AppAddict

Stop Making CRON Jobs!

Cron Was Made for Always-On Unix ServersEarly in my career, I used to get annoyed when the old hands would wave away every automation problem with, "Just make a cron job." Cron dates back to the earliest days of Unix. It's simple, dumb, and dependable: once a minute it checks a text file, and if a line in that file matches the current time, it runs the associated command. Like most Unix tools, it works great--once you learn the arcane scheduling syntax. For example: 0 3 * * * /Users/amerpie/scripts/backup.sh To cron, that means: *run this script every day at...

February 8th, 2026 Mac Apps

Raindrop.io Gets a Significant New Feature

I've used the bookmark service Raindrop.io (and its apps for macOS and iOS as well as the Safari extension) the last three years, and it's a subscription I don't hesitate to renew. It has a deep feature set, and today it added something genuinely interesting for Pro users: a beta version of a private LLM assistant called Stella. Stella is designed for people with large, messy bookmark libraries. Instead of manually cleaning and reorganizing, you can just ask for help in plain language. Examples the system already understands: • Organize my unsorted bookmarks into collections • Suggest a better structure...

February 6th, 2026 Mac Apps

One Year Into Switching to an EU Cloud Storage Provider

It's a given that we all need a safe place to store or back up our digital lives--somewhere our data will survive if a laptop gets stolen or a house burns down. Beyond simple protection, there's the everyday convenience of being able to reach your files from any device, anywhere with an internet connection. For most of us, that means choosing a cloud service that fits our needs. The usual suspects are U.S.-based: iCloud, Google Drive, Dropbox, and plenty of others. In 2025, I decided to rethink that default. For privacy reasons, I wanted to reduce my reliance on U.S.-based...

February 6th, 2026 Mac Apps

Automate Your Homebrew Backups and Easily Reinstall your Mac Apps

The number of Mac apps you can install through the free package manager Homebrew keeps growing by the day. Tools like Cork, Taphouse, and Updatest can even convert apps you originally installed through other methods into versions that Homebrew can manage and update for you. Homebrew also includes a built-in backup feature that creates what it calls a Brewfile--basically a plain-text script listing everything Homebrew has installed on your system. That file can later be used to reinstall your entire app catalog in one shot, which is incredibly useful if you're setting up a new Mac or rebuilding your current one...

February 5th, 2026 Mac Apps

MountMate, the App You Didn't Know You Needed, Gets Updates

One of the things I treasure most about being part of the community that includes independent Mac developers is the opportunity to make feature requests. I never cease to be amazed when an app I use and love gets updated to include an idea I suggested. Yesterday, for the second time, the developer of MountMate (Homie Lab) responded to a feature request within hours. Back in June, he added Intel compatibility, and yesterday he added hotkey support so that MountMate can now be used in automation workflows like Keyboard Maestro, BetterTouchTool, and Apple Shortcuts. Additional new features include: • Dynamic...

February 5th, 2026 Mac Apps

The Prompt I Use to Generate an Obsidian Friendly Log With Backlinks, Tags and Tasks

Every night, shortly before 12:00 AM, an automation I set up on my Mac opens the ChatGPT app and send this prompt: Generate my Obsidian AI Daily Log for the last 24 hours. Requirements: - Sort everything in true chronological order with timestamps. - Use one-line summaries for each discussion. - Structure it as a technical journal, not a chat summary. - Include these sections: 1) Timeline 2) Signals & Insights (what I learned or realized) 3) Friction & Problems (what broke, confused, or slowed things down) 4) Decisions (explicit or implicit choices made) 5)...

February 1st, 2026 Mac Apps

Keyboard Maestro, The App That Makes Everything Better - Tips for the Automation Curious

When Keyboard Maestro went on sale during the Black Friday season last year, I was surprised by the number of people who purchased the app and then found themselves at a loss for use cases. The community forum run by Peter Lewis, the developer, has a good reputation for being helpful, but in my experience it's full of complex solutions to problems I don't have. My intention has never been to use Keyboard Maestro as a software development platform. It's always been about this simple question: how can I turn 10 clicks into 1 click--or better yet, how can I...

January 31st, 2026 Mac Apps

SnapsofApps Has New, Powerful Features

Ryan Dekker, the developer of SnapsOfApps, a robust and full-featured window management app, just released an update that adds a bevy of new features aimed at more complex setups involving multiple monitors and spaces. He tackled thorny problems like managing how macOS identifies identical display models and how using a MacBook in clamshell mode affects window management. In under 10 minutes, I was able to install and configure the app to use two displays and eight spaces, launch a dozen apps with individual windows, and have every single aspect of the setup work correctly the first time from a simple...

January 30th, 2026 Mac Apps

Clawdbot Can Do It

Automating repetitive tasks on my Mac has been an ongoing obsession for years. To me, it's the essence of using a computer as the tool it's meant to be. The less often I have to click the same sequence of buttons I clicked yesterday, the happier I am. To that end, I've long relied on Keyboard Maestro, BetterTouchTool, Hazel, Drafts, Apple Shortcuts, and IFTTT. Two days ago, I read about a new agentic AI app called Clawdbot that runs locally on a Mac and interacts with it in ways previous apps simply couldn't. People have strong feelings about AI. I...

January 26th, 2026

Four New Free and Affordable Apps I Like from Indi Devs

SmartTrackerSmartTracker is a universal app that syncs across all platforms via iCloud. Using the URL from a vendor's page (Newegg, Amazon, Micro Center, etc.), the app tracks prices in near real time. You can set a target price and receive a notification within minutes of a price drop. Several features stand out: charts, tracking numerical data beyond price, and collections. When I'm shopping for a big-ticket item, I find it useful to create a collection of the same product across multiple vendors. Today I got excited when Micro Center listed Mac minis for $100 less than Amazon--until I noticed the...

January 24th, 2026 Mac Apps

Spaces and Desktops and My Mental Health

I spent most of my computer using life on a Macbook and only recently started using a dual display setup. I didn’t start this process until after the release of macOS 26, Tahoe. Quite possibly, that may be the absolute worst time to be experimenting with this in the history of the Mac. This is not my favorite version of the operating system. I’ve found that some relatively common applications are resistant to window management across Spaces: Calibre, Obsidian, Better Touch Tool, System Configuration, and Elgato Stream Deck Configuration are all consistently problematic. In addition, having windows from the same...

January 20th, 2026 Mac Apps

The File-Sharing Tools I Trust—and Why

When it comes to sharing data from a Mac, there are plenty of scenarios and plenty of methods. Identifying the right tool for the job comes with experience. Whatever method you land on today might not be the best method in a year--and that's OK. Sometimes a system you already know how to use and troubleshoot is better than something new and unproven, no matter how many bells and whistles it has. And then there's the gradual enshittification of tech, where the useful and free tool you once loved slowly becomes expensive and exploitative. Regardless of circumstances, the criteria most...

January 17th, 2026 Mac Apps

Tailscale: The Best Free App Most Mac Power Users Aren’t Using

Someone asked me to name the best free app available to Mac users in 2026. I didn’t hesitate before choosing Tailscale. Tailscale is a VPN, but not in the usual sense. It’s a private, encrypted, identity-based network where your devices recognize each other no matter where they are. It uses WireGuard technology and is often described as a mesh network. The terminology isn’t important. This isn’t the kind of VPN that simply masks your home IP address or anonymizes web traffic. Tailscale lets you treat a collection of devices in different geographic locations as if they were all in the...

January 15th, 2026 Mac Apps

Droppy - A Notch App with a Lot to Like

I've tried a variety of notch apps, and I haven't been truly happy with any of them. I'm not sure whether the novelty of the interface is the problem, or if it's the design of the apps I've used that bothers me. I recently installed Droppy, a free and open-source app built entirely with Swift for speed and stability, and I like it more than the other notch apps I've used. It isn't overloaded with superfluous features, and the features it does have can be toggled on and off easily. It also seems very stable--I haven't encountered any bugs so...

January 14th, 2026 Mac Apps

Image Workflow with Cleanshot X, Clop, Clotski, NameQuick and Hazel

Apps gain new capabilities through updates. Our preferences change, task requirements shift, and workflows evolve right along with them. It pays to periodically reevaluate the tools and methods we rely on. As a writer and blogger, I go through a surprising number of images every day. My goal is simple: images should be optimized for file size, renamed intelligently, and land exactly where I need them for current projects. After 24 hours, they should be archived--still accessible, but no longer cluttering my active workspace. Start with DownloadsClotski is a menu bar utility for browsing, tagging, renaming, and editing metadata for...

January 11th, 2026 Mac Apps