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Not the submitter, but I installed this a couple days ago to replace Bartender. For those not following along at home, the Bartender author just sold it to some
by kstrauser 2y ago
Not the submitter, but I installed this a couple days ago to replace Bartender. For those not following along at home, the Bartender author just sold it to some sketchy app mill. It’s an app that legitimately requires screen recording permissions to work. I trusted the old author’s reputation. I have zero trust in the own owner.
Ice isn’t as good yet. It’s not nearly so configurable. For example, you can either hide all icons or none. You can’t decide to show some of them all the time. That’s a bummer. I’ll still happily accept that trade off to replace Bartender, which I’d previously purchased several versions of. It’s dead to me.
Great job so far, Ice. I hope you keep improving!
- omlitt 2y agoIt’s missing a lot, especially for a MacBook with a notch. I went with ibar until ice or any other app gets more features that bartender had. -Difficult to configure unless you don’t have a lot of apps in the top bar. -No way to scroll through the list. -Does not offer a way to show the extra icons in a bar that displays below. -No search functionality. This is something I used frequently. -Folders which were recently added to Bartender was a nice option. I do hope the developer is planning on adding more features.
- nobodywasishere 2y agoYou can always show some icons by moving them to the right of the open/close icon
- omlitt 2y agoThis only works when you don’t have many icons. You can’t see ones that are hidden behind the notch. If you can, I missed this.
- nobodywasishere 2y agoAh yeah that's a good point. Don't know if this covers that use-case yet
- draugadrotten 2y agoFrom the blog: I understand that the transition hasn’t been entirely smooth. Recently, there was a change in the signing certificate for the app, and unfortunately, this change wasn’t communicated properly to you, our loyal users. https://www.macbartender.com/b5blog/A-New-Chapter-for-Bartender/ https://www.macbartender.com/b5blog/A-New-Chapter-for-Barten... previous discussion on the hidden sales: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40584606 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40584606
- nicolas_t 2y agoArgh, I didn't realize that the app was sold and I paid for the upgrade recently :( If I had known I wouldn't have. I wonder if this could be a case for a chargeback, since the owner silently sold the app
- kevsim 2y agoWhy do these apps require screen recording permissions to work? Just curious.
- eviks 2y agoTo get information about other apps' icons
- SpaghettiCthulu 2y agoIf true, that's a wild permissions model
- nativeit 2y agoAmong many. Apple’s security model has a lot of ups and downs like this. I gather any app that needs access to anything on the screen outside of itself requires “screen recording” permission. I know all of the Remote Desktop apps, as well as color sampling functions in browsers, Adobe’s apps, and all of the designer tools with similar functionality require it.
- theshrike79 2y agoYou wouldn't want your mouse driver, for example, being able to see _every_ piece of software in your menu bar by default without extra permissions? The case for "I need to see what apps are in the menu bar" is so rare there's no setting for it -> "screen recording" is the closest one.
- filleduchaos 2y agoIt isn't a permissions model, it's explicitly a hack.
- yig 2y agoDozer [0] doesn't require any special permissions. I guess this is needed by Bartender because it creates a little pop-out menu that shows the icons somewhere else? [0] https://github.com/aonez/Dozer/releases/tag/v4.2.1-silicon https://github.com/aonez/Dozer/releases/tag/v4.2.1-silicon
- atmosx 2y agoThanks for the heads up. I use bartender, I will replace it with this app.
- vmladenov 2y agoThanks for sharing this note, I completely missed this development. Sad to see what has become of this app.
- txdv 2y agoI just bought it a month ago for max support for a ridiculous price like 50eu :(
- lycopodiopsida 2y agoAfter many years of updates I've also bought the mega supporter license this year, which I deeply regret - not because of the money lost but because it seems that author has misused our trust.
- web3-is-a-scam 2y agoI didn’t know Bartender was sold. I thought it was fishy to need screen recording permissions but I assumed it was because of “security” features of the new macOS/m series chip/whatever so I just let it go because I trusted the Bartender dev. Uninstalled. What a shame.
- ziml77 2y agoBartender did need screen recording permissions for certain features to work under the more locked down security model in macOS 11+. That happened well before Bartender was sold.
- jmuguy 2y agoIce (and other menu bar managers) require the same permissions - your assumption was correct and Bartender has needed those permissions for a while.
- c-hendricks 2y agoHidden Bar doesn't, I'm guessing the screen recording permission is needed for showing on hover.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- hbn 2y agoIt does need screen recording permissions because trying to do what Bartender does on a closed down system like macOS is inevitably going to require a hack. The issue is we trusted the dev because we knew who he was and he'd have an angry mob after him if he was caught doing something sketchy. Now that it's sold to an unknown third party, there's no one to hold accountable for this software we're trusting with screen recording permissions on our machines.
- windexh8er 2y agoThe Reddit thread for context [0]. I sent an email to the original author with my feedback. I can understand why, but I got an autoreply that the mailbox was no longer monitored (even though it's still his personal domain). The things that transpired in the transition are all things I would expect an indie dev to not do. Ultimately my message to Ben was that it was unfortunate how everything was handled and that customers weren't notified. I was a paying customer of Bartender. I'll never use the software again, nor will I buy anything from the original author. [0] https://www.reddit.com/r/macapps/comments/1d7zjv8/bartender_5_not_safe_anymore_warning_from/ https://www.reddit.com/r/macapps/comments/1d7zjv8/bartender_...
- scottoreilly 2y ago> For example, you can either hide all icons or none. I thought so at first too, but it’s just a confusing UI. The documentation says: > Simply Command + drag your menu bar items to rearrange them. What isn’t said is that this dragging also allows you to keep some of the items permanently showing. Anything you drag to the right of that double arrow icon will stay there.
- oefrha 2y agoGood thing it’s been added to README now, I was similarly stumped two days ago and only found out from the issue tracker: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40580582 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40580582 The instructions really should be in the app, though.
- michaelcampbell 2y agoIndeed, I had to 'call a friend' to figure it out. I knew it was possible, but couldn't figure out how. Loving the minimalism of it now, though.
- kstrauser 2y agoI swear I tried that. Guess not! In that case, it covers 95% of what I used in Bartender.
- bluSCALE4 2y agoIt's really weird, non intuitive but once you figure it out, it's great. For example, if you cmd drag something, it puts you back into edit mode. The chevron design system is weird: they need to just mimic the coloring they show in the README.
- latexr 2y ago> I trusted the old author’s reputation. I have zero trust in the own owner. As of now, I have zero trust in the old author too. The lack of communication is the fault of both parties. Ben Surtees has caused serious damage to their own reputation. Any new software released under that name will have a hard time gaining trust and traction.
- CodeWriter23 2y agoProbably one of the terms of sale. But choosing to receive even more money above protecting the privacy of those who previously paid you money and trusted you is pretty dastardly IMO.
- latexr 2y agoI would say that if it was one of the terms of the sale (we don’t know), that’s even worse. If a buyer makes that request, the seller should be even more conscious of “who the heck am I selling to?”
- carlosjobim 2y agoAnd who are you to slander a named person and publicly question his reputation, for selling his own business that he created to somebody else? Your behaviour is not proportional to what has happened. It is an icon utility.
- callalex 2y agoWhich part of the statement is slander?
- carlosjobim 2y agoSaying that somebody has a damaged reputation.
- latexr 2y ago
- butchlugrod 2y agoReally satisfied with Ice. I've been a long-time Bartender user, but have thought that version 5 is a little slow and buggy. Ice does what I need it to do (hide/show icons) and it does it faster than Bartender. Not as many features, but my own needs are pretty simple.
- jnsie 2y agoThanks for flagging the sale of Bartender. As a long time user I had no idea and am saddened to hear the new. I'll be switching to Ice or another open source tool immediately.
- gaws 2y ago> you can either hide all icons or none. You can’t decide to show some of them all the time. This is a non-starter. I hope, with a renewed interest fueled by the Bartender sale and HN, the developers implement this as soon as possible.
- kstrauser 2y agoLooks like I was wrong about that. The README was updated to explain how after I'd started using it.