ScrennFloat
I only recently realized that my use of screenshots falls into two very different categories.
On one hand, I use screenshots to illustrate blog posts and social media. That usually amounts to two or three captures a day.
On the other hand, I take screenshots constantly for technical reasons; learning a new application, documenting my self-hosted server configuration, keeping track of network settings in my home lab, or simply capturing information during
I only recently realized that my use of screenshots falls into two very different categories.
On one hand, I use screenshots to illustrate blog posts and social media. That usually amounts to two or three captures a day.
On the other hand, I take screenshots constantly for technical reasons; learning a new application, documenting my self-hosted server configuration, keeping track of network settings in my home lab, or simply capturing information during everyday tech work.
For the past couple of years, I’ve relied almost exclusively on CleanShot X for screenshots.
Recently I discovered ScreenFloat, which is designed for the second scenario. It’s not really an app where you capture a screenshot and file it away. Instead, the screenshots you take stay visible while you work so you can reference them.
If the screenshot contains text, that’s not a problem. ScreenFloat includes some of the strongest built-in OCR capabilities I’ve seen in this category.
Capture
Capturing screenshots is straightforward. You can grab a static region of the screen or use a timer when you need to trigger some UI element before the capture occurs.
ScreenFloat also supports screen recording with microphone and system audio.
You can start a capture from:
a keyboard shortcut
the menu bar
a widget
One small but practical detail; unless you change it, the next capture will reuse the same screen region as the previous one. When you’re repeatedly documenting the same part of an interface, that saves time.
Floating Screenshots
Floating screenshots are surprisingly useful when you treat them as working references.
Typical examples:
coding or scripting while referencing documentation
technical writing while capturing UI elements
design work where you need to sample colors or inspect visual details
Anyone working in a screen-heavy workflow quickly understands the value.
ScreenFloat works well here for two main reasons.
First, it includes a solid set of built-in editing tools. You can crop, rotate, resize, annotate, and redact sensitive information such as text or faces. Screenshots can also be folded (collapsed) so they stay available without taking up much screen space.
The text tools go beyond simple OCR. ScreenFloat can detect and interact with:
links
phone numbers
barcodes
Second, the app is designed around the idea that screenshots are reference material, not just disposable images.
Every capture is stored in a built-in library called the Shots Browser. It includes:
smart folders
tagging
favorites and ratings
full-text search
If you run ScreenFloat on multiple Macs, you can access the same Shots Browser from other devices. That’s a genuinely useful feature. Most competing tools simply dump screenshots into Finder folders and leave organization up to you.
What’s to Like
Aside from the feature set, the one-time purchase price of $17.99 is refreshing.
ScreenFloat also supports Mac automation tools such as:
Shortcuts
AppleScript
That makes it much easier to integrate into an existing automation workflow.
The developer, Matthias Gansrigler-Hrad, has a long-standing reputation for maintaining his apps and responding to users. I bought my first app from him more than a decade ago; the long-lived shelf utility Yoink.
ScreenFloat has also seen frequent updates since version 2 was released.
Version 2.3.5 (March 2026) added:
improved search results in the Shots Browser
ability to capture the mouse cursor in timed shots
drag-and-drop support in the markup editor
improved widget appearance
easier access to image-copy options
Possible Drawbacks
Like any feature-rich tool, ScreenFloat has a bit of a learning curve. The interface is well designed, but it still takes some time to understand everything it can do.
My recommendation is simple; start with one feature and build from there.
Another practical consideration is that floating screenshots are still windows. If you leave a few dozen of them open, you can expect some impact on system resources.
And if you’re looking for a full-blown screen recording and media production suite, this isn’t that kind of tool.
Conclusion
ScreenFloat isn’t just another screenshot utility. There are plenty of good ones.
What makes ScreenFloat interesting is that it treats screenshots as working references, not just images you capture and forget.
For developers, designers, writers, or anyone else who spends their day juggling information across multiple windows, that idea turns out to be surprisingly powerful.
Requirements: Requires macOS Monterey 12.3 or newer
Privacy Policy: The developer does not collect any data from this app.
It’s always such a pleasure to find out when one of my favorite developers has released a new app. That’s how I felt recently, when I read that The Low‑Tech Guys not only had a new app but that it was going to be a pretty strong player in the Mac automation field. That prompted me to approach the lead developer to learn more about the past, present and future of the company. But first, the apps.
Crank
Crank
Crank acts on triggers you
It’s always such a pleasure to find out when one of my favorite developers has released a new app. That’s how I felt recently, when I read that The Low‑Tech Guys not only had a new app but that it was going to be a pretty strong player in the Mac automation field. That prompted me to approach the lead developer to learn more about the past, present and future of the company. But first, the apps.
Crank
Crank
Crank acts on triggers you define to take action without requiring user intervention. It’s more powerful than just Apple Shortcuts or Shortery, but at just €8 for a five-seat lifetime license, it stops short of Keyboard Maestro’s complexity and price.
Crank can do all of this and a lot more:
Stop notifications from interrupting Zoom calls
Check and fic quarantine issues on everything you download
Toggle VPN usage based on the connected wi-fi network
Move downloaded ebooks right into calibre
Change the audio output to bluetooh headphones or speakers when they connect
Automatically adjust your display
Disconnect Bluetooth devices before closing the MacBook lid
The Portfolio
It was the quality of Low Tech Guys' previous applications that made me happy to hear about their new release. I first encountered one of their apps a couple of years ago when I discovered Clop. Since then, I have systematically gone through their portfolio to take advantage of the extremely useful, free, and low‑priced powerhouses they’ve developed.
Clop
Clop ($15) - Clop automatically optimizes (reduces) the file sizes of images, videos and PDFs copied to your clipboard. Optionally, it can also convert files on the fly. Clop can even feed the results to a shortcut for further processing. You can set it so that it watches specific folders for different file types. - Clop - Image, video, PDF and clipboard optimiser
rcmd (FREE) - rcmd uses your right command key + a letter to launch applications. You get app-launching hotkeys without having to set them up manually, although you can do that too. You can use the same hotkey to hide an app or cycle through other apps. If you pait rcmd with Hammerspoon, you can even cycle through windows, not just apps. rcmd - Switch apps instantly using the ⌘ Right Command key
Lunar
Lunar ($23) - Lunar is the acknowledged leader in display control for all DDC capable monitors, whether it’s a brand new Apple Studio with a Mac Pro, or a no name brand connected to a Hackintosh. It’s features include:
Extending keyboard control for brightness and volume to all displays
Extra controls on Apple native displays
Sync mode to change the brightness of all connected displays based on the built-in Ambient Light Sensor
Exceed the brightness constraints on XDR Apple laptop displays
Dial screen brightness below the 0% setting (because that’s not really 0%)
Startup Folder (FREE) - Startup folder gives you aw way to open anything at startup, apps. shortcuts, links and files. It can hide anything you wajt running but not on screen even when that’s not a native feature. You can optionally set it up to keeps apps from quitting and if they fo, they will automatically be relaunched. Startup Folder - Run anything at startup by simply placing it in a special folder
Pipiri
Pipiri (€8) - Pipiri brings picture in a picture functionality to ant macOS window and that has more use cases than you would think"
Watching a long-running terminal command while working in another app
Keeping logs visible while debugging software
Keeping an eye on AI agent progress (Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot, etc.) while browsing
Streaming a video that doesn’t support native PiP (Twitter/X, Reddit, Twitch, etc.)
Monitoring a dashboard or CI pipeline without switching windows
To see everything The Low Tech Guys have to offer, check out this page,
"Low-Tech Guy #1"
If you’ve ever wished your external monitor behaved more like a MacBook display, you’ve probably encountered Lunar, the powerful monitor control utility from developer Alin Panaitiu. Over the past several years Alin has quietly built a small ecosystem of thoughtful Mac tools including Clop, rcmd, Crank, and others that focus on real workflow problems rather than novelty.
I asked Alin about how he got started, the challenges of building hardware-adjacent Mac apps, and what he’s working on next.
How did you get started in app development?
I got started in 2017 after buying my first external monitor for my MacBook; an LG 4K display with USB-C.
It was a great monitor, but something felt off. Unlike the MacBook, it had no adaptive brightness. In fact, the brightness couldn’t be adjusted at all.
That sent me down the rabbit hole. I discovered DDC, the protocol used to control monitor settings, and started building Lunar so my external monitor could adapt its brightness automatically.
For about four years Lunar was completely free and open source. In 2021 I took the leap, quit my job as a Python engineer, and started working full-time on the paid Lunar Pro tier.
“I discovered DDC and started building Lunar because I wanted my monitor to adapt its brightness automatically.”
Is Low-Tech Guys your full-time job?
Yes; if you can call it a normal job.
It’s my only source of income and where most of my effort goes. But the rhythm isn’t typical.
Sometimes macOS changes break something important and I end up working 14-hour days. Other weeks are quieter; answering support emails and fixing the occasional bug.
Which of your apps has been the most challenging to build?
Lunar, without question.
It operates very close to hardware; communicating directly with monitors, Raspberry Pis, and ESP32 chips. That’s very different from most macOS software.
Hardware is unpredictable. Firmware quirks, kernel panics, monitors that stall or behave strangely; problems that only occur on a particular user’s setup.
Those are incredibly difficult to debug because they can’t always be reproduced locally.
“Hardware can be unpredictable; stalling, kernel panics, wrong firmware, missing bits. Things that only happen on a user’s very specific setup.”
Which developers do you admire?
Sindre Sorhus for building an enormous ecosystem of Swift packages that macOS developers rely on, including Defaults and Hotkeys.
I also admire Ryan Hanson for creating Superkey, which finally allowed me to ditch Karabiner-Elements.
And Saagar Jha, whose work on macOS reverse engineering taught me a great deal.
You recently released Crank. What are you working on next?
No new apps for the moment. Crank and Pipiri took a lot of effort and I’m a bit drained right now.
Instead I’m focusing on rcmd v3 and Clop v3.
rcmd v3
The next version of rcmd will include: • Native window switching • Launching apps by holding rcmd and typing letters Example: rcmd S P O launches Spotify • Window search with quick typing Example: rcmd X C jumps to Xcode → Crank window • Searching windows by title • Stages; saving sets of apps and windows as workspaces • Instant switching between stages using rcmd + letter • Optional trigger keys such as Caps Lock or Fn
Clop v3
Clop is moving toward a pipeline-based optimization system where multiple file operations can happen without repeatedly re-encoding data.
Example workflows might look like:
Images dropped into ~/Desktop/blog • optimize • resize to 1600px width • convert to WebP • move to ~/Projects/blog
Videos dropped into Dropzone • optimize using a high-quality encoder • speed up to 1.5× • remove audio • upload with Dropshare • copy the URL to the clipboard
PDFs dropped into an Invoices folder • optimize • crop to A4 • extract text to a file
Other improvements include a dropzone that appears near the cursor and better support for external storage.
I wrote a review of Cling that was a bit tough on it. You handled that gracefully. What’s the current state of Cling?
Cling is something I still want to develop further, but time is the limiting factor.
I started building a custom fuzzy indexing engine for it and got about 90% of the way there. As usual, the last 10% is the hardest.
The goal is to remove external tools like fzf and fd and bring everything directly into the app with faster and more accurate results.
Right now the fzf scoring algorithm simply isn’t well suited to what Cling is trying to do.
2026-04-02 - Update - (From Reddit) Spotlight doesn't index files like hidden dotfiles (~/.config), System frameworks, root configs and binaries, .plist preference files etc. That means apps that rely on the Spotlight index like Raycast or Alfred also can't find these files.
Cling brings its own custom index made specifically for the macOS filesystem, which allows you to fuzzy search any file that exists on your Mac.
Comparison:
Spotlight, Alfred, Raycast can only find apps and files in the home directory and the fuzzy algorithm isn't as fuzzy as I like it to be.
ProFind, HoudahSpot, EasyFind, Tembo, Find Any File: these are a lot more capable than Cling in narrowing down a specific search based on file metadata, Cling is more for fast search by name.
Cardinal is the only app I know that is closest, very similar. Some 2.0 additions in this app like the live index view were inspired by it. Cling focuses more on actions while Cardinal focuses on adding some metadata to the index.
Features:
instant fuzzy search over the whole filesystem
keyboard-centric actions for opening, editing, copying and managing files
ignore lists for excluding files and folders from the index
external storage indexing, search while disk is unmounted
QuickFilters for narrowing down results with a minimal typing
Pricing: €12 for a lifetime license on up to 5 Macs
There's a 14-day trial that starts automatically on launch. After the trial, the app keeps working in Free Mode where you can still fuzzy search files but only in Home and Applications.
Tax laws in my country changed significantly, forcing me to move from an LLC to a sole proprietorship.
To simplify accounting I consolidated everything under Paddle.
That meant ending contracts with Setapp, Apple distribution agreements, and other marketplaces. As a result, my apps are now free on the App Store, while paid licensing is handled through Paddle.
I don’t expect that arrangement to change anytime soon.
Closing Thoughts
Talking with Alin, a theme keeps surfacing: the most useful Mac utilities often come from developers scratching their own workflow itch. Lunar began with a simple frustration; an external monitor that couldn’t adjust its brightness.
Since then that curiosity has grown into a small but influential set of tools used by Mac power users around the world. And if the roadmaps for rcmd v3, Clop v3, and eventually Cling are any indication, Alin is far from done refining the Mac experience.
For users who care about thoughtful utilities and deep macOS integration, his work is well worth watching.
Independent developers continue to build some of the most thoughtful utilities on macOS. These are small, focused tools that solve real workflow problems instead of trying to become the next all-in-one productivity suite.
Here are a few that recently caught my attention.
Stealthly Icon
Stealthly
For anyone whose workday involves frequent Zoom, Teams, or other online meetings, presenting a professional, distraction-free screen matters. The same is true if you recor
Independent developers continue to build some of the most thoughtful utilities on macOS. These are small, focused tools that solve real workflow problems instead of trying to become the next all-in-one productivity suite.
Here are a few that recently caught my attention.
Stealthly Icon
Stealthly
For anyone whose workday involves frequent Zoom, Teams, or other online meetings, presenting a professional, distraction-free screen matters. The same is true if you record tutorials or training videos. You want viewers focused on the content; not scanning your Dock, desktop, or menu bar for clues about your life.
I installed Stealthly for both myself and my wife as soon as I heard about it.
Stealthly is a $12.99 utility available directly from the developer (recommended) or on the Mac App Store. It automatically hides desktop icons, application windows, Dock items, menu bar icons, and even your wallpaper when you’re sharing your screen. It also enables Do Not Disturb to silence calls, alerts, and notifications.
When your meeting or recording ends, Stealthly restores everything exactly as it was.
Automation works in two ways:
Scheduled automation – Stealthly runs at specific times
Application triggers – Stealthly activates when certain apps launch, such as Zoom or Teams
The app includes a two-week free trial and is available in six languages.
If you regularly share your screen, this is one of those utilities that solves a problem you didn’t realize you had until someone else built it.
Screenshot showing the Find Files feature in FileMinutes app
File Minutes
When I started doing IT support at a small private university, I was shocked to discover that many students and even junior faculty dumped every document into a single folder and relied entirely on search to find things later.
I still can’t wrap my head around that approach.
I prefer a defined file structure with folders that have clear roles in my workflow. It isn’t complicated, and most of the time I can navigate directly to what I need.
Search still has its place, though.
File Minutes sits somewhere between a search tool and a lightweight file manager. It’s keyboard-driven, easy to learn, and extremely fast when you need to locate images, Markdown files, archives, or other documents across your system.
Once you find the file, you can either open it in its native app or reveal it in Finder.
Some features I particularly like:
Filter browsing by file type
If I’m looking for a PDF, my view isn’t cluttered with unrelated file types.
Save favorite folders
Jump instantly to locations you use frequently.
Bi-directional filtering
Search for files named invoice and narrow the results to Downloads; or browse Downloads and filter results to files containing invoice.
Keyboard navigation
Up and down arrows browse the current branch of the file tree. Left and right arrows move up or down a directory level.
File actions
Open, copy, or preview files using keyboard shortcuts.
Content search
Search inside PDFs, Markdown files, documents, and text files.
File Minutes collects no telemetry and performs no data collection. It runs on macOS 13 or later and costs $10 for a single license or $21 for three seats.
MiddleDrag (Free)
MiddleDrag is a tiny free utility (about 2 MB) that adds natural middle-click functionality to your Mac trackpad; whether that’s your laptop trackpad or a Magic Trackpad.
If you work without a mouse, this can make a surprising difference.
Some places where it really shines:
CAD and 3D modeling
Pan and orbit smoothly in Fusion 360, Blender, OnShape, FreeCAD, and SketchUp without reaching for a mouse.
Browsers
Open links in background tabs, close tabs instantly, and auto-scroll long pages with a simple three-finger tap.
Coding and terminal work
Paste selections in Terminal (Linux style) and interact more naturally with VS Code multi-cursor editing.
It’s small, simple, and one of those utilities that quickly becomes muscle memory.
Restore workspace interface
Workspace+
If you run a multi-monitor command-center setup with several tiled windows, a browser full of tabs, and a dozen apps open at once, recreating that layout every time you switch tasks gets tedious fast.
Workspace+ lets you capture an entire workspace and restore it with a single click.
Apps reopen, windows return to their positions, and browser tabs reload as part of the workspace.
This makes switching contexts dramatically faster.
Some useful capabilities include:
Keyboard access
Navigate and trigger workspaces entirely from the keyboard using hotkeys.
Multiple browser support
Works with Safari and Chromium-based browsers including Chrome, Edge, Opera, Brave, Arc, and Vivaldi. Firefox is not currently supported due to technical limitations.
Automatic triggers
Workspaces can restore automatically when displays connect or disconnect; ideal if you move between a desk setup and a laptop environment.
If you already use a window manager like Rectangle Pro, Snaps of Apps, or Moom, you can approximate a similar workflow. There’s also the free utility Bunch, which comes close but requires some basic scripting.
Workspace+ is easier to configure and requires far less setup.
A lifetime license costs $14.99, or you can subscribe for $2.99 per month with a three-day free trial.
One current limitation: the app does not yet restore windows across multiple Spaces in Mission Control. The developer has indicated that this feature is on the roadmap.
M4 Mac Mini
When I bought my last new Mac two years ago, I set it up the way I had been setting up my personal computers for years: plug in a Time Machine drive and run Migration Assistant. On a modern Mac with an SSD, even if you have hundreds of apps installed like I do, the whole process takes about 20 minutes. It recreates your Applications folder, brings over preferences, and generally makes the new machine feel finished almost immediately.
Nothing could be easi
When I bought my last new Mac two years ago, I set it up the way I had been setting up my personal computers for years: plug in a Time Machine drive and run Migration Assistant. On a modern Mac with an SSD, even if you have hundreds of apps installed like I do, the whole process takes about 20 minutes. It recreates your Applications folder, brings over preferences, and generally makes the new machine feel finished almost immediately.
Nothing could be easier.
There is a downside, though. Migration Assistant faithfully brings over all the accumulated cruft along with the good stuff. That’s how I ended up with Keychain entries for wireless access points I installed in 2014, and references in ~/Library/Application Support to apps I haven’t touched in years.
UPS is dropping a Mac mini on my doorstep sometime this morning. For the first time in a long time, I’m not going to use Migration Assistant.
Automated App Installation
Thanks to tools like Updatest and Cork, I’ve moved every application that can be managed by Homebrew into that ecosystem. On my current machine that covers 212 GUI apps plus 260 CLI packages and dependencies.
Recreating that environment on a new Mac is trivial.
To back up your current setup:
brew bundle dump
To install everything on a new Mac:
brew bundle install
By default, Homebrew can also install Mac App Store apps using the mas CLI. The generated Brewfile is plain text and extremely easy to edit if you want to remove anything before installing.
A small sample looks like this:
cask "gechr/tap/whichspace"
cask "wifi-explorer"
cask "wins"
cask "xbar"
cask "xnconvert"
cask "xnviewmp"
cask "zen"
cask "zotero"
mas "Acidity", id: 6472630023
mas "Actions", id: 1586435171
mas "Actions For Obsidian", id: 1659667937
mas "Amphetamine", id: 937984704
mas "AppTela", id: 6752568197
mas "AutoMounter", id: 1160435653
If you don’t use Homebrew, you can still automate Mac App Store installs directly with the mas CLI.
To export a list of installed App Store apps:
mas list | cut -d' ' -f1 > mas-app-ids.txt
To install them on a new Mac:
xargs -n1 mas install < mas-app-ids.txt
To identify apps that were installed outside Homebrew or the Mac App Store, run:
Open the resulting JSON file in a text editor like BBEdit. Any app showing:
_“obtained_from” : “identified_developer” _
was installed directly from a developer download and will need to be reinstalled manually.
Configuration
Applications are the easy part. Configuration is harder.
Just entering license keys and registration details for my paid apps could easily take hours.
I briefly looked at Mackup, but it doesn’t seem well suited for a GUI-heavy workflow like mine. A more modern tool, chezmoi, looks promising for exporting and restoring my dotfiles, including things like:
• .zshrc
• .gitconfig
• ~/.ssh/config
• .config/nvim/init.vim
For everything else, my plan is simple: build a small set of rsync jobs by hand and move over only what I actually need.
To avoid permission issues and sandbox quirks, I’ll launch each application once before restoring its configuration so macOS creates the necessary directories:
~/Library/Application Support/
~/Library/Preferences/
~/Library/Containers/
~/Library/Group Containers/
Because I run a heavily automated setup with apps likeKeyboard Maestro, BetterTouchTool, Hazel, and Raycast, I’ll rely on their built-in export/import features rather than trying to automate those configs.
It’s technically possible to script the capture of a large number of system settings. In practice, the time it would take to build and debug that script would probably exceed the time it takes me to reconfigure things manually.
Teaching an Old Dog New Tricks
Earlier in my career in edtech, I spent a lot of time doing large-scale Mac deployments. The workflow was simple: build a golden image and deploy it hundreds of times using NetBoot to whatever hardware the district had just purchased.
Later we moved to modern deployment systems like Jamf.
If you need 900 eMacs unboxed and deployed, I’m your guy.
Highly opinionated personal setups like the ones most of us run on our own Macs are a different animal entirely. There’s no universal image for that kind of machine.
But there’s a lot we can learn from each other about building reproducible setups that stay clean over time instead of dragging a decade of digital barnacles from one Mac to the next.
Octarine
I’ve been hearing about Octarine for a while. It’s one of those apps that people whose opinions I respect talk about with a certain level of admiration. After testing it as thoroughly as I’ve tested any app in a long time, I understand why.
Octarine is a tool for creating, editing, and organizing text-based information using connected but independent documents: Markdown files. Without relying on plugins, it supports image
I’ve been hearing about Octarine for a while. It’s one of those apps that people whose opinions I respect talk about with a certain level of admiration. After testing it as thoroughly as I’ve tested any app in a long time, I understand why.
Octarine is a tool for creating, editing, and organizing text-based information using connected but independent documents: Markdown files. Without relying on plugins, it supports images, video, PDFs, and files created by other productivity apps. Those files can be linked inside Octarine but still open in their native applications.
Octarine isn’t designed for a single purpose. It’s more like a flexible Markdown workspace you can adapt to several overlapping uses:
Journaling
Task management
Writing and long-form drafting
Math or science reference notes
Documentation
Personal knowledge management (PKM)
Project planning
Setup
Octarine is available for Windows, Linux, and macOS, but it’s not a heavy Electron app. The download is just over 30 MB, and it launches as fast as TextEdit; effectively instant.
The interface is tab-based, similar to a web browser. It isn’t strictly native macOS UI, but it’s clean, responsive, and supports customizable themes.
Installation on the Mac is simple:
Open the downloaded DMG
Drag Octarine.app into /Applications
That’s it.
When you launch it for the first time, Octarine asks you to open or create a Workspace. A workspace is simply a folder of Markdown files; either ones you create or notes that already exist somewhere on your Mac.
Structure
You can download, install, and configure Octarine in well under a minute and immediately start creating documents.
A key design choice is that Octarine uses the filesystem directly. Your workspace is just a folder containing Markdown files with human-readable filenames.
That means:
You can manage files directly in Finder
You can open them in any text editor
Octarine will immediately reflect changes made elsewhere
I verified this by opening a note in Typora, adding a table, and watching it render instantly inside Octarine.
Because everything lives in normal folders and Markdown files, syncing is straightforward. You can use:
iCloud Drive
Google Drive
Syncthing
GitHub repositories (built-in integration)
The Git support also provides versioning for people who want a real audit trail for their notes.
Like most PKM-oriented tools, Octarine supports wikilinks. Typing [[ opens a searchable list of notes in the workspace. If you bracket a title that doesn’t exist yet, Octarine offers to create the note.
There’s also a knowledge graph showing connections between notes. Just remember: posting screenshots of your graph online costs you several internet credibility points.
Formatting
Most formatting tools are accessible through a slash command menu (/), which exposes a wide range of Markdown and extended elements:
Headers
Text styles (bold, italic, strikethrough)
Callouts
Code blocks
Mermaid diagrams
LaTeX
Dividers
Tables
Colored text
Dates
Links
Templates
You could easily use Octarine purely as a writing tool. It’s a full Markdown editor with live rendering similar to apps like Typora.
Under the hood, however, the file remains a plain text Markdown document. You can open it in BBEdit, import it into Obsidian, or process it with any other Markdown tool.
Octarine also converts pasted HTML into Markdown, preserving elements such as headers, links, bullet lists, and text styles.
Organization
The left sidebar provides a file tree for navigating your workspace. Nested folders work exactly as you’d expect.
When you attach files such as images or PDFs to a note, Octarine automatically creates folders to store them.
Octarine also supports seven types of metadata, which can be used to organize and filter notes.
The most powerful organizational feature is something called Views.
Views are dynamic, database-style tables that display notes based on filters, sorting rules, and custom columns.
Think of them as smart saved searches that update automatically as your notes change.
Tagging is also well implemented. Tags are clickable throughout the interface, and a Tag Manager provides a centralized list of every tag in your workspace.
AI Integration (Pro Version)
Octarine includes optional AI integration.
It works with:
Local models via Ollama and LM Studio
Apple Intelligence
Cloud APIs such as OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google Gemini
AI operates within the context of the current note, allowing it to generate, rewrite, summarize, or refine content.
Like most AI writing workflows, the real learning curve comes from developing reusable prompts that produce consistent results.
Pro users can also download a 90 MB local model that can index an entire workspace to provide additional context-aware features:
Context indicators
Each message shows the sources used (folders, notes, or date filters). Icons and hover cards reveal the details.
References
A list shows which notes were consulted to answer your query.
Export options
Responses can be copied as Markdown or plain text.
Chat titles
Titles are generated automatically after the first response and can be edited using the Sparkles icon.
Save the chat
Clicking the Create Note icon in the chat breadcrumb saves the conversation as a note. Your questions become blockquotes, with each Q&A pair separated by a divider.
An Opinion on an Opinionated App
There’s no question that Octarine is powerful.
As someone who has spent years building PKM systems, I can appreciate how much functionality is available without needing plugins or complex setup. Many of the features Octarine includes by default require significant configuration in something like Obsidian.
That simplicity removes a lot of early decisions that intimidate people exploring tools like this.
Octarine is developed by a single developer, which might give some users pause. Personally, it doesn’t worry me much. Some of the most respected Mac utilities come from solo developers, including:
Keyboard Maestro
Hazel
BetterTouchTool
Rectangle Pro
Looking at Octarine’s update history, development is clearly active and responsive to feedback.
The changelog shows frequent updates, and the roadmap includes plans for:
iOS and Android versions
One-click publishing
Quick capture tools
Task-management improvements
Browser extensions
…and quite a bit more.
With the exception of AI features, most of Octarine’s functionality is available in the free version.
The Pro license currently costs $70 (early-bird supporter pricing) and unlocks all current and future features. That isn’t cheap, but it’s roughly in line with other established writing tools like iA Writer ($69) or utilities such as TextSoap ($45).
For users who want a structured Markdown workspace without the plugin rabbit hole, Octarine is definitely worth a serious look.
2026-04-01 - Recent Changes
Bullet lists and task lists with nested children now show a collapse chevron on hover — click it to fold the nested items out of sight, keeping long outlines manageable.
Collapse state (headings, codeblocks, lists & tasks) are persisted automatically, so collapsed sections stay collapsed when you restart the app.
Performance
Significantly reduced CPU and memory usage across the app — typing, idle, and workspace switching are all lighter.
Improved workspace watching functions to be more performant and less power consuming.
Reduced CPU spikes during workspace indexing.
Embedding pruning for large workspaces is now much faster.
Improvements
Date cells in Views now respect your preferred date format.
Ask Octarine & Writing Assistant now shows error messages as toasts when something goes wrong, instead of failing silently.
The task migration flow uses fewer file operations, making it faster and more reliable.
Resurf
Resurf is a clever new app, currently in beta, with a lot of potential. This is one of those “I needed an app to do X, so I built one” projects; the difference is that it was built by a design engineer who clearly understands macOS conventions. The result feels native and thoughtfully put together.
Using it brought back a few workflow habits I haven’t used since the days when Evernote was king.
The entry point into Resurf is a floating c
Resurf is a clever new app, currently in beta, with a lot of potential. This is one of those “I needed an app to do X, so I built one” projects; the difference is that it was built by a design engineer who clearly understands macOS conventions. The result feels native and thoughtfully put together.
Using it brought back a few workflow habits I haven’t used since the days when Evernote was king.
The entry point into Resurf is a floating capture widget that you trigger with a shortcut. From there you can use either the mouse or the keyboard to capture five types of content, with some overlap:
Notes
Links
Screenshots (using a built-in capture tool)
Media
Voice memos
The same widget also provides a Spotlight-style search across your Resurf vault, which is essentially the folder where everything you capture is stored.
Practical Use Cases
There are several ways Resurf can fit into a real workflow.
Screenshot organizer A quick way to capture, store, and resurface reference screenshots without littering your desktop with files named Screenshot 2026-03-21 at 10.43.11.png.
Bookmarks and lightweight browser Links can open directly inside Resurf so you can skim content without switching to a browser. Eligible pages default to Reader View with adjustable font sizes, but you can switch to a standard page view or send the link to your default browser.
Scratchpad If you need a fast place to dump temporary information, Resurf works well as a searchable scratchpad. You can open straight into the notes interface and start typing.
Quick notes staging area Once the shortcut becomes muscle memory, it’s easy to use Resurf for quick capture even if you keep your long-term notes somewhere else. When something turns out to be worth keeping, the macOS share sheet makes it simple to move it into another app.
Organizing Your Data
A Resurf vault can live in iCloud, in another synced folder like Dropbox, or locally on your Mac. If you use iCloud, you’ll be able to pair the Mac version with the upcoming iOS app.
You can also maintain multiple vaults, each located anywhere in your file system.
Within a vault, Resurf provides several ways to organize what you capture:
Inbox / Later If you don’t want to categorize items during capture, everything can go into an Inbox for later triage. There’s also a Later folder for items you want to defer organizing.
Areas Areas function much like folders and can hold any content type.
Tags Tags can be created during capture. The sidebar includes both a tag browser and a dedicated tag view.
Pins Any item can be pinned to the top of its area.
Voice memo export for transcription Voice memos can be exported to the file system, making it easy to run them through a transcription tool and turn them into text documents.
Nice Touches
A few small details show that the developer thought about real usage rather than just features.
Share Sheet support Resurf stores notes internally as JSON rather than plain files, but exporting content to other apps is straightforward through the macOS share sheet.
Open In Similar to the share sheet; lets you send items directly to another app.
Instant Markdown rendering Markdown renders automatically without switching between edit and preview modes.
Slash commands Formatting can be applied quickly using slash commands.
Notes about notes Every captured item can include an attached note, which is handy for adding context to screenshots, links, or media.
Chrome extension Lets you save links directly from the browser.
Feature Requests
Resurf is still early in development, and there are a few capabilities that would make it significantly more powerful.
Support for clickable internal links to things like Mail messages or Obsidian notes
The ability to attach arbitrary documents to notes
Inline images inside notes (currently you can only add notes about images)
Regardless of where your vault lives, your data remains private. The app only contacts Resurf’s servers to validate your license. According to the developer, no identifying information or user content is transmitted during that process or afterward.
The company is based in Canada. Because they never see your data, GDPR provisions around data access, portability, and deletion are largely irrelevant in this case.
Price
$39
One-time purchase at the early supporter price. Unlimited captures. Any updates we release are free for 2 years after stable release.
Unlimited captures
Mac app license (up to 2 Macs)
All beta updates included
Any updates released are free for 2 years after stable release
Some small utilities become so embedded in my workflow that they start to feel like part of macOS itself. When I sit down at someone else’s Mac or a freshly set-up machine and they aren’t there, it genuinely throws me off.
I’m curious what apps fall into that category for you.
Shareful
One of those apps for me is Shareful by Sindre Sorhus.
The Mac share menu has always felt like an afterthought compared to iOS. Many developers don’t bother im
Some small utilities become so embedded in my workflow that they start to feel like part of macOS itself. When I sit down at someone else’s Mac or a freshly set-up machine and they aren’t there, it genuinely throws me off.
I’m curious what apps fall into that category for you.
The Mac share menu has always felt like an afterthought compared to iOS. Many developers don’t bother implementing it, and Apple keeps it oddly limited. Shareful fixes that by adding a few practical actions that save me a surprising number of clicks every day:
Copy
Open In
Save As…
Save to Downloads
It’s simple, but once you have it, the default share sheet feels incomplete without it.
Start by Innovative Bytes
Even though I’m very much a keyboard-launcher person (Team Raycast), there are situations where that approach breaks down.
Sometimes I need a small, obscure utility whose name I can’t remember. When your /Applications folder is as crowded as mine, scrolling through it isn’t realistic.
Tagging Tagging lets you create categories for apps without any friction. You can even nest them, like Utilities/Screenshots or Utilities/Clipboard, which makes browsing a large app library much more manageable.
Notes You can attach a short description to an app so you remember what it actually does.
A good example is the file-conversion utility Consul, which lets you change an image’s format just by renaming it. Seeing a note like “file rename / conversion” when browsing makes it much easier to find again later.
CleanShot X — the screenshot tool whose keyboard shortcuts are permanently burned into my muscle memory; although ScreenFloat is starting to make a case for itself
Power User Apps
I spend a lot of time trying to remove small bits of friction from my Mac workflow. macOS is a great system, but out of the box it still leaves a lot of obvious automation opportunities on the table.
I spend a lot of time trying to remove small bits of friction from my Mac workflow. macOS is a great system, but out of the box it still leaves a lot of obvious automation opportunities on the table.
Most of the improvements I rely on come from stitching
I spend a lot of time trying to remove small bits of friction from my Mac workflow. macOS is a great system, but out of the box it still leaves a lot of obvious automation opportunities on the table.
I spend a lot of time trying to remove small bits of friction from my Mac workflow. macOS is a great system, but out of the box it still leaves a lot of obvious automation opportunities on the table.
Most of the improvements I rely on come from stitching together tools like AppleScript, Keyboard Maestro, Shortcuts, and a few power-user utilities I discovered at r/MacApps.
None of this is complicated once it’s set up. The goal is just to eliminate little interruptions that happen dozens of times a day.
Here are a few small automations and workflow tweaks that currently make my Mac feel a lot more like my machine.
I like Safari, but I don’t like how easily it spawns extra windows. I now use an AppleScript tied to Keyboard Maestro. With a mouse click or hotkey, it closes every Safari window except the frontmost one.
Safari has good AppleScript and Shortcuts support, but it still doesn’t provide a keyboard-friendly way to jump directly to a specific Tab Group. My workaround is an Apple Shortcut that batch-opens groups of URLs that mirror my tab groups: Server, Social, Blogging, Software, etc.
I set up BetterTouchTool so that fn + Button 3 on my Logitech mouse triggers the New command across roughly two dozen apps. Depending on the app, that can mean a new tab, new note, new document, new Shortcut, new Keyboard Maestro macro, new email, or new message.
I’m currently using SideNotes as my scratchpad. It stays hidden on the right edge of my primary display until I toggle it with a hotkey or an ExtraBar menu item.
Most of these are tiny things, but they add up surprisingly fast
I use Rectangle Pro’s layout manager to launch and arrange 10 apps across two displays and eight virtual desktops. Each desktop has a keyboard shortcut, and I tie them together with a single Keyboard Maestro macro. (download link)
I wrote a small shell script (download link) that reconnects me to Tailscale if the connection drops or fails to start. It runs via launchd, configured through Lingon Pro.
I use macOS 26’s automation features in Apple Shortcuts to create my daily Obsidian note from a template. The automation also inserts a weather report and the day’s calendar events, so the note is ready when I sit down at my desk each morning. (Requires Actions for Obsidian.)
When I need a dual-pane file manager instead of Finder, a Keyboard Maestro trigger runs an AppleScript that closes all Finder windows and replaces them with a ForkLift window. (download macro)
If a developer doesn’t expose a URL scheme, you can’t deep-link into specific menu items. Finder is a good example; there’s no direct link for Go to Folder. ExtraBar can run scripts, though, so a small AppleScript can send keystrokes to trigger the command. If the feature exists in a menu but has no keyboard shortcut, you can also create your own under System Settings → Keyboard → Keyboard Shortcuts.
Sample Script
tell application "Finder" activate end tell tell application "System Events" keystroke "g" using {command down, shift down} end tell
None of these are huge changes individually, but together they remove a lot of small interruptions during the day.
Curious what small automations or workflow tricks other people here are using.
DoubleMemory
I’m always impressed when an out-of-the-box thinker builds an app unlike anything I’ve seen before. Iterating on proven concepts is fine, but after testing enough clipboard managers and voice-to-text apps, they all start to blur together. Give me something new, clever, and useful, and I’ll happily change my workflow to make room for it. a year ago, DoubleMemory caught my attention with its interesting feature set and it's done nothing b
I’m always impressed when an out-of-the-box thinker builds an app unlike anything I’ve seen before. Iterating on proven concepts is fine, but after testing enough clipboard managers and voice-to-text apps, they all start to blur together. Give me something new, clever, and useful, and I’ll happily change my workflow to make room for it. a year ago, DoubleMemory caught my attention with its interesting feature set and it's done nothing but improve since then.
I sometimes worry that one day my brain will run out of capacity for new hotkey combinations. When that happens, any app that relies on them will be off the table. DoubleMemory neatly sidesteps that problem by baking the instruction directly into its name.
Press ⌘C twice quickly, and the app captures either the webpage you’re on or the text you’ve highlighted. It then drops that content into an aesthetically well-designed, searchable, Pinterest-like interface with some surprisingly useful capabilities.
There’s a setting that allows DoubleMemory to save everything you copy, but I’d advise against leaving that on all the time. It’s not a clipboard manager in the sense that Raycast or PastePal are. For example, it doesn’t capture images.
Where it shines is with URLs. Highlight the URL of any webpage you’re on and press ⌘C twice. DoubleMemory downloads the page content and stores it locally, making it as much a read-it-later tool as a bookmark manager. In practice, it works well as either.
Saved content can sync via iCloud, which means your collection is accessible on your iPhone, iPad, and other Macs.
DoubleMemory also doubles as a lightweight notes tool. Highlight a passage of text anywhere, press ⌘C twice, and it’s saved to your board. From there you can add your own commentary and organize the entry with tags. There’s even optional AI-powered auto-tagging if you want help categorizing things.
One detail I appreciate: DoubleMemory doesn’t require an account, and you don’t need to install a browser extension. If you routinely save URLs from different sources on a specific topic, you quickly end up with a clean, searchable database that works offline.
It’s also refreshingly lightweight. The app uses roughly 10 MB of RAM during normal use. For automation fans, it supports Apple Shortcuts, the macOS share sheet, and drag-and-drop to the Dock (if you enable the Dock icon).
Interesting Features
Bookmark Imports If you want to migrate an existing read-it-later list or bookmarks from another service (for example Raindrop), DoubleMemory includes solid import tools.
Active Roadmap I’ve been following the project for about a year, and development has been steady. Planned features include image and screenshot support and automated imports of saved searches. Personally, I’d love to see it pull in my saved Reddit posts.
Approachable Developer The developer is easy to reach and actively engages with users. There’s a Discord, a Substack newsletter, an active Reddit presence, and a well-maintained website with an up-to-date changelog.
Freemium Model The free tier already allows unlimited saves, notes, bookmarks, and tags. The Pro plan mainly adds more than three saved searches and supports the developer. Future premium features are expected to focus on advanced retrieval, AI-powered organization, and richer content consumption tools. I have some 50% off subscription codes. Use the comment tool below if you want one.
DoubleMemory has a lot going for it. It’s easy to understand, genuinely useful in daily workflows, and feature-rich without feeling bloated.
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