What's new in 1.0 “Big Slur”
Everything. It is the first release.
Release notes are traditional, so here are some. Nothing below has ever been in a previous version, because there was not one.
Magnification that tracks the cursor
A proper falloff curve, with the peak genuinely following the pointer rather than snapping to the nearest icon. Tune the size and the width of the curve by feel — every slider applies live.
Real acrylic blur
Windows' own backdrop blur behind a rounded slab, asked for through the same API the shell uses. Not a screenshot, not a grey rectangle with opacity on it.
Minimise into the dock
A live thumbnail of the window flies down into its icon, the way it should. Restoring flies it back out.
Window previews on hover
Rest on an app with several windows open and every one appears above the icon as a live thumbnail with its title. Click one to switch straight to it. Five browser windows are otherwise one icon and one dot.
Running apps appear on their own
Anything with an open window shows up whether it was pinned or not, slotted in before the separator, with a running dot underneath. Right-click and Keep in Dock to pin it for good.
A menu bar across the top
Acrylic, 24pt, reserving its own strip so maximised windows stop below it. The active app's name in bold, File / Edit / View / Window, battery, Wi-Fi, a Control Centre with real Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, brightness and volume, and a clock.
Three ways to get out of the way
Never hide, hide whenever the cursor is away, or dodge — stay put until a window actually reaches the dock and slide away only while one is there.
A dock on every display
Primary only, one nominated screen, every screen at once, or one dock that follows the cursor after a short dwell so it stops teleporting on every screen crossing.
Drawn icons for two offenders
The Clock app gets a real analog face showing the real time, rolling over each minute. Settings gets a machined silver gear on a grey squircle, with corners that actually run into the edges.
Technical specifications
Requirements
MackOS carries its own runtime, so there is nothing to install first.
| Processor | 64-bit x64 |
|---|---|
| Operating system | Windows 10 version 1809 or later, or Windows 11 |
| Disk space | 190 MB |
| Prerequisites | None |
| Installer | None |
| Background services | None |
| Kernel drivers | None |
| Account required | No |
| Telemetry | None |
| Price | None |
That is the entire table. There is no second page.
Installation
Two steps, and one blue box
Unzip it anywhere
The Desktop is fine. Inside are three files: the app, the read-me, and the licence.
Double-click MackOS.exe
The licence appears first. After you accept it, the dock fills itself from whatever is currently pinned to your taskbar. Right-click the dock, or use the tray icon, to configure or quit.
“Windows protected your PC”
You will probably see a blue SmartScreen box saying it stopped an unrecognised app. That is because MackOS is not code-signed — a certificate costs a few hundred dollars a year — not because anything is wrong with the file. Click More info, then Run anyway.
If you would rather check first, here is the SHA-256 of the download. Compare it with Get-FileHash .\MackOS.zip -Algorithm SHA256.
Known limits
Things that are not finished
Sold to you by the person who wrote it, so you may as well hear it from him.
Multiple monitors are unproven
The per-display architecture is built and every mode is selectable, but only one monitor was attached during testing. Two docks side by side, two reserved work areas, mixed DPI scales and hot-plugging a display have not been driven end to end.
Hiding modes are lightly tested
Auto-hide and dodge are wired up and build clean, but were not exercised in anger. Both are off by default.
Two things Windows will not allow
Applications do not publish their menus to other processes, so File / Edit / View send the standard shortcuts rather than that app's real commands. And the Wi-Fi network name is location data, so with Location services off the bar shows “Connected” without a name.
It is not code-signed
Hence the SmartScreen prompt above. The hash on this page is the only integrity check on offer, and this page is served over your own network.
Get MackOS 1.0
One zip. The app, a read-me, and the licence. Nothing is written to your machine until you run it, and nothing outside %APPDATA%\MackOS after that.