BetterTile 0.4.6 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.6 Beta

• Refreshed native menu and Settings, with clearer action icons and reliable drag reordering.
• More reliable Bento layout retention when switching desktops, plus drag snapping on desktops with one window.
• New New window side preference in Bento Behavior: Automatic, Left, Right, Top, or Bottom. Existing layouts stay in place.
• Minimized Bento windows return to their prior position even when macOS delivers delayed window observations.
• Improved divider handling and an interactive resize preview, larger corner snap regions, and correct final drag placement.
• Layout Wheel selection matches its visible buttons near screen edges. Opening jitter no longer picks an unintended action.
• Reduced duplicate Wheel updates and improved cleanup when settings change or the app quits.

This remains a public beta. Space-switch stability has been checked on a single display; broader display/fullscreen combinations remain under validation.

The beta keeps the existing signing identity and update mechanism. No additional permissions, dependencies, networking or tracking are introduced. Existing settings and action order are preserved.

The app remains self-signed and is not notarized. A first installation may
require Open Anyway in System Settings → Privacy & Security.

This release follows 0.4.51. Its internal build number increases from 11 to 12;
Sparkle uses that build number to determine update order.

BetterTile 0.4.51 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.51 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.51 improves Repair Bento. Repair now chooses the valid layout
that keeps windows closest to their current positions, so a window on the
right or bottom stays on that side when possible. Three- and five-window
layouts can also mirror their larger pane to match the existing arrangement.

Clicking BetterTile's Dock icon while the app is already running now opens or
raises Settings. The Dock menu also includes Open Settings…. An ordinary
cold launch remains unchanged.

This release does not change BetterTile's permissions, privacy behavior,
update feed, or data handling. It continues to use the stable BetterTile Beta
signing identity introduced in 0.4.1. The app remains self-signed and is not
notarized, so first launch may require Open Anyway in System Settings →
Privacy & Security.

BetterTile 0.4.5 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.5 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.5 adds the Layout Wheel for fast, pointer-centered window
placement. Hold the configured modifier trigger, move to an action sector, and
release to apply it. The wheel supports one or two levels, configurable
actions, cancellation from its center or empty sectors, and Repair Bento when
the display is using Bento mode.

An optional Middle Click trigger provides one-handed activation. When enabled,
BetterTile reserves unmodified middle-click system-wide while the feature is
active; modified middle-clicks and other buttons continue to pass through.
The feature is disabled by default and does not request Input Monitoring.

Update checks now run every four hours by default while BetterTile is running.
They remain disableable in General Settings, and update archives continue to be
authenticated by Sparkle.

This beta uses the stable BetterTile Beta signing identity introduced in 0.4.1,
so an existing Accessibility grant should continue across updates. The app is
still self-signed and not notarized; first launch may require Open Anyway
in System Settings → Privacy & Security.

BetterTile 0.4.4 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.4 Beta

This beta fixes the presentation of Sparkle's update window. There are no new
features, permissions, or data-handling changes.

Update windows appear in front

Opening Check for Updates… or Update Available… could appear to do
nothing because BetterTile's floating Settings window covered Sparkle's update
window.

When an update is available, BetterTile now closes Settings before presenting
the update so the update window is visible immediately. A check that finds no
update keeps Settings open and shows You're up to date above it. Gentle
scheduled reminders remain quiet until you choose to view the update.

The short Checking for updates… progress window can still sit behind
Settings. The final update or no-update result appears in front.

Accessibility permission

This release is signed with the same BetterTile Beta certificate as 0.4.3, so
your Accessibility grant should carry over. No re-approval should be needed.

If BetterTile stops responding to shortcuts after updating, remove the old
BetterTile entry from System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility
and add BetterTile again, then let us know through Send Feedback….

Privacy

This release adds no tracking, telemetry, new permission, or user-data
collection. Update checks continue to read the GitHub-hosted appcast, and
Sparkle continues to authenticate downloads with its EdDSA signature.

Known limitations

• Bento manages up to six windows per display; additional windows float.
• This remains beta software. If a layout becomes stuck, use Repair Current
  Bento Layout from the menu-bar menu.

Feedback

Bug reports are welcome through Send Feedback… in the menu-bar menu or as a
GitHub issue. Please include your macOS version, the affected application, and
the shortest sequence that reproduces the problem.

BetterTile 0.4.3 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.3 Beta

This beta fixes two Bento layout faults. There are no new features, permissions,
or update changes since 0.4.2.

Dividers move the pane you grabbed

Two dividers in one layout could end up sharing an identity. Dragging one then
resized a different, untouched pane while the divider under the pointer stayed
put. This happened after moving a window back beside a pane it had already
neighboured, and after removing a window from a layout.

Every divider in a Bento layout now has its own identity, so a drag resizes the
panes on either side of the divider you grabbed. A locked pane stays with its
own divider.

Window > Fill behaves like BetterTile's own focus

Using macOS's Window > Fill on a tiled window filled it on top of its
neighbours, which stayed open underneath, and the layout still treated them as
tiled. Restoring a covered window could not bring the group back.

Fill now takes the same path as focusing a window in BetterTile: the filled
window is placed and its covered neighbours are minimized together, and
BetterTile remembers which ones it covered. Un-minimizing one covered window
restores the rest. If the neighbours cannot be minimized, the filled window
returns to the size it had before Fill.

Accessibility permission

This release is signed with the same BetterTile Beta certificate as 0.4.2, so
your Accessibility grant should carry over. No re-approval should be needed.

If BetterTile stops responding to shortcuts after updating, remove the old
BetterTile entry from System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility
and add BetterTile again, then let us know through Send Feedback…. That
would be a bug worth reporting rather than expected behavior.

Privacy

This release adds no tracking, telemetry, new permission, or user-data
collection. Update checks continue to read the GitHub-hosted appcast, and
Sparkle continues to authenticate downloads with its EdDSA signature.

Known limitations

• Bento manages up to six windows per display; additional windows float.
• This remains beta software. If a layout becomes stuck, use Repair Current
  Bento Layout from the menu-bar menu.

Feedback

Bug reports are welcome through Send Feedback… in the menu-bar menu or as a
GitHub issue. Please include your macOS version, the affected application, and
the shortest sequence that reproduces the problem.

BetterTile 0.4.2 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.2 Beta

This beta makes an available update easier to notice. Window-management
behavior is unchanged from 0.4.1.

Update reminders

BetterTile now tells you which version is waiting instead of showing a plain
indicator:

• The menu-bar icon turns blue and its tooltip names the available version.
• The BetterTile menu shows an Update Available… item with a version badge.
• The menu-bar panel and Settings show the version on a blue capsule. Clicking
  it opens the update.
• The reminder survives a restart. It clears itself once you install or skip
  the update, or when the update is no longer offered.
• BetterTile checks for updates every four hours while it is running, instead
  of once per day. You can still turn automatic checks off in Settings.

Scheduled updates now arrive quietly. BetterTile marks the menu bar and waits
instead of interrupting you with a dialog. Checking for updates yourself still
opens the usual update window right away.

Accessibility permission

This release is signed with the same BetterTile Beta certificate as 0.4.1, so
your Accessibility grant should carry over. No re-approval should be needed.

If BetterTile stops responding to shortcuts after updating, remove the old
BetterTile entry from System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility
and add BetterTile again, then let us know through Send Feedback…. That
would be a bug worth reporting rather than expected behavior.

Privacy

BetterTile stores the version number and build number of a known available
update on your Mac so the reminder survives a restart, and removes that once the
update is installed, skipped, or withdrawn. Nothing is sent anywhere. This
release adds no tracking, telemetry, new permission, or user-data collection.
Update checks continue to read the GitHub-hosted appcast, and Sparkle continues
to authenticate downloads with its EdDSA signature.

Known limitations

• Bento manages up to six windows per display; additional windows float.
• This remains beta software. If a layout becomes stuck, use Repair Current
  Bento Layout from the menu-bar menu.

Feedback

Bug reports are welcome through Send Feedback… in the menu-bar menu or as a
GitHub issue. Please include your macOS version, the affected application, and
the shortest sequence that reproduces the problem.

BetterTile 0.4.1 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.1 Beta

This beta changes how public builds are code-signed so later betas can keep one
macOS application identity. Window-management behavior is unchanged from 0.4.0.

Before you start

Approve BetterTile and re-add Accessibility once. Version 0.4.1 changes
from the previous ad-hoc signature to the stable BetterTile Beta signature.
After installing, open System Settings → Privacy & Security, approve
BetterTile with Open Anyway, then remove any old BetterTile entry from
Accessibility and add BetterTile again.

Your existing BetterTile settings carry over.

Later betas signed with the same certificate are intended to retain this
Accessibility grant. The 0.4.1 to 0.4.2 update will be the first public test of
that behavior.

Signing and updates

The BetterTile Beta certificate is self-signed. It is not an Apple Developer
ID certificate and the app is not notarized, so macOS still requires the manual
approval above. Sparkle separately authenticates update downloads with its EdDSA
signature.

BetterTile continues to check the GitHub-hosted appcast for updates. This
release adds no tracking, telemetry, new permission, or user-data collection.

Known limitations

• Bento manages up to six windows per display; additional windows float.
• This remains beta software. If a layout becomes stuck, use Repair Current
  Bento Layout from the menu-bar menu.

Feedback

Bug reports are welcome through Send Feedback… in the menu-bar menu or as a
GitHub issue. Please include your macOS version, the affected application, and
the shortest sequence that reproduces the problem.

BetterTile 0.4.0 Beta

BetterTile 0.4.0 Beta

This beta makes Bento more reliable across Spaces, Stage Manager, overlapping
windows, and fast mouse gestures. It also separates Xcode development builds
from the public app so contributors can test without replacing their installed
beta.

Before you start

Re-grant Accessibility after updating. Betas are ad-hoc signed, so macOS
treats each update as a different application and discards the permission. Open
System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility, remove BetterTile if
it is listed, and add it again. This will remain necessary until BetterTile is
distributed with a Developer ID certificate.

Your existing settings carry over.

More accurate Bento sessions

• BetterTile can now distinguish overlapping windows from the same application
  and refresh only the window that changed when macOS provides exact identity.
• Bento restores the correct layout for each display and Space. Windows shown
  on multiple Spaces remain floating, and native fullscreen Spaces receive no
  automatic placement or divider.
• Stage Manager thumbnail drags resolve to the frontmost real window in the
  selected group. Other windows in that group remain untouched.
• Application minimum-size hints help BetterTile avoid layouts that a window
  cannot accept.

These observations use validated, read-only macOS capabilities. Missing or
invalid data falls back to the previous public Accessibility behavior. The
observed identities and Space topology stay in memory and are not transmitted
or saved.

Smoother mouse gestures

Drag snapping and linked resizing now share one listen-only mouse event source
when the existing Accessibility grant permits it. If the source is unavailable
or stops, both features return to their previous event monitors without changing
or retaining system events. BetterTile does not request Input Monitoring.

Safer development builds

Xcode now builds BetterTile Debug with separate settings, Accessibility
permission, and a badged icon. Debug builds do not check for updates. The public
release keeps its existing identity and update behavior.

Known limitations

• Accessibility permission must be re-granted after every beta update, as above.
• Bento manages up to six windows per display; additional windows float.
• This remains beta software. If a layout becomes stuck, use Repair Current
  Bento Layout from the menu-bar menu.

Updates and privacy

BetterTile checks the GitHub-hosted appcast for updates, shows the release notes,
and requires your action before downloading and installing. It sends no system
profile and adds no tracking, telemetry, or new permission in this release.

Feedback

Bug reports are welcome through Send Feedback… in the menu-bar menu or as a
GitHub issue. Please include your macOS version, the affected application, and
the shortest sequence that reproduces the problem.

BetterTile 0.3.0 Beta

BetterTile 0.3.0 Beta

This beta focuses on making Bento layouts predictable: each window event now
has one owner, layout changes commit atomically, and repeated observations settle
instead of fighting earlier writes.

Before you start

Re-grant Accessibility after updating. Betas are ad-hoc signed, so macOS
treats each update as a different application and discards the permission. Open
System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility, remove BetterTile if
it is listed, and add it again. This will remain necessary until BetterTile is
distributed with a Developer ID certificate.

Your existing settings carry over. The new defaults described below apply only
to fresh installations.

Bento layouts settle cleanly

• Window writes are now owned transactions, so BetterTile can distinguish its
  own Accessibility callbacks from genuine external moves and resizes.
• Bento session updates use one atomic commit path. Stale work is discarded and
  recalculated from the current layout instead of being merged into it.
• Empty panes created by thirds, quarters, and other shortcut layouts no longer
  remain as phantom occupied space when the layout changes.
• Ambient window changes now pass through one tested Core reconciler, reducing
  duplicated insertion and recovery policy.
• Fixed-point and adversarial tests cover repeated callbacks, stale revisions,
  membership changes, minimization, display work-area changes, and rollback.

Better fresh-install defaults

New users now start with linked resizing enabled, Ghost Preview feedback, a
10-point divider handle, a 1-point Bento pane gap, and a 0.12-second Bento swap
delay. Existing installations keep their chosen values.

Smaller interface improvements

• Menu-bar glyphs for Almost Maximize and Center Resize now match their Settings
  counterparts.
• Window mutation failures now report one explicit outcome: applied, cleanly
  rolled back, or degraded. This removes stale shared error flags and makes
  recovery behavior consistent.

Known limitations

• Accessibility permission must be re-granted after every beta update, as above.
• Bento manages up to six windows per display; additional windows float.
• This remains beta software. If a layout becomes stuck, use Repair Current
  Bento Layout from the menu-bar menu.

Updates and privacy

BetterTile checks the GitHub-hosted appcast for updates, shows the release notes,
and requires your action before downloading and installing. It sends no system
profile and adds no tracking or new permissions in this release.

Feedback

Bug reports are welcome through Send Feedback… in the menu-bar menu or as a
GitHub issue. Please include your macOS version, the affected application, and
the shortest sequence that reproduces the layout problem.

BetterTile 0.2.0 Beta

BetterTile 0.2.0 Beta

The second public beta. Windows now land where you ask them to in far more
applications, layouts stop coming apart on their own, and per-app rules are
something you set deliberately rather than something that follows whichever app
happens to be in front.

Before you start

Re-grant Accessibility after updating. Betas are ad-hoc signed, so macOS
treats each update as a different application and discards the permission. Open
System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility, remove BetterTile if
it is listed, and add it again. This will be true of every beta until the app is
distributed with a Developer ID certificate.

Your settings are upgraded automatically, and your existing preferences
carry over. If you go back to 0.1.0 afterwards, it cannot read the newer
settings file and will start again from defaults.

Windows land where you ask

Electron apps, Chrome, Microsoft Office, and — importantly — every application
while VoiceOver is running could previously place a window somewhere other than
the frame BetterTile requested. Those applications reinterpret geometry while an
accessibility attribute is active; BetterTile now sets that attribute aside for
the duration of a write and restores it afterwards, and only ever for apps that
had it enabled in the first place.

Layouts hold together

• macOS's own window commands no longer wreck a Bento layout. With two panes
  tiled evenly, using Window → Move & Resize → Right on one of them collapsed
  its neighbour to a 120pt sliver. A relocated window was being read as a dragged
  divider. macOS's commands now drive Bento through the same planner BetterTile's
  own shortcuts use.
• A single missed update no longer dismantles a layout. A window's absence is
  now corroborated before its pane is given up.
• Layouts adopt what is already on screen, including windows arranged by
  macOS's own tiling, instead of rearranging everything on sight.
• Failure messages tell the truth. A delayed check used to report "did not
  move" over an action you had already replaced with a drag or another command.
  It now reports a failure only when the window genuinely never moved.

Per-app rules, set by you

Some applications do not belong in a tiled grid — palettes, colour pickers,
session-restore prompts — and a few misbehave under any automated placement.

Open Settings → Per-App Rules and click Add App… to pick from your
running applications, or Browse… for one that is not running. Each app can be
set to:

• Manage Normally — the default
• Exclude from Bento — keeps its own size and position in Bento layouts,
  while shortcuts and drag snapping still work when aimed at it
• Ignore Everywhere — BetterTile never moves or resizes it

Rules are remembered per application, and an app that is not installed keeps its
rule. Setting a row back to Manage Normally removes it from the list.

Changed from the previous beta: rules used to apply to whichever app was
frontmost, both in Settings and in the menu-bar menu. Both of those are gone,
replaced by the list above. Any rules you had already set are kept.

One window on a desktop

Settings → Window Layout → "When a desktop has one window" now offers every
positioning action — halves, thirds, quarters, sixths, Center, Center Resize,
Maximize, Almost Maximize — or Leave Unchanged, rather than the three choices
it had before.

The behaviour changed as well. The placement is applied every time a desktop is
left with a single window, not once and never again. After it lands, the window
keeps whatever size you give it: resizing it by hand sticks, and it is not moved
when the Dock appears, the resolution changes, or you switch away and back. Open
a second window and normal tiling takes over; close back down to one and the
placement is applied again. The Repair button in the menu bar restores it on
demand, and no longer converts a manual desktop to Bento.

Also in this release

• Feature switches. Keyboard shortcuts and drag snapping each have a master
  on/off switch in Settings → General. Turning shortcuts off leaves your key
  bindings untouched, so turning it back on restores exactly what was there.
• Repair unsticks a stranded window. A window left floating by an earlier,
  busier layout stayed floating, and would not tile with the next window to open.
  Repair now clears that. When there is genuinely nothing to do, it says
  "Nothing to repair" instead of claiming a layout was applied.
• Visible floating windows are handled properly when a Bento layout is over
  its six-pane limit.
• Updates are delivered through the appcast attached to each GitHub release.
  BetterTile checks for updates, shows you the notes, and requires your action
  before downloading and again before installing. No system profile is sent.

Known limitations

• Accessibility permission must be re-granted after every beta update, as above.
• Bento manages up to six windows per display; beyond that, additional windows
  float.
• Rolling back to 0.1.0 resets your settings to defaults.

Feedback

Bug reports and feedback are welcome through Send Feedback… in the menu-bar
menu, or as a GitHub issue. Including the macOS version and the application
involved makes a placement bug much easier to reproduce.