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A look at our 2010 product release timeline

Monday, April 5th, 2010

Many users have been asking me about our plans for products we haven’t yet updated, namely Witch, yFlicks, and Butler. In response, I offer this generic timeline of our plans for the rest of 2010:

Please note that this is a rough timeline, and subject to change based on our workload, customer demand, the phase of the moon, and the price of soybean futures on the daily spot market. However, it should provide a bit more detail on what our priorities are, and the approximate timeframe in which we hope to ship each of our apps. (It doesn’t show minor releases, which may include bug fixes and/or new features; those will be ongoing for each product.)

Read on for a bit more detail on each of the products in the timeline.
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Posted in Butler, Company News, Leech, Name Mangler, Paddock, Products, Witch, yFlicks | 19 Comments »

The terms of the Many Tricks software license

Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

I’ve had a few questions on how Many Tricks’ programs are licensed: is it per computer, per user, per user per computer, or something else? Given the confusion, I thought I’d explain here so it’s (hopefully) clear. I’ve posted this same information to our FAQ pages. And yes, we do have a full, legalese-filled software license, which covers what’s below and adds some required legal terminology.

The objective in our licensing is to keep things simple and fair. To that end, all of our products fall under one general usage license. Here’s how the licensing works: It’s basically a “buy only one” license model, except in the case of possible simultaneous usage. These situations should help clarify that basic rule:

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Posted in Butler, Company News, Leech, Name Mangler, Products, Witch, yFlicks | Comments Off on The terms of the Many Tricks software license

Leech 2.0 released

Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

Hot on the heels of Name Mangler 2.1 comes the release of Leech 2.0. Leech is a lightweight download manager that puts you in control of your downloads, regardless of your browser usage. Version 2.0 has some exciting new features, including:

  • Downloads can be selected and acted on using a contextual menu; this makes it simple to move, pause, or resume large number of downloads
  • You can set certain domains and file extensions that Leech will not intercept when running in browser-integrated mode. (Works in Safari, Camino and OmniWeb; use FlashGot to fine tune Firefox’s exceptions.)
  • URL ranges allow downloading sequences of files. For example, http://some.site.url/file_{1-3}.txt will download file_1.txt, file_2.txt, and file_3.txt
  • Reveal currently-downloading files in the Finder by double-clicking on their entries in the window
  • Retry All contextual menu item for faster retries
  • Automatic updating via Sparkle
  • Drag-and-drop support for depositfiles.com. (You must have a valid depositfiles account that is currently logged in using Safari or any other WebKit browser.)

In addition, there are some important bug fixes and operational improvements:

  • Browser integration now works in 64-bit mode for users running OS X 10.6
  • Leech no longer interferes with other Safari plug-ins that use the Sparkle updating framework (e.g., older ClickToFlash versions)
  • Leech no longer interferes with Safari AdBlocker‘s data feeds (requires Safari AdBlocker 1.8.2 or newer).
  • Dock icon progress indicator is now more accurate
  • Download queue position information is more accurately shown
  • In accordance with Mac OS X 10.6’s Finder, file sizes (using units such as KB, MB, etc.) are now calculated using the multipler 1000, rather than 1024. (The latter should only be used for binary prefix units like KiB and MiB, but prior to Mac OS X 10.6, it was customary to describe 1024 bytes as 1 KB in the Mac world)

The price for all this goodness is unchanged from the prior version (except for minor rounding changes in going from prices in Euros to prices in US Dollars): $14. Even better, if you’re a Leech 1.x user, you can upgrade for only $5 (you must have a valid license file to purchase an upgrade license).

If you’re one of those who purchased Leech after March 17th, 2010, you’ll be getting your free Leech 2.0 license via email in the very near future.

As always, you can report bugs, request features, and ask for help on our support site.

Posted in Leech | 16 Comments »

The future looks all Sparkle-y

Wednesday, March 24th, 2010

As I noted in the Name Mangler 2.1 announcement, all future Many Tricks products will include support for in-app updates via Sparkle.

If you’re not aware of Sparkle, the reality is you’re probably aware of Sparkle. If you’ve ever run an app that let you download and install an update directly within the app, chances are good it’s using Sparkle to do that behind-the-scenes magic.

This amazing tool is open source, and supported by donations—and we’ll be doing some stuff in the future to support the project, as we think it’s a great addition to our code base.

Because you do lose some control over your machine in Sparkle-enabled apps (when they automatically download an update you didn’t ask for), all of our apps will include a simple on/off toggle for automatic update checking. If you’d rather check manually, just turn off the automatic updates. Personally, though, I leave Sparkle enabled in all the apps I use that include it; it makes product updates incredibly simple.

I’m thrilled we’re taking this step, as it simplifies what was a too-complex task for our programs—clicking a couple of buttons beats going to your browser, downloading and expanding an archive, quitting the original program, finding the original and new versions on your disk, and replacing old with new. Instead, Sparkle does all the heavy lifting ; you just click a couple of buttons and your app is up to date.

So thanks, Sparkle, for making our users’ lives simpler!

Posted in Butler, Company News, Developer, Leech, Name Mangler, Products, Witch, yFlicks | 12 Comments »

Many Tricks’ Welcome Back sale event

Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010

I made brief mention in my new site launch tweet that we’d be having a “launch day promo.” And so, here it is. True, it’s no longer launch day, but we’re still in a festive mood here, so what the heck…

Starting right now—but ending on Thursday (March 25th) at 10:00pm Pacific time—you can get 25% off your total order when you buy any two or more Many Tricks products at the same time. (You can do this easily by clicking the Continue Shopping button after adding the first product to your cart.) The eligible products are Butler, Leech, Name Mangler, and Witch.

After adding at least two products to your cart, enter the super-secret discount code welcomeback in the (wait for it) Discount Code box, then click Update Cart. You’ll see the 25% discount reflected immediately.

Even better, if you buy Leech and/or Witch, you’ll get the current version of each product as well as the soon-to-be-released next versions. (Name Mangler was just updated, and a Butler update is quite a ways out, so this bundled upgrade feature doesn’t apply to those two products.) Once new versions of each app come out, we’ll post instructions on how to get your free upgrade.

“But wait, I just bought a product from you, after the site came back to life! So I miss out!?” No, actually you don’t. We’ll be sending you ‘early adopters’ a personal discount code that you can use for 25% off your your next purchase on any Many Tricks product. This is our way of saying “thank you” for purchasing so quickly after our site came back to life.

Once again, this sale ends for everyone at 10:00pm Pacific time on Thursday March 25th, so act quickly to save some yourself some cash.

Posted in Butler, Company News, Leech, Name Mangler, Products, Witch | 1 Comment »

We now support Google Checkout

Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010

In addition to PayPal, you can now purchase Many Tricks’ products via Google Checkout. On each product’s cart screen, you’ll see both PayPal and Google Checkout logos—just click the logo of your choice to use that method of payment.

Please let me know if you have any problems with the new service—we’ve already received one order via Google Checkout, though, so I’m confident it’s working fine.

Posted in Butler, Company News, Leech, Name Mangler, Witch | Comments Off on We now support Google Checkout

Rob Griffiths to join Many Tricks

Monday, February 22nd, 2010

Portland, Oregon (February 22, 2010) — Many Tricks, a long-time creator of numerous essential Mac utilities, is pleased to announce that Rob Griffiths, founder of macosxhints.com and previously a Senior Editor at Macworld, will be joining Many Tricks as a partner, beginning March 1st. Rob Griffiths will handle all aspects of the business side of the company, including marketing, accounting, web systems, sales, and support, while Peter will focus on writing code for Many Tricks’ products. Both partners will work together on improving existing programs and on new ideas.

Peter Maurer, founder of Many Tricks, said, “I’m thrilled to have Rob on board to help run the company. For many years, I’ve wanted to do more with my applications, but I’ve had no interest in the “business” side of the software industry. Rob’s strong background in business, along with his experience in the Mac software world, will help take Many Tricks to the next level.”

“I’m incredibly excited by the opportunity to join Peter Maurer at Many Tricks,” said Griffiths. “Many Tricks’ utilities, especially Butler and Witch, have been essential tools on my Macs for many years. I’m really looking forward to working with Peter to help grow the business.”

Many Tricks will be updating its existing lineup of Mac utilities throughout 2010, and launching some entirely new programs. “We’ve got some good stuff in the pipeline, especially for the upcoming iPad,” said Rob Griffiths.

In closing, Peter stated “I’m feeling great about this partnership; it really frees up my time to focus on coding, and I’m confident that the two of us can create compelling solutions in the utilities space on the Mac, the iPhone, the iPod touch, and the iPad.”

About Many Tricks: Many Tricks, co-founded by Peter Maurer and Alexander Schön, has been producing great Mac software since 2003, and its product line currently includes Butler, Witch, yFlicks, Leech, and Name Mangler.

Posted in Butler, Company News, Leech, Name Mangler, Witch, yFlicks | 10 Comments »

Leech 1.1.4

Friday, July 4th, 2008

Leech 1.1.4 fixes two bugs — one related to download queue management and one related to the “Sleep when done” feature.

But this is not just a bugfix release — there’s also a new feature, which we call the “rubber window” internally. This means that you can have Leech resize the main window to fit all downloads automatically, so it never takes up more screen space than necessary. Go to the “Feedback” preferences to turn this on.

Update: Speaking of Leech, check out the latest ScreenCastsOnline show, which gives you a detailed look at how Leech works.

Posted in Leech | Comments Off on Leech 1.1.4

The Future of the Butler (Butler 4.1.6)

Monday, June 30th, 2008

Roughly half a year ago, we started distributing Butler as what we called a transient version, which basically meant it would stop working at some point in time, namely tomorrow. We did this because back then, we weren’t sure where we would be going with Butler. Similar to Witch, Butler had been distributed as donationware for years, and we knew we couldn’t really afford keeping that up, as detailed for Witch in this blog entry.

So when we converted Witch into shareware, we also did that to test the waters for Butler 5. We wondered: How are the users going to react to this transition? Will they be willing to update, or will they just continue using the old version?

I can honestly say that I was blown away by the response to Witch 2.0 — going shareware solicited nothing but positive feedback, and I think it’s safe to say it was an economic success as well. Given that experience, we knew: Butler 5 will be shareware. As always, past donators will get free licenses once we start distributing Butler 5 licenses; but still, this decision meant we had to raise the bar some more. If we’re going to make people pay a shareware fee, the product should be worth it.

That’s why we can’t give you a Butler 5 beta today. We’re aiming high, and we’re determined to shoot high, so there’s still a lot to do in terms of user interface and underlying technology improvements. Some tasks are easy yet time-consuming (e.g., commissioning new, larger icons to replace all those old 16×16 pixels icons), and others are just hard to get right (e.g., redesigning Butler’s configuration window to make current Quicksilver users feel more at home). In fact, we even decided to stop working on Butler 5 for a while in order to complete and release another application named Leech first, just to make sure we wouldn’t run into funding problems while working on Butler 5 as long as necessary. And that worked out really well.

There’s another thing we learned from the above-mentioned Witch transition, though, and that’s trusting our loyal users. Witch’s transition was a great success even though we didn’t force anyone to update by means of a transient version or anything like that.

So let’s ditch the whole “transient” concept. Today, we’re releasing Butler 4.1.6, which features two noteworthy improvements:

  • The status window (the one that’s shown in response to your entering hot keys or requesting iTunes information, for instance) no longer captures mouse clicks. In other words, you can click right through it. If you want to move the status window via click & drag, do so while holding the command key.
  • Typinator no longer confuses Butler’s pasteboard history.

But the most important change, as alluded to above, is that this version is no longer transient or deliberately limited in any other way. And it’s still donationware. Once Butler 5 is ready, we’re quite confident you’ll want to upgrade.

Posted in Butler, Leech, Witch | Comments Off on The Future of the Butler (Butler 4.1.6)

Service Scrubber 1.1.5

Friday, June 27th, 2008

No, we still can’t edit signed applications on Mac OS X 10.5 without causing keychain problems (explanation), but Service Scrubber 1.1.5 features an improvement that I, personally, have been looking forward to pretty much ever since Service Scrubber was released — a serious icon.

Granted, this may seem like a nonrelevant problem to some of you, but the old preliminary icon was never meant to stay; and it has bugged me for years. So I’m deeply grateful to Lars Herrmann for creating the icon I had always envisioned.

The other improvement in this version is a French localization overhaul by Ronald Leroux. And speaking of Ronald — being donationware, this doesn’t really apply to Service Scrubber; but if French is your primary language, and if you’re about to buy one of our shareware applications (i.e., Leech, Witch, or yFlicks), you should definitely check out Lingua Franca for localization news. And once you’re there, consider using their “Buy Now” buttons, where available. That way, Ronald will get his share of the sale, compensating for his hard work on all those French localizations.

Posted in Leech, Service Scrubber, Witch, yFlicks | Comments Off on Service Scrubber 1.1.5

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