There have been a lot of discussions recently about the Mac App Store, and how many Mac developers are abandoning it. Here's an excerpt from one example, which includes links to many others:
The Mac App Store was released in January 2011 and it marked the beginning of a great new distribution channel. Even though it lacked some bells and whistles, the developer community was hopeful the problems would be addressed in due course. Unfortunately, it has been years and there’s no evidence that the core issues would be addressed in the future, at all. When notable developers are abandoning your platform, cannot do the right thing for their customers and are delaying their MAS submission, something is very, very broken. I believe that the inaction is harmful to the whole Mac community, affecting consumers and developers alike.
— Mac App Store: The Subtle Exodus by Milen Dzhumerov
This has been a concern for me and my Dejal apps, too.
As I work on an update to my Simon app, I'm once again faced with this issue. Simon currently has two editions in the Mac App Store, Simon Express and Simon Free. Those are already cut-down editions of the full Simon app available on this website, but they also haven't been updated since Apple introduced the sandbox requirements. Simon is a large and powerful app, and really isn't able to be sandboxed without cutting out even more functionality, which I don't want to do.
So, I am forced to announce that Simon Express and Simon Free will be removed from the Mac App Store when the next update of Simon is released. I've thought about removing them immediately, but decided that it'd be better to leave them until the more natural point of the next update. I would really recommend that everyone use the full version of Simon instead of the App Store editions, though.
What about my other apps?
The current version of my free break reminder tool Time Out, 1.7.1, can not be sandboxed either, so the latest version on the Mac App Store, Time Out Free, is stuck at 1.6.5. Again, I recommend people use the version from this site instead. However, I am working on version 2 (currently in alpha testing), which is sandboxed. Supporting sandboxing has complicated the design, and added a lot of work, but I felt it was worth it for such a generally popular and widely-used app. So Time Out 2 will be available both on the Dejal site and the Mac App Store.
My snippet manager app, Caboodle, is up to version 1.5 currently, but again the Mac App Store edition, Caboodle Express, is a bit behind at version 1.4. As with Time Out, this is a widely-used app, so I want to be able to update the App Store edition. So I'm also working on an update that will support this (and may even support iCloud and Dropbox syncing). Work on this is on hold currently; I'll resume after the next updates of Simon and Time Out are done.
Finally, BlogAssist, my menubar utility to help with HTML markup (which I used extensively writing this blog post) is already fully sandboxed and up-to-date on the App Store. Both the standard edition and BlogAssist Express on the App Store are on version 2.4.
So, as you can see, I still believe in the Mac App Store and want to support it for my consumer apps. Although it has technical challenges, and definitely has many problems as others have discussed, I think it is a useful service for my customers, and a valuable way of getting my apps in front of more people.
However, for a more niche, powerful and professional app like Simon, the limitations of the App Store outweigh its benefits, so I can't justify the compromises required to support it. I do hope that changes in the future — there are lots of things Apple could do to make the App Store a better fit for such apps — but I don't think they have much interest in such changes. I'm just glad that they recognize that there are apps that don't fit the App Store, and continue to support apps outside the store via mechanisms like Developer ID.
Announcing the general release of Simon 3.6!
This release includes new Notification Center and History plug-ins, a rewritten Twitter plug-in, several report enhancements, and other improvements:
One (last?) beta of Simon 3.6, with a couple more tweaks:
Here's another beta of Simon 3.6. This has a tweak based on a recent Simon forum discussion, and updated help and localizations. This will probably be the last beta before general release.
Happy holidays!
Here's another beta of Simon 3.6.
This version includes:
It's been a while, but here's a beta of the next version of Simon, my flagship Mac app to monitor websites and servers.
Version 3.6b1 includes:
Simon is now available for 25% off at MacUpdate Promo, for a limited time!
They are offering the Platinum license, which supports unlimited tests, for just $374.00!
Plus they have the Bronze license, with up to 15 active test configurations, for just $36.99, and the Silver license, with up to 40 tests, for just $74.49!
Don't miss these great prices!
(2013-05-21: Updated links and prices for the extended deals.)
Here's a quick update to Simon, to version 3.5.1.
This update fixes an issue that prevented the Apple Mail transport method of the E-mail notifier plug-in from working properly.
It also improves the reliability and debug logging of the Web (HTTP) plug-in.
There's a great sense of antici...pation in the developer community, awaiting tickets for Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference to go on sale.
The problem is, in recent years the tickets have been selling out in mere hours. In 2009, the 5,000 tickets sold out within a month. In 2010, they sold out in about 10 days. In 2011, it was only 12 hours. And in 2012, it only took two hours.
How fast will they go this year? Less than an hour? Half an hour? Minutes?
So there are a number of websites that offer to notify you when WWDC is announced, so you can get your ticket as quickly as possible — some where you pay to get notified sooner.
Of course, Dejal Simon is designed for just that kind of job. If you already have Simon, you can easily add a test to get notified. If you don't, you can download the free trial and try it yourself.
It's easy to add such a test. Simply create a new test (perhaps called "WWDC"), set the frequency to whatever interval you like (e.g. 5 minutes or even 1 minute), choose the Web (HTTP) service, and enter the http://developer.apple.com/wwdc URL. (The Cookies will automatically populate.)
If you like, you could add a second test for http://developer.apple.com/wwdc/tickets, in case that is updated first.
There's no need to alter the default Change filter on the Filters page; that will detect any change on the page. Since there isn't dynamic content to ignore, that's fine.
To get notified when a change is detected for this test, add whichever notifiers you want to the Notifiers page. Why not go crazy and add email, sound, Twitter and speech... and have the page open automatically in your default browser while you're at it:
Some of those notifiers you may need to configure, if you haven't previously, e.g. set up the email and Twitter ones. You can configure them to say whatever you like:
I hope this tip helps you manage to get a ticket!
Announcing the general release of Simon version 3.5!
Firstly, please note that Simon now requires an Intel Mac, and a minimum of OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard). If you are using Simon on an older machine, you can continue using version 3.4 or earlier (there are download links on the Simon site).
Simon 3.5 includes a number of improvements and fixes for OS X 10.8 (Mountain Lion) support. It also includes improvements to the Web (HTTP) Twitter, Calendar, Script, Email and Speech plug-ins.
Here are the full release notes for the details:
One last (hopefully) beta release of Simon 3.5.
This beta release just includes updated German, French and Japanese localizations.
I want to do the general release next week, so please test this version and let me know if you experience any issues.
Here's another beta of Simon 3.5. Please check that everything works as expected, and let me know ASAP if you find anything wrong. Thanks!
This update includes:
Here's a second beta release of Simon 3.5.
This update includes more improvements, including something I've wanted to do for a while: split up the Web (HTTP) plug-in to make it more failsafe. A small number of customers, that use this plug-in extensively, sometimes find that it starts failing after waking the computer. Hopefully this change will solve that. Plus it's better for security and future sandboxing.
There's also an improvement that Japanese people in particular will enjoy, though I'm sure others will benefit too.
Here are the details:
Announcing the first beta release of Simon 3.5. This update doesn't add any features yet (some may be added in a later beta), but provides full Mountain Lion compatibility via moving to the latest development tools, which necessitated a number of other changes.
One of those changes is dropping PPC support. I know that this may affect some customers, since Simon often runs on an older server machine, and I apologize if this is disappointing. But the latest development tools don't support PPC anymore. Similarly, the minimum OS version has been raised to Snow Leopard (10.6).
Here are the details:
My flagship Mac app, Dejal Simon, turned 10 years old earlier this month. Simon 1.0 was released on 2002-12-06. I actually missed the anniversary, but Jean MacDonald mentioned other 10-year anniversaries on Twitter, and I realized Simon's was also recent. I do like to blog about Dejal history, so I thought I'd mark this milestone too.
Like most software, Simon has undergone many changes since its inception all those years ago. An immediately obvious difference is the icon: version 1.0 had a monochrome icon, as shown to the right. The modern icon is similar, but more colorful and attractive, I think.
As for the user interface, version 1.0 looked somewhat different, though you'll recognize a number of elements that have persisted to this day:
Check out those pinstripes! Simon 1.0 worked with Mac OS X 10.1, where the window chrome was much more in-your-face than nowadays.
Back in the initial versions, Simon's editors were displayed in sheets over the top of the list windows, instead of as separate windows as now. Here's the Alter Test editor over the (cropped) main window:
Back in 1.0, all Simon did was check websites (or FTP sites), so there's no service selection. And everything's crowded into this one sheet, which only got more busy in 2.0. It was finally split over multiple pages in 3.0, which I think is much nicer and clearer.
Similarly, here's the Alter Notifier editor, also as a sheet. The only notifiers supported initially were Sound and Speech; it's much more versatile nowadays:
Finally, here's what the Simon website looked like back then; notice the old Dejal logo, and the rather dated design:
I hope you enjoyed this brief romp down memory lane. Take a look at the modern Simon 3!
I must admit, I set the version number in 3.4b3 to just 3.4, for the Mac App Store release, and forgot to set it back. So the version I released this morning as 3.4b3 was actually a general release build. Since the previous version had been in beta several weeks, and there was just one change in this new build, I decided to let it remain as such.
So, here it is, officially as a general release!
This version includes a much more reliable Automatic Email transport, along with some other improvements:
defaults write com.dejal.simon EmailUseLegacyTransport YES
in Terminal. (Standard edition only)A quick update of Simon, to 3.4b3.
This release fixes an issue that prevented the second check of a new test from detecting a change. Subsequent checks worked fine, but the second check not detecting a change can cause confusion.
Note that new or edited tests don't register a change for the first check after editing, in case the configuration was altered.
This will probably be the last beta before the general release. So please let me know if you find any issues.
Simon 3.4b2 is all about the Email and SMS notifier plug-ins.
Ever since the Email notifier was introduced, several years ago, it has been problematic — configuring email settings can be quite difficult.
This release replaces the Automatic email mode with a new Apple Mail one, which (as the name implies) uses Apple's Mail app to send the email. It has a convenient list of accounts, just like in Mail (if you have that option enabled there), and when it notifies it launches Mail in the background (if it is not already running) and quietly sends the email.
So this makes configuring the Email notifier easier, and it should be much more reliable than the old "Automatic" mechanism. As a bonus, you'll have a record of the sent emails in your Sent mailbox in Mail (you can always use a rule to delete them if you wish).
If you don't want to use Mail, or want more control, you can still use the custom SMTP and sendmail transports.
Finally, the SMS notifier plug-in also uses the new Apple Mail mechanism, as an alternative to the Clickatell service.
Here are the release notes with more information:
defaults write com.dejal.simon EmailUseLegacyTransport YES
in Terminal. (Standard edition only)I've just done a small beta release of Simon, to version 3.4b1.
This has a useful change, and a couple of important fixes:
I am spending most of my time on a couple of new projects (one of them for a client, the other as a prototype for Time Out 2 technology). But I plan to do small incremental beta releases of Simon 3.4 over the next few weeks, basically releasing changes as soon as I've done them, since work on it will be sporadic. It'll be an interesting experiment in release styles.
As always, if you find any issues or have any suggestions for improvements, let me know in the Simon Forum. While I'm working on a release is a great time to send in suggestions, as they're much more likely to get implemented straight away, instead of added to the feature suggestions list. (But no promises; as I said, my time on Simon is limited currently.)