This is an interesting app in terms of illuminating expectations of different user groups.<p>Back in 2010 when I got my first MacBook, the app not closing when the window closed was alien to me as someone who had only ever used Windows. But that discomfort only lasted a few months, and I grew to strongly prefer the distinction of “this app is running” and “this app is has a window open” + value the difference between Cmd-Q and Cmd-W.<p>I remember one OS update made the app closing behavior the default, and I had to go learn where the setting was to undo it; a subsequent OS backtracked on that. The distinction is less meaningful these days with NVME making apps launch much faster than spinning 2.5” drives, but stuff like Photoshop still has a long startup time.
I have used Macintoshes since 1984 and I never once even noticed this dichotomy. When I looked at this app, I thought, "Huh? Why would I care about that?" I literally never once considered the accumulation of open apps to be any sort of inconvenience. Having it brought up, I realize that land on the pro-Mac-style side of the conversation.<p>When I have used Windows (and it's a fair amount), I am often annoyed to have an app that I thought was in the Taskbar gone. The cognitive step of thinking it was there, looking for it, seeing it gone, realizing I closed its last window and hunting it down in the (still appalling) Start Menu is distracting.<p>I consider it to be another example of my long held belief that Microsoft never, ever chosen the right alternative in any esthetic decision in its UI.
What a great little utility -- part of my growing collection of tools to make MacOS behave more reasonably, or at least more in line with my particular expectations (which, yes, in many cases means more like Windows).<p>I think that part of the appeal of an app like this is about keeping things "tidy". MacOS seems to be built around making it easy to clutter -- lots of randomly sized overlapping windows (resolved using Rectangle for Aero-snap like functionality -- the weird full-screen split-screen nonsense in MacOS is just frustratingly limited and slow and has too many animations and transitions to be useful), dozens of apps filling up the dock, six hundred icons in the menu bar (which I use vanilla.app to resolve), and so on.<p>I think my mental model distinguishes between applications and utilities. Utilities are effectively like the old TSR tools -- you start them, then they just run quietly in the background until you need them, with no interface. Applications, by contrast, _are_ their interface, so it feels strange that when I close that interface, the application itself isn't closed. This utility alters the behaviour of the OS so that it conforms to this mental model. I suspect that this is a situation where there's no "right" approach, but rather a set of preferences and learned behaviours.
Interesting app, curious what the use case is?
Mac OS has always been good at managing resources for background apps (in my experience). I don’t mind if I have some extra open apps. I think I even have the setting activated that hides the ‘dot’ to show ‘running’ apps.<p>Honestly, if you look in activity monitor there are over a hundred apps running without any windows being rendered.<p>Maybe it’s because I’ve always had more ram than I need?
I can see this being useful for old MacBooks with little RAM but I'd never used it.<p>Closed apps running in background are like services. I do not need the window to be rendered in the background for messages or chat apps. I open them only when needed. Or having a large-ish apps I use on daily basis preloaded in compressed memory. It's just a sensible workflow.
Whether this app is for you or not, it must be appreciated that this is possible, and is what will distinguish 'real computers' from toy devices like iPad.<p>There was a time where Apple was trying to make iOS/iPad the future of (Apple) computing, but it could just never happen partly because while Apple may have lowered the floor on ease-of-use, they also significantly lowered the ceiling of functionality compared to macOS (or Windows). Completely eliminated the long-tail of possibility that people use Real Computers for.<p>iPads now have the same CPU as some Mac computers, yet they're still significantly held back by software limitations (and have been pretty much since day one).
Who among you can verify this isn't a huge gaping hack hole?<p>1. Never validated by Apple<p>2. Requires disabling Gatekeeper<p>3. Permitted to run silently in the background<p>4. Permitted to control any other application<p>How would you check that even building it could run something you don't want on your computer? And if running it exposes a trojan?<p>After all, it's the only app from user "onebadidea" on github.<p>Please be good consumers...
I recommend adding Mail and Calendar to exclusions, as these app do not sync when not running.<p>Also there are few really annoying bugs that makes the app almost unusable: <a href="https://github.com/onebadidea/swiftquit/issues/1">https://github.com/onebadidea/swiftquit/issues/1</a>
I use Quitter by Marco:<p><a href="https://marco.org/apps" rel="nofollow">https://marco.org/apps</a><p>I have a few dozen apps set to quit after specific periods of time. This allows me to run/resume certain apps for a few hours (VLC, Figma), while others shut down only 10 minutes after I use them (Messages, Calculator).
pretty awesome that someone made this.<p>i used to think macos was was simpler than windows, but this type of 'feature' was just one of many that made me think, 'no - it was just marketing'.