Étiquette : mac app store

Displays updated to version 1.4

We’re releasing today a new version 1.4 of Displays, our app to change resolution on Mac and manage monitors.

With this version, you can choose the amount of blue light to reduce, in order to rest your eyes, and you can now assign a keyboard shortcut to take a screenshot. Other improvements have been made to better handle overheight menus and to show if a monitor supports P3 wide gamut.

But above all, we fixed bugs occurring with macOS Sierra. With version 1.3, Displays was not able to support retina resolutions on all Macs. We’ve fixed that. We also fixed a bug preventing the dark mode to be correctly switched on/off when using our night mode.

This version is only available on our website, as we’re not selling it on the Mac App Store anymore. If you bought Displays on the Mac App Store, you are eligible to a free licence.

For a limited-time only, you can buy Displays on our webstore with a 30% discount offer: enter the coupon code « WELCOME ».

Migrating outside the App Store

Today, we took the decision to start selling our apps by ourselves.

When Apple opened their App Store for the Mac in 2011, we immediately decided to sell our apps on it. TunesArt was the first app on the store, and TrashMe just after. In may 2016, we launched a third app on the Mac App Store: Displays.

The Mac App Store is a great way to discover new apps. For users, it also means a centralised place to buy, manage and install their apps. However, nothing has been really easy! Before releasing TunesArt on the Mac App Store, we submitted dozen of versions to Apple: all rejected. We removed two features (automatic download of lyrics and iPod scrobbling) to conform to Apple rules. Same happened with TrashMe: on the App Store, an app can’t offer a feature requesting admin password. That was a major issue, as the purpose of TrashMe is to uninstall apps and clean your Mac, which means sometimes requesting admin password.

For Displays, the situation is a bit different: Apple changed something in their API designed to manage resolutions. That means that Displays can’t manage Retina resolutions anymore on macOS Sierra… at least not with the official way. You need to know that there are public and private APIs. When you change your screen resolution, Apple is using a private API, and not the public API exposed to all developers. And guess what? Using private APIs is strictly forbidden on the Mac App Store, so we have no choice: leaving the Mac App Store is the only solution.

That does not mean we’re removing all our apps from the Mac App Store. Only Displays is leaving the store today, our other apps will be shortly available both on the Mac App Store and our webstore. For people having bought Displays on the Mac App Store, we’re offering a free licence key to migrate outside the Mac App Store.

Visit our webstore to buy ours apps.

Displays 1.1 is now available

We’ve just released the first update for Displays, our monitors manager for Mac OS X. Displays 1.1 is now available on the Mac App Store as a free update. It’s recommended for all users, as we fixed several bugs.

We also added some new features. As requested by users, you can now hide resolutions you don’t want to see in main menu (go to Labels tab in Preferences). Last, we added some settings for PiP windows to manage position and level. Read full changelog here.

We’d like to thank all our first users for their enthusiasm and their great support. Anybody can suggest new features and ideas thanks to our contact page. New features will be added in upcoming release, so stay tuned!

Displays can be downloaded on the Mac App Store for 2.99$ (special launch price).
More information: Displays page | Youtube channel

Apple and application sandboxing

The biggest revolution for Mac applications is coming soon. Apple is going to force developers to implement sandboxing in their applications, before the end of March 2012. At least for applications available on the Mac App Store.

Sandboxing is a great concept for end-user, as it improves security: a sandboxed application does not have any access to your system, except for some particular and limited tasks. Thus, the application don’t see your filesystem, but only its « sandbox » (also called « container »). iOS already implements this concept, which main limitation is the impossibility for an application to read or write file in another application container.

However, what is good for a mobile phone is not always good for a computer! On Mac OS X, many applications need a wide access to your system, such as our application TrashMe (we’re looking and deleting files in you Library folder, which is forbidden for a sandboxed app). We don’t have any guarantee that our app will be compatible with future Mac App Store rules. Previous deadline was November 2011, but there were too many bugs with sandboxing and Apple decided to define a new deadline.

We’re working hard on improving our applications and testing sandboxing (and a new project is coming soon). We’ll keep you informed.

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