When you create a Mac app using SwiftUI, you get the standard Mac menubar by default. The commands modifier lets you customize the menu bar, either by adding, replacing or removing items and menus. You can even add some presets which give a consistent way to add groups of common items.

The problem comes when you want to communicate back to the SwiftUI views from the menubar. How can you direct your menubar commands to the correct destination? AppKit uses the responder chain, so it effectively broadcasts any menubar message until something handles it. This might be an edit field, a view, a window or even the app itself. SwiftUI doesn’t work like this, but I’ve explored multiple possibilities for passing messages from the menubar to the active window.

macOS by Tutorials Edition 3.0 is now available!

The book is available for purchase or update at Gumroad .

If you previously bought the first edition of this book from either Kodeco or Amazon, please email me for a 50% discount code.

if you already bought the second edition from me via Gumroad, this is a free update that you can download from your Gumroad library.

In Xcode 16, Apple quietly introduced the ability to format your Swift files using Swift Format. I’m a long-time user of SwiftLint, but having such a tool built into Xcode would be a great convenience, so I decided to give it a try. Here is my description of why I use such a tool, how well it works compared to the alternatives, and how I configured it for my own purposes.

In 2012, with OS X Mountain Lion, Apple added a feature called Gatekeeper . It had been available earlier as a command line utility, but this was the first time they made it accessible through System Preferences. Gatekeeper allowed users to control which apps could be installed on their Macs by offering three options: allow apps from App Store, App Store and identified developers or Anywhere. This was the start of Apple trying to lock Macs down, similarly to how iOS devices are locked down, but it allowed power users to install any apps they wanted.

In macOS Sierra (2019), the Anywhere option was removed. It was still possible to open any app by right-clicking and selecting Open. You had to get past a couple of warning dialogs, but it worked. Now, in macOS Sequoia, even that has gone. So how can you open an app that isn’t signed by an identified developer?

TL;DR: You can still run unsigned apps, but it’s a bit more difficult. After trying once, you have to go to System Settings -> Privacy & Security, scroll to the end and click Open Anyway for that app.

In Xcode 16, project files and folders are arranged differently in the Project navigator. What used to be a group is now a folder, and this simple change has some interesting effects. At first, I was against the new scheme - in fact in my SwiftUI for Mac 2024 article, I specifically recommended reverting back to the old group method. But after doing some more reading and testing, I think the answer is not so clear cut.

Since Xcode 15 doesn’t work on macOS Sequoia, now’s my last chance to create sample apps with both Xcode 15 and Xcode 16 in macOS Sonoma, and compare the two.

A couple of months ago, I got a message from App Store Connect pointing out that one of my iPhone apps - Berio’s Sequenza VII - had not been updated in 3 years and so would be removed from the App Store unless I updated it within 90 days. I disagree with this policy, but small developers like me can’t fight Apple. Since I want the app to remain available, I then had to consider how to update it. Once I opened the app project, I realized that the app was written in Objective-C, so I decided to take the plunge and convert it to Swift and SwiftUI.

Over the years, I have written articles and sample apps to demonstrate the new features of each year’s SwiftUI updates with particular emphasis on macOS app development. Last year, the major update to SwiftUI was the new data flow system using the Observation framework. I covered that in my article SwiftUI Data Flow 2023 but I didn’t feel there were sufficient UI changes to warrant an update to my usual sample app.

This year, the HTTP Cats app is back! And I’ll cover new features from both WWDC 2023 and WWDC 2024.

I started writing books for Kodeco when I was asked to contribute some Mac content to SwiftUI by Tutorials . I quickly learned that I really enjoyed long form technical writing but I wanted to create more Mac-specific content. After some negotiations, Kodeco agreed to my plan to write macOS by Tutorials and the first edition was published in April 2022.

As I have written elsewhere, Kodeco has pivoted away from books and into providing multi-modal courses. They agreed to transfer the rights of the macOS by Tutorials book to me as it was out-of-catalog and since then, I have released an update.

When writing for Kodeco, all I had to do was write the text and the accompanying code and images. The people at Kodeco took care of the rest. Many thanks to all involved - I greatly underestimated the work that this entailed! Now that I am self-publishing, I have had to learn how to create the various formats myself. This post is a summary of how I did that.

In April 2022, Kodeco published the first edition of macOS by Tutorials . Nothing stays the same in the world of Apple development, so I started to plan an update after WWDC 2023. At around that time, Kodceo was going through a transformation from being like a library to being more of an educational institution. Their focus is now on multi-modal courses and they are no longer interested in publishing books.

Kodeco agreed to transfer the rights of the macOS by Tutorials book to me, since it was out-of-catalog and since then, I have been working on an update which is almost ready for release. I had hoped to have it out before WWDC 2024, but real-life has a habit of getting in the way, and that was not possible.

The book is now available at Gumroad .

If you previously bought the book from either Kodeco or Amazon, please email me for a 50% discount code. I am unable to provide a free update for the Kodeco version, but I will provide free updates subsequently for the self-published version.

Several years after I started planning it, Man Reader version 2 is now available. This is a major update with a completely new, modern, user interface and it’s available from the Mac App Store .

Man Reader is a utility app for reading macOS’s man pages. Man Reader allows quick, convenient and easy access to the man pages on your system, useful for programmers, system administrators and tweakers.