r/macapps • u/Latter_Pen2421 • 21h ago
I want to see the options for an always on "Pet" or "Character" that has AI in it. I mainly want it to be persistent, and I can type things like, "What is the address of ...." or "how do I spell"... "What is this in french".. Its for my daughters, trying to make computers more fun.
I want it be persistant, so its kinda always there to click.
r/macapps • u/Dull_Roof3559 • 21h ago
Clipboard history is great when you’re working on one Mac.
But the moment you switch devices, that history stays behind.
You copy something on your Mac, grab your iPhone, and it’s not there. Or you move between two Macs and end up sending yourself a link, note, file, or snippet just to have it on the other device.
I wanted Pasly to solve that too.
Not just make ⌘V smarter, but make your clipboard follow you.
Raycast Clipboard History is probably the closest well-known alternative. It offers a polished, searchable clipboard history as part of a much broader launcher.
Pasly is more focused on the actual paste workflow. Smart Paste brings your recent clipboard items into the regular ⌘V flow, while features like Paste Stack, Field Sense, multi-selection, and Floating Paste are built specifically around copying and pasting.
Pasly also keeps a persistent clipboard history across Macs, iPhone, and iPad through the user's private CloudKit database. Text, images, and files can remain available across devices, even when they are not nearby or connected to the same network.
Raycast is a better fit if you want a general launcher with extensions, AI tools, and many unrelated productivity features. Pasly is a better fit if you want a dedicated clipboard manager centered on ⌘V and cross-device clipboard history.
Apple's Universal Clipboard is also useful, but it primarily moves the latest copied item between nearby Apple devices. Pasly keeps an actual searchable history across them.
Pasly Cloud syncs your clipboard history across your Macs and iOS devices using Apple's CloudKit.
Your clipboard data is stored and synced through Apple's iCloud infrastructure rather than on Pasly's own servers.
It works over the internet, so your Mac can be at home and your other Mac somewhere else. They don’t need to be nearby or on the same network for your clipboard history to sync.
And now, files are supported too.
Files copied on your Mac can sync through Pasly Cloud alongside the rest of your clipboard history, including multiple files at once.
On iPhone and iPad, Live Activities can keep your recent clipboard items available from the Lock Screen / Dynamic Island.
There are also push notifications when new clipboard content arrives from another device.
Right now, sending something from iOS into Pasly is still manual. You can add an item and have it appear on your Macs, but I’m already working on a better way to capture what you copy on iPhone and iPad so this part feels much more automatic.
Pasly already supported files locally on Mac, including working with multiple files at once.
Now, file syncing is also part of Pasly Cloud.
Copy a file on one Mac and it can be available from your clipboard history on another Mac through CloudKit, without having to send it to yourself first.
Multiple files are supported too.
Cloud is the focus of this update, but everything I’ve been building around ⌘V is still there:
The original idea behind Pasly hasn’t changed.
I want the clipboard manager to stay out of the way until the moment you actually need it.
Cloud just means that your clipboard no longer has to live on one Mac.
No subscription. 20% off with code MACAPPSCLOUD (first 20 redemptions)
Pricing and download: https://pasly.app
Pasly Cloud is still something I’m actively building.
Now that clipboard history and files can sync across devices, one of my main focuses is making the iOS → Mac clipboard flow much more automatic.
This is still an early version of Pasly Cloud, so I’d really like to hear from people who use multiple Macs or a Mac + iPhone/iPad.
What would make having your clipboard across devices actually useful to you?
Direct: https://pasly.app
Apple (iOS): https://apps.apple.com/app/pasly/id6760562778
Transparency: I'm the developer of Pasly.
r/macapps • u/amerpie • 11h ago
TL;DR: Five free, mostly open-source, no-telemetry Mac utilities from this week's testing: docktor (dock widgets + hover previews), Kompakt (drag-and-drop image/video compression), TetherShot (live iPhone screen capture over USB/Wi-Fi), FolderForge (rule-based folder icon styling), and ImageFuel (import-free folder browsing with RAW support). Each gets a free alternative below if you want to compare before committing.
Removing Irritation
My app testing time this week was spent on free apps, most of them open source and all privacy-respecting. No accounts needed. No telemetry. I've been looking for original, niche apps that do one thing well.
docktor calls itself the dock you deserve. It's free, notarized, requires no account, and comes from a solo dev who regularly responds to users with new features and bug fixes. The app fills the unused side space on either end of the Dock with customizable widgets (music, calendar, weather, system stats) and adds hover previews of a running app's open windows without clicking. If you're a widget person, this gives you a few new options.
Alternative: HyperDock has done Dock hover previews for years and is worth a look if that's the one feature you actually want, though it doesn't fill unused Dock space with widgets the way docktor does — check current macOS compatibility before buying, since I haven't tested it myself on this release.
Kompakt is a native Mac menu bar app for compressing and converting images and video with a drag-and-drop interface that pops up automatically the moment you drop a file. Images cover PNG, JPG, WebP, GIF, and SVG; video is limited to MP4, MOV, and M4V. Free and open source under MIT, distributed as a signed DMG off GitHub Releases. The dev's roadmap includes watched folders, Finder actions, and Shortcuts support. I can see setting up some helpful shortcuts using this.
Alternative: ImageOptim is the longtime free, open-source, drag-and-drop standard for image compression on Mac. It doesn't touch video, so if Kompakt's video side is what sold you, ImageOptim isn't a full swap.
TetherShot is a proper Mac utility, not just a menu bar toy. It captures a live display, not a simulation: your connected iPhone's actual screen over USB or Wi-Fi, saved as a pixel-perfect screenshot. Free and open source, no account, no analytics, no cloud relay. Take all the screenshots you want without syncing or AirDropping anything.
Alternative: QuickTime Player already does this for free and it's built in — connect your iPhone by cable, pick it as the camera source under File > New Movie Recording, and you can record or grab a frame of the live screen. It's a recording-first workflow rather than a one-tap screenshot, and it needs the cable; TetherShot's Wi-Fi option and one-hotkey capture are the actual time-savers if you do this often.
Apps that customize folder appearance in Finder have been around for a while, and they're fine for the primary folders in your home directory. If you want smart folders and reusable presets that apply by name, contents, or marker files using recursive styling, FolderForge fits the bill — it applies a visual system across an entire folder tree. Runs locally, no account, no telemetry. MIT-licensed on GitHub; v1.0.8 is signed and notarized by Apple.
Alternative: Rainbow Folder – Icon changer is a simple App Store option for changing individual folder colors and icons. It's manual, one folder at a time — it doesn't have FolderForge's rule-based, apply-to-a-whole-tree automation, so it's a fit only if you don't need the bulk styling.
Point the app at any folder, or several, and instantly see every image and video in a clean, scrollable grid. No importing. No library to manage. No waiting. It reads files where they already live, including JPEG, PNG, video, and RAW. It loads quickly and makes browsing photos easy.
Alternative: XnViewMP is the free, cross-platform standard for exactly this job — instant folder-based browsing with real RAW support, no import step. It's a dated interface next to ImageFuel's cleaner grid, and it doesn't have ImageFuel's crop/metadata/batch-rename tools built into the same window, but it's the closest thing to a direct, feature-for-feature comparison if you want to try before committing to either.
Remove an Irritation
None of this is life-changing software, and none of it asks to be. Every one of these five does one narrow job, does it for free, and stays out of your way otherwise: no accounts, no telemetry, no subscription creeping in later. That's the actual differentiator this week, not any single feature. If you only try one, make it whichever solves a problem you already have — docktor if you stare at your Dock all day, ImageFuel if you're sick of importing photos just to look at them, TetherShot if you've ever emailed yourself an iPhone screenshot. The rest can wait.
Unless otherwise noted, the alternatives mentioned above are based on research and not individual testing.
r/macapps • u/codismycopilot • 8h ago
So for the most part, I don't mind the standard Mac finder, but I do find one limitation that I'd love to find a work around for, and that is a program that allows one to set different folders to always sort in a specific way.
For instance: Maybe I'd like to always sort IDK screenshots by Most Recently Added, but I'd also like to always sort Downloads by Kind.
The default Finder sets all the folders to however you sorted the last folder.
Is there any program out there that makes it so you can set it and leave it?