Tailscale's New macOS Home
138 points - today at 6:22 PM
SourceI haven't had enough menu bar icons to run into this but is it really the case that the notch just hides whatever icons happen to be behind it? Like, the OS doesn't handle this incredibly obvious edge case? Why not just put an overflow dropdown next to the notch (something Windows XP managed to figure out)? I know software quality has been going down in recent versions of macOS but this is absurd.
Yep, and there's no indication that anything is hidden, no dropdown/etc.
nozzlegear
today at 7:54 PM
I run into it when using Rider. I have text size increased on my Macbook and Rider has 8000 menu items, so my menu icons (all of which are default macOS, no third-party stuff) will be hidden to make room for Rider's stuff. I have to switch over to another workspace or window (i.e. away from Rider) if I want to access one of them. It's annoying but I'm not sure who I blame here; Rider I guess, for having a zillion menu items.
Screenshot: https://imgur.com/8y0QbZN
The gap between "Run" and "Tests" is the notch, which I don't usually notice is there unless I'm in Rider.
giancarlostoro
today at 6:54 PM
This is genuinely shocking that Apple is not handling that. Talk about quite a decline in one of their flagship products.
My workaround was to restore pre-notch behaviour by picking a resolution from the "show all resolutions" list that is conveniently+ exactly screen res height minus notch height.
I theoretically "lose" that much height but gain a) zero notch b) non-rounded top corners and c) a traditionally heighted menubar instead of the giant one that is so big only to cater for the notch.
+ I thought this was thanks to BetterDisplay but it turns out no third party tool is needed and it's all first party probably because someone at Apple is as annoyed by the notch as I was and so that's their solution.
Hasn't menu bar applets crowding with no official overflow menu been a problem with MacOS with an obvious solution (add an overflow menu) for... 2+ decades now? I know third party solutions exist and it's kind of an edge case, but still, I remember encountering this back in the day on my ancient plastic Macbook.
It's much worse than it used to be. Before it was only really a problem with apps with a lot of menus, and you could access the items by switching to an app with fewer of them. Now, the notch takes up a lot of space, and you hit it really soon on a 14" display—I can only have maybe three third party menu applets on top of my collection of built-in ones before they disappear into the notch.
badc0ffee
today at 7:37 PM
I think it's not just the notch, but that menu bar icons are more widely spaced than they used to be. I want to say it happened around Sonoma (10.14)? I was working on a Mac app at the time. Icon styles went from dense with a generally square clickable area to widely spaced, wide rectangular clickable area, and a highlight with rounded corners when clicked.
Jcampuzano2
today at 6:59 PM
Yes it is genuinely infuriating that this is the case for a company that for so long was praised for their superior UX.
This along with the tons of other paper cuts they've slacked on is tarring their brand.
crazygringo
today at 7:56 PM
To be clear: this is not really new with the notch. It's been menu bar icon behavior for decades where if there isn't enough space for all the menus plus menu icons, menu icons disappear with no way to get to them. The notch just acts like the last menu item now (albeit even if there's space between the last menu item and the notch, for applications without a ton of menus).
And yes, it's completely bizarre that macOS doesn't provide an overflow menu. Instead, again yes for decades, you've had to buy/use something like Bartender for this. It is utterly bizarre and inexplicable.
With Tahoe, Apple has finally provided a half-solution, which is that in System Settings you can entirely hide select running menubar utilities to regain some space. But of course that's only helpful for utilities you never need to look at or click.
tl;dr: yes this is utterly absurd but it's been absurd for decades. It's nothing to do with recent versions of macOS.
One of the mentioned apps, Bartender, was sold to a third party [0].
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40584606
I think they've cleaned it up since then [1], but in the age of supply chain attacks, very concerning. Personally, even as a paying user of Bartender, I moved to the open source solution, at least I can watch the github for changes.
[1] https://www.macbartender.com/b5blog/Lets-Try-This-Again/
InsideOutSanta
today at 7:20 PM
The other mentioned app, Ice, is unmaintained and no longer works on Tahoe. There's a maintained fork called Thaw.
javawizard
today at 7:00 PM
> I know software quality has been going down in recent versions of macOS
Note that this particular problem has existed for well over a decade. It's atrocious, but let's not pretend it's anything new.
The macbook notch has existed for a decade?
javawizard
today at 8:00 PM
No, menu bar items being hidden when there are too many of them has happened for a decade.
The notch has just made menu bar space more scarce than it used to be.
data-ottawa
today at 7:45 PM
If you opened an app like Xcode with a lot of menus options, it would extend beyond across the screen and cover up your menu bar icons.
If I open Xcode today on a 14" MacBook, two menu items extend past the notch, and they still hide your menu bar icons.
This has been the case for a long long time, and it's always been an obvious failure case.
Menu bar icons overflowing. The notch just makes it a problem quicker, and in an exciting new way.
Every time I get a new Mac, I run these commands to reduce the spacing between menu bar icons. Lets you fit at least 2x the number of items in the menu bar.
```
defaults -currentHost write -globalDomain NSStatusItemSpacing -int 2
defaults -currentHost write -globalDomain NSStatusItemSelectionPadding -int 2
```
richardlblair
today at 8:07 PM
This was always my biggest gripe about using a mac, the OS that "just works". I ended up a bunch of commands I had to run and a stack of apps I needed to install for it to feel usable.
freedomben
today at 8:10 PM
And for years and years when in discussions about Linux vs Mac, Linux was always slammed as having to be customized and "user's should never have to use the terminal" . (I agree with that, but even in 2014 I remember having to run terminal commands to tweak stuff to make it work more like I wanted to)
potatocoffee
today at 7:50 PM
This is so much better, thank you for this.
swiftcoder
today at 8:02 PM
Dude. How am I only just learning this? This needs to be plastered loudly over the internet
This seems like a good place to ask: What is the current state of the art for connecting back to my home network while remote? I want:
access to my home server
ability to stream US TV when abroad (by exiting from my home network)
ability to make it easy for others with non-tech backgrounds to connect with their devices (parents, kids, etc)
ability to have remote linux servers connect automatically on boot. This one is because I can't get OTA TV at home and want to set up a simple streaming box at someone else's house to do it that connects back to my house, so we can stream off all of our devices.
I'm guessing tailscale will be a part of this setup which is why I ask here.
Tailscale will enable all of this.
Set up a US device as an exit node, and configure other devices to proxy through it.
Yes, you've described Tailscale + Exit Nodes + Tailnet that you invite your family to. Install Tailscale and enable some devices as exit nodes - it's pretty much as simple as that.
I just use WireGuard to connect my local network. I see no point in throwing a middleman into the mix.
fastingrat
today at 7:45 PM
if you are behind cgnat (both ipv4, ipv6) then vps, have public ipv6 then you can connect via public domain (ddns openwrt) and if you have a public ip, wireguard it is
colechristensen
today at 7:19 PM
I found good success with OpenWRT/Tomato and WireGuard.
The interface is bad when it comes to provisioning but it can be done with a QR code and once it works the native experience of turning on the VPN was just stunningly fast. In this day and age you expect things to be slow with negotiation and various unreliable steps but it was just amazing that I tap the VPN button on iOS and it's connected in a fraction of a second.
sadeshmukh
today at 6:53 PM
Useful menu bar manager for Mac that lets you hide multiple icons behind a single icon: https://github.com/jordanbaird/Ice
I’m on mobile so don’t have the link handy but there’s a fork called Thaw that has been getting frequent updates
nozzlegear
today at 8:06 PM
Isn't it true that Apple just prefers apps not use the menu bar in the first place? I'm not sure where I had read that, but it might explain why Apple doesn't improve the menu bar. Personally I'm of the opinion that they should improve it because the current situation is untenable.
But am I misremembering this?
The only reason I used Tailscale's menubar applet was to change exit nodes, I definitely don't need a whole UI.
Guess I'll just stick with CLI only for now (via darwin-nix)
daft_pink
today at 6:47 PM
Ironically, I have trouble with Tailscale and Mac SSO. I setup my tailnet with Apple SSO and when I want to connect on my non Windows device there is not an easy way to add a new user and the new user has their own tailnet. I wish I could just use tailscale with a passkey without using third party sso.
seabrookmx
today at 7:19 PM
> We’re working on a comparable UI for Windows devices
As a Linux user and fan of good GUI apps, it always bums me out I'm stuck with the CLI-only options for apps like Tailscale. Even for a simple tray icon I have to resort to buggy GNOME extensions.
I understand the fragmented ecosystem and small user-base on the desktop Linux side make it hard to justify, but I hope that changes one day!
> Apple, a company that traditionally favors simple functionality
but not being able to interact with an icon is DISfunctionality, though yes, a simple one. So that principle can't explain the bad design either.
i love that they posted a snippet of Swift code showing other developers how to detect this themselves!
I love Tailscale so much and when I got added to what may have been an A/B test for the windowed app, I was even happier with it. It's a great improvement.
al_borland
today at 6:50 PM
I always assumed the justification for the notch would be FaceID on Macs. However, it’s been many generations and we still don’t see it.
Anyone know if this new windowed Tailscale view is enabled on the non-App Store version?
I guess I'll find out soon enough once I update, but I didn't see any specific callout in the article.
I’ve been using Bartender (paid) and Thaw (free) to manage my menu bar. Recently, both apps have become quite buggy. I’m not sure whether this is due to macOS or if there are better alternatives I’m not aware of.
threetonesun
today at 7:18 PM
I feel like every app I use has gotten buggier in Tahoe, I suppose major UI rewrites will do that.
Yes! More windowed interfaces! I hate apps that outgrow a modal. I hate losing the context. No wait I think I hate all modals.
Mullvad, your turn next please
I personally found it confusing and un-Mac-like that quitting the configuration app also now stops the Tailscale service. It was unfortunate to discover this while I was AFK.
My recommendation is to rethink it to work like apps like 1Password, Default Folder, Keyboard Maestro, Ice, etc., where I can always easily open a configuration app, but the service must be intentionally/knowingly quit via either the configuration app or the menu bar utility.
TLDR: Please separate the service from the new configuration app.