the Finder, ForkLift and Path Finder, as well as when saving files to slow servers over a network. It also brings little improvements in several areas:
The on-the-fly previews (the ones you see when traversing Default Folder X’s menus, in its Finder drawer, and in Open dialogs) have been improved to look better and display more smoothly.
It’s now easy to make Default Folder X forget all of your recently used files, folders and Finder windows all at once. Just hold down the Option key when choosing “Forget Recent <whatever>” at the bottom of a menu, and the menu command will change to “Forget All Recent Data”.
For any AppleScripters out there, there are new commands for managing files and folders in DFX’s Finder drawer, and an option to pop up its menu at a specific screen location. Note that if you’re using a macro utility that can run AppleScripts (like Peter Lewis’ excellent Keyboard Maestro), this can make it really handy to get to Default Folder X’s menus without going up to the menu bar.
There are also more than a dozen bug fixes, covering everything from occasional reliability issues to more esoteric problems with Pro Tools, Rogue Amoeba’s Fission app, and the built in screen capture utility in Mojave and Catalina. Oh, and Default Folder X’s Finder-click feature will now recognize all the tabs in Finder windows that aren’t in the current Space (if you’re using Mission Control to manage multiple workspaces). That was a really weird one.
Itemized release notes with all the details are available on the Default Folder X Release page, as usual, along with download links.
Version 2.5 of App Tamer is available, addressing a number of issues with different web browsers.
It adds default settings for Microsoft Edge, throttling Edge to 2% CPU when it’s not in the foreground.
It also fixes issues with Chrome apps that run as separate processes (created by saving a Chrome Shortcut with the “Open as window” checkbox turned on), making sure that Chrome is left running at full-speed when a shortcut app needs to run unhindered.
Performance problems have been resolved when site-specific browsers created with Epichrome are running. Previously, their reliance on frequent, repeated calls to shell commands was causing App Tamer itself to use too much CPU.
And finally, site-specific browsers created with Coherence Pro can each have their own settings in App Tamer, rather than all being managed with the settings you’ve given to Chrome.
Full release notes and download links are available on the App Tamer release page, or by choosing “Check for Updates” in App Tamer if you’re already running it.
Go64 version 1.1.1 is now available. It’s a minor update that fixes a bug that could result in Go64 reporting that an app had a 32-bit-only internal component when the app actually also had a 64-bit version of that component. So it’d mistakenly report that the app wouldn’t run on Catalina when it would, in fact, run.
This update also fixes a situation where, if you multi-selected a bunch of apps and revealed them in the Finder, Go64 would open a separate Finder window to show each application. Now it’ll just open whatever folders it needs to and highlight all of the selected apps that reside in that folder.
If you’ve already got Go64, just choose “Check for Updates” from its menu. If not, you can download it from the Go64 page. Go64 is free.
Default Folder X 5.4.2 is now available. It’s a fairly small update, but important if you use MATLAB or are running Catalina.
The first improvement is a workaround for a bug in MATLAB that causes it to hang when Default Folder X is running (it also happens when VoiceOver, Magnet, Spectacles or a number of other apps are running, but I can’t fix that). Default Folder X will now wait until after MATLAB’s splash screen is dismissed before trying to communicate with it. That avoids triggering the bug.
The second change is a bug fix that gets rid of the annoying message that Default Folder X puts up repeatedly in Catalina telling you that the Finder needs to be relaunched. If you’ve run into this, you know what I’m referring to. You’ll no longer see that message unless you explicitly turn Default Folder X’s Finder toolbar buttons on or off in your preferences.
