Version history

Changelog, such as it is.

FunNotch has no automatic updater yet, so this page is how you find out that a new version exists — it's worth a bookmark if you care about that sort of thing.

1.0.1 Latest

Mostly a pass over the whole codebase, fixing things that were wrong or would have become wrong — plus one small addition and a set of better starting defaults. Worth updating for the first fix below if your Mac has no backlit keyboard.

New

  • An empty agenda can fill itself with examplesAppearance → Agenda. Off unless you ask for it. A day with nothing on it shows a few sample events and reminders instead of blank space; they are badged Sample, they never replace anything real, and the closed notch will not count one as your next event.

Changed

  • Better defaults out of the boxA fresh install now starts with the HUD on, widgets beside the cutout while music plays, downloads landing on the shelf, copy-on-drag, a faster hover, no border, and a 50-item clipboard. Existing settings are untouched — this only affects a first run or a reset.

Fixed

  • Media keys could stop working entirely on some MacsThe HUD swallows a key after handling it, so macOS doesn't draw its own. It was swallowing keys it had failed to act on too — on a Mac with no backlit keyboard, or where brightness can't be set, that key did nothing at all. Keys that can't be handled are now passed to macOS untouched.
  • Five places that could crash on an unusual MacFolder lookups for Downloads, Desktop and Caches assumed macOS always returns a result. Two of them run at launch, so the app would have refused to start rather than misbehaved.

Improved

  • Volume keys do a fifth of the work they used toOne audio-device lookup per keypress instead of five, inside a handler macOS puts on a deadline
  • The diagnostic log no longer grows foreverCapped, with the oldest entries trimmed on a background thread
  • Opening Diagnostics stays fast however long the app has been installedIt reads the end of the log rather than all of it
  • Less work on every drag, drop and media keyThe log's date formatter is built once instead of per line
1.0.0

The first public build. Everything below shipped at once, which is what a 1.0 is — there is nothing here to compare it against yet.

Media

  • Now playing from Music, Spotify and any browser, with artwork and a live spectrum
  • A progress bar you can actually drag to seek
  • Transport controls, shuffle and repeat, in the open panel

Shelf

  • A drag-and-drop file shelf that opens to meet a drag already in flightThe panel comes down before you let go, so there's nothing to aim at
  • AirDrop and share straight off the shelf
  • Catches new screenshots and finished downloads on its own
  • Rename items, let them auto-expire, or file them away to a folder

Clipboard and focus

  • Clipboard history, searchable and pinnable
  • A focus timer that blocks websites and appsSafari, Chrome, Brave, Edge and Arc, with Pomodoro cycles and session totals

At a glance

  • Twelve configurable widgets, any number either side of the cameraClock, battery, weather, Wi-Fi, CPU, memory, disk and more
  • Calendar events and reminders
  • Pulls the join link out of a meeting inviteZoom, Meet, Teams and Webex
  • Weather, battery with charging percentage, and Bluetooth connect and disconnect activity

System

  • A HUD for volume, brightness and keyboard backlight that replaces the system oneIt catches the key before macOS acts on it, so you never end up with two
  • Menu bar customisation — an icon, or a live readout beside it
  • Camera mirror
  • Hidden from screen recordings and shares
  • Gestures, plus a size and border that fit your display
  • Custom themes you can save
  • A diagnostics screen listing what the app can and cannot see, and how to fix each gap

And

  • Notch Breakout, a small mouse-controlled game that pauses when you close the notch

Known limitations in 1.0.1

Worth knowing before you install, and all of them are true today rather than hypothetical.

The build is signed ad-hoc, not with a paid Apple Developer certificate, so Gatekeeper refuses the first launch and you have to allow it by hand. There is no automatic updater, which is the reason this page exists. It is not open source. And it needs macOS 14 Sonoma or later — earlier versions are missing APIs the notch panel depends on.

Download 1.0.1 Compare with TheBoringNotch