[DrammBA]

Given how many developers here use LLMs daily, how do you think about defensibility? Tools like this seem relatively easy to reverse-engineer and replicate with enough time and LLM assistance. Did that influence your decision to charge a subscription or the change to a personal license?

[a-ve]

That's the reason why I added a subscription in the first place - you would pay a dirt-cheap price for a "boring" product with an added insurance that someone will be there to support it.

People will replicate it, sure, but supporting it regularly is another thing. I guess the majority wanted a perpetual license - so it's a win for the masses.

[risyachka]

>> how do you think about defensibility?

defensibility nowadays is app support and development. the more work you pour into it the more defensible it will be.

I personally would gladly pay to have app constantly polished and improved. What I would not use is some vibe-coded alternative that was slopped with AI in a day and pushed to github with a tweet "i made a free X alternative" and then abandoned.

[user34283]

I would not.

I'm not paying $40 for a taskbar replacement. And not for two years of updates and a two device limit on top.

Maybe if it was $10, I could consider it. Prices for macOS apps are insane in my opinion. Everyone wants to charge yearly or every two years now too.

[madhacker]

I second this! As a lite Mac user, $40 is a bit steep. I'll manage without boringBar no matter how great it is.

[hirvi74]

Honestly, I have tried to really cut down on my usage of 3rd-party dependencies when possible. In a way, it's kind of freeing. Whatever I still need, I write myself. If I cannot write it, then I try to find something FOSS. If I find nothing, then I consider purchasing something.

For example, I am rolling my own window manager (that needs some much needed TLC). I ditched Alfred for Spotlight. Though Alfred is better, I will survive just fine. And the list goes on.

I am not trying to take a dig at the OP. I am sure he or she put effort into this application. But I am genuinely curious -- does anybody actually need this software? Cmd+Tab, a decent window manager, and Spotlight would solve the same problems for free.

[mitchell209]

I fresh install to give myself a different perspective when I feel like I have too many 3rd party solutions to problems that no longer exist. Spotlight is better and I only casually use my macbook nowadays, so I don't need the power of Alfred. I don't need dock extensions because Stage Manager is mediocre but works well enough for the browser, chat / music apps, and whatever document I'm working with at the time.

[dangus]

They’re not insane.

It costs $99 a year just to be able to write Mac apps at all.

Any sort of buy-once app on macOS is unsustainable to the developer. They are paying Apple $99 a year forever.

If you want cheap/free apps get off of Apple’s ecosystem and switch to Linux.

[zx8080]

> It costs $99 a year just to be able to write Mac apps at all.

$99 costs publishing apps for profit.

Anyone can compile and run for free.

[rahabash]

Seconded. $10 for 2y and Id buy.. otherwise it feels too steep a price.

[shamsghi]

Agree

[mfru]

how much is there to improve and polish for a taskbar? at most it will be keeping up with macOS throwing breaking changes at you and maybe one or the other weird bug.

but isn't that it?

[8avo]

I cannot agree with you more.

Personally, I dare not replace the Dock with Windows-style task bar for fear that my OLED display might have burn-in on it. Yet, when I need an alternative, I would rather make an APP for my own.

[butlike]

It's not the idea, it's the implementation. It still takes time and effort to reverse-engineer, LLM assistance or not.