DejalNews #91: introducing Recal: calendar tools for busy people… and more updates

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Welcome

This is DejalNews, an occasional newsletter from Dejal.

Please note that this is the last issue of DejalNews. See below for details.

Introducing Recal: calendar tools for busy people

I’ve just released the first version of a brand new app, called Recal. This is a collection of tools to help with managing the Apple Calendar, including a quick editor of events, templates for frequently used events, including a placeholder and a list of values, plus a report of hours matching criteria (with optional hourly rate), a utility to move or delete matching events, and a tool to summarize events to reduce the number of events.

Learn more on the web page for Recal. Available now for macOS, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS.

Time Out version 3.0.4 released

Time Out version 3.0.4 includes some nice fixes:

Fixed the time of the first break of the day when using the From Fixed Time scheduling option.
Fixed an issue where the Break for time could be longer than the Every interval, which doesn’t make sense.
Fixed a calendar-based break having a duration of zero instead of the duration of the calendar event.
Fixed the Teams Meeting rule script, which stopped working due to Microsoft renaming the background process that handles an active meeting.
Fixed a crash when changing the Label for a break to a grayscale color.
When an app is in full-screen, clicking the Time Out status item will now show Time Out’s window on top of the full-screen window.

It is available from the Mac App Store, via Setapp, and direct from the Dejal website.

Weather Events 1.2 released

Weather Events version 1.2 was released.

Now mentions wind gusts in the description for each breezy day, indicating about when it’ll be windy.
In the day editor, the locations menu now has an Other Location… command to search for a previous or new location.
Improved the speed and reliability of location searches.
Improved default names of locations outside the US and Canada to omit the region.
Improved handling of changing locations in different time zones.
Now cleans up unused locations.
Added a calendar menu in the Settings when setting new day locations from calendar events, to optionally only look in one calendar instead of any.
Removed the Skip button to postpone calendar authorization during onboarding, at Apple’s request.
Fixed occasionally using a placeholder location.
Fixed sometimes unexpectedly using a full address for a location.
Fixed inability to click/tap on the location map when choosing a new location.
Fixed the About, Welcome, and Settings windows appearing behind those of other apps on macOS.
Fixed overlapping controls in the onboarding titlebar.
Fixed using too much iCloud data.
Fixed a rare crash.
Now requires OS 26 or later.

If you already have the app, you can update via the App Store.

Otherwise, get Weather Events 1.2 now!

Simon 5.2b1 released

Simon version 5.2b1 was released. This update includes better support for macOS Tahoe, an improved Web Page service, tests list refinements, Preview improvements, updated variables, and much more.

It is currently a beta release, but is entirely usable. A general release will be forthcoming soonish.

If you are using the direct edition, you can change your Updates settings to include beta releases, then use the Check for Updates feature in the app to update. Otherwise, download the beta now!

This is the last issue of DejalNews

Due to low subscriber numbers and a huge amount of spam signups, I’ve decided to retire the DejalNews email newsletter. This newsletter has been going, off and on, for about 30 years — yes, three decades! It has had some hiatuses, and the subscriber list has been reset at least once, but it has never been super popular. I’m a little sad to discontinue it, but people just don’t seem to be into email nowadays, and the mail provider doesn’t do a very good job of weeding out garbage signups.

Who knows, I might bring it back again in the future; wouldn’t be the first time! But I don’t have any plans to do so at this stage.

Follow Dejal on Mastodon, Bluesky, Threads, Micro.blog, Facebook, Reddit, and more

Do you use one of the popular social media platforms? Dejal is probably there!

See this blog post for links to Dejal’s account on those platforms and more.

– David

Time Out 3.0.4 released

I have just released version 3.0.4 of Time Out to fix a few issues that may affect some people:

Fixed the time of the first break of the day when using the From Fixed Time scheduling option.
Fixed an issue where the Break for time could be longer than the Every interval, which doesn’t make sense.
Fixed a calendar-based break having a duration of zero instead of the duration of the calendar event.
Fixed the Teams Meeting rule script, which stopped working due to Microsoft renaming the background process that handles an active meeting.
Fixed a crash when changing the Label for a break to a grayscale color.
When an app is in full-screen, clicking the Time Out status item will now show Time Out’s window on top of the full-screen window.

It will be available from the Mac App Store and Setapp as soon as they approve it, and is immediately available direct from the Dejal website.

Update: now available on all three.

If you missed it, version 3 includes:

macOS Tahoe support
Exclusions are now Rules, and more powerful
A new theme editor, and image and text theme types
Added a Duplicate Break command
Enhanced the postpone/skip control limits option to per break, hour, or day
But wait, there’s more!

See the What’s New page for details.

How can I add a reminder to stand up and sit down without stopping working?

A customer asked how to add a reminder to stand up and sit down, without blocking them from working, in the /r/Dejal community on Reddit:

I want to use time out to automatically start a 45 min timer when i log in , and after that time display a message stand up (but let me continue working), and then once i stood up for 15 minutes display a message sit down. (total time 60 min) one cycle. this i want to repeat all time i am working in the computer. is this possible?

I know where to set the message, but if i set the time out to 15 minutes, it doesn’t let me continue work during those 15 minutes, as it freezes the screen.

The easiest way to achieve this is to use a single break that has a duration of zero (which doesn’t dim the screen when the break is due), and a freqeuncy of every 1 hour:

Break Schedule

Then add a couple of notifications on the Break Actions page; one 15 minutes Before Due to say to stand up, and another zero minutes Before Due to say to sit down:

Break Actions

This will show the “stand up” notification after 45 minutes, then the “sit down” notification 15 minutes later, and repeat throughout the day.

Time Out 3.0.3 released

Time Out version 3 was released recently. I just released version 3.0.3 to fix a couple more issues that may affect some people:

– Fixed the Full Countdown to Next Break status option not showing seconds when less than an hour.
– Fixed a possible crash when showing the Last Done Break Label in the status item.

It will be available from the Mac App Store and Setapp as soon as they approve it, and is immediately available direct from the Dejal website.

If you missed it, version 3 includes:

macOS Tahoe support
Exclusions are now Rules, and more powerful
A new theme editor, and image and text theme types
Added a Duplicate Break command
Enhanced the postpone/skip control limits option to per break, hour, or day
But wait, there’s more!

See the What’s New page for details.

Time Out prices increasing soon

Time Out version 3 was recently released. On the Support Time Out page in the app, I have a notice that the prices for the supporter options will be increasing soon. Time Out has an unusual payment model: most features are available to use completely free, but some features are available as rewards for people who support ongoing development. The prices haven’t changed since version 2 was released way back in 2016 (yes, a decade ago!), so I felt it was about time for a small adjustment. But I didn’t want to surprise people, so I announced it in the app, and now on the blog, so people can become a supporter, or renew their support, before the price goes up.

Time Out is available from the Mac App Store, Setapp, or direct from the Dejal website.

If you missed it, version 3 includes:

macOS Tahoe support
Exclusions are now Rules, and more powerful
A new theme editor, and image and text theme types
Added a Duplicate Break command
Enhanced the postpone/skip control limits option to per break, hour, or day
But wait, there’s more!

See the What’s New page for details.

Time Out is still free; you can use it for as long as you like without paying anything. But people who contribute to ongoing development by becoming supporters get the advanced features as a reward. You can become a supporter for 3, 6 or 12 months; these one-time payments do not auto-renew, but you can extend your support if you wish. The features will remain available permanently. You can become a supporter in the app, or via the Dejal Store.

Become a supporter now, before the price goes up! (And yes, even if you’re still using version 2.9.7, you can become or renew your supporter status.)

Time Out 3.0.2 released

Time Out version 3 was released recently. I just released version 3.0.2 to fix an important issue that could affect some people updating from version 2:

– Fixed unintentionally removing custom scripts from the scripts folder while introducing Rules scripts.

If you’ve already updated to version 3, and had added custom action scripts, my apologies; they will likely have been lost. Hopefully you can restore them from a backup. Most people won’t have added custom scripts, so this probably only affects a small percentage of people, but any data loss is a red alert for me.

It will be available from the Mac App Store and Setapp as soon as they approve it, and is immediately available direct from the Dejal website.

If you missed it, version 3 includes:

macOS Tahoe support
Exclusions are now Rules, and more powerful
A new theme editor, and image and text theme types
Added a Duplicate Break command
Enhanced the postpone/skip control limits option to per break, hour, or day
But wait, there’s more!

See the What’s New page for details.

How can Time Out pause any media before a break?

Time Out can perform actions before, during, or after a break. What if you want it to pause any media playing before a break?

A customer contributed a script that can be used with Break Actions to do just that.

It pauses any playing media when a break starts — Spotify, Plexamp, BBC Sounds, browser-based players, or anything else registered with macOS’s Now Playing system. Apps that are already paused are unaffected.

In addition to the script that you can use with Time Out’s Break Actions, there is a brew dependency that requires installation.

See the Pause Media GitHub page for details.

Note that I haven’t tested this; it seems fine, but use at your own risk.

How can I detect when the camera is in use for Time Out?

Time Out includes the ability to detect when Zoom, Teams, or FaceTime is actively in a meeting, and postpone or skip breaks via the Rules feature. But if you have something else using the camera, is there a way to detect that?

A customer contributed a script that can be used with Rules to do just that.

It automatically skips or postpones Time Out breaks while your camera is active, so you are never interrupted mid-video call. More general than the built-in rules for specific apps.

In addition to the script that you can use with Time Out’s Rules, there is an app dependency, which is bundled with the script.

See the Camera In Use GitHub page for details.

Note that I haven’t tested this; it seems fine, but use at your own risk.

Time Out 3.0.1 released

Time Out version 3 was released recently. I just released version 3.0.1 to fix one important issue that could affect some people updating from version 2:

– Fixed a crash when upgrading the data from version 2 if the Statistics page was set to show certain values.

If you had a crash when updating, this fix is for you. If you didn’t, no urgency in updating. If you haven’t updated yet, now’s your chance.

It is available from the Mac App Store, Setapp, or direct from the Dejal website. On the Mac App Store, I’m slowly rolling out the release, in case any other important issues turn up, but so far so good.

If you missed it, version 3 includes:

macOS Tahoe support
Exclusions are now Rules, and more powerful
A new theme editor, and image and text theme types
Added a Duplicate Break command
Enhanced the postpone/skip control limits option to per break, hour, or day
But wait, there’s more!

See the What’s New page for details.

DejalNews #90: Time Out 3.0 now available

DejalNews header

Welcome

This is DejalNews, an occasional newsletter from Dejal.

Want to get this newsletter in your inbox? Sign up on the Dejal site.

It’s been a while since the last DejalNews newsletter (over a year!), so I expect I’ll get several unsubscribes from people who forgot they signed up, or are no longer interested, or were added by spammers (I just spent an hour clearing out about a thousand obvious junk emails). I really should publish these a little more often. Lots of updates coming this year, so I probably will.

Time Out 3.0 released

The big news is that Time Out version 3.0 is now available! This major update to my popular break reminder app for Mac includes several huge improvements:

Time Out now requires a minimum of macOS Tahoe (26.0), and has been updated to support Liquid Glass, modern icons, and other recent technologies.
New theme editor, making it easier than ever to add custom themes.
New YouTube, Images, and Text theme types, joining the existing Local HTML and remote Website types.
Exclusions are now Rules, and more powerful, including enhancements to app rules, new fullscreen rule, customizable script-based rules including detecting when in a meeting, and more.
Added a Duplicate Break command.
Enhanced the postpone/skip control limits option to per break, hour, or day.
Improved data format, to support syncing in a future update.
Plus many other changes.

Read the blog post for full details.

New and updated themes for Time Out

Prior to the Time Out 3.0 release, I had updated several break themes, including updating and adding several YouTube-based themes, and adding a checklist theme. These are bundled with Time Out 3.0, so no need to download them manually if you update to that version… but if you have to remain on version 2.9.7 due to using an older OS version, you can download those themes from the Time Out Extras page.

Simon tip: How can I look for changes in a large binary file on a site?

I previously published a Simon tip, based on a customer query. They wanted to detect when a large binary file like an app changes on a website. While Simon could download the file, I came up with a better solution.

Check out this blog post for the details.

Time Out tip: The Calm theme can’t log in; how can I still use Calm?

For people who use the Calm.com website, they made a change that makes it harder to use during a Time Out break. But I came up with a way around that.

Check out this blog post for the details.

Follow Dejal on Mastodon, Bluesky, Threads, Micro.blog, Facebook, Reddit, and more

Do you use one of the popular social media platforms? Dejal is probably there!

See this blog post for links to Dejal’s account on those platforms and more.

– David