Hangabout 0.15

Halo moves smoothly now. Every one of its animations plays at 60 frames a second instead of 8, so the slow turn at rest, opening out for a reminder, listening and the Done ripple no longer stutter.

Installing

1. Open Hangabout.dmg and drag Hangabout onto Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.14

Meet Halo, a holographic AI core. A sphere of gold and orange circuitry with rings turning inside it, edge waves and ripples rolling out. It floats in its corner and never flies: it opens out where it rests to bring you a reminder, and grows in place when you double-click it. It calls you Sir and says reminders and answers out loud in a British voice, entirely on your Mac. Turn the voice off with Speaks out loud in the menu.

Installing

1. Open Hangabout.dmg and drag Hangabout onto Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.13

Update now works even if you opened Hangabout straight from your Downloads folder: the new version installs into Applications instead of sending you to the download page. Only one copy of Hangabout runs at a time, so an old copy can no longer keep offering an update you already installed.

Installing

1. Open Hangabout.dmg and drag Hangabout onto Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.12

Iron Man and Tony wear a new boxy red-and-brass armour, and Tony's blazer is redrawn to match. Clicking Done now celebrates in character: webs, a shield throw, or beams. Edit habits has a Today column with today's done and skipped counts. A monthly reminder set for the 31st goes back to the 31st after a short month.

Installing

1. Unzip, drag Hangabout.app into Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.11

Iron Man and Tony, redrawn.

• A new Iron Man. Red-and-gold armour drawn for Hangabout. He stands on the floor, flies on thrusters in both palms and boots, and fires a beam from each palm — double-click him, or wait for a reminder.
• A new Tony Stark. He waits in a blazer, and the suit flies on piece by piece under a sweep of blue light — boots, legs and chest, shoulders, helmet. Then he flies and fires as Iron Man.

If you had either one picked, you get the new one automatically.

Installing

1. Unzip, drag Hangabout.app into Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.10

Tony Stark, rebuilt.

• A new Tony. He waits in a blazer, then builds the suit on piece by piece — bodysuit, boots, chest and legs, full armour, helmet — under a sweep of blue light.
• Suit up from the menu does just that: on with the armour, a few seconds standing in it, off again.
• Double-click for the full show. He suits up, rises slowly on his thrusters firing beams from both palms, hovers at the top, and floats back down.
• Beams on reminders. Tony and Ironbot now fire their palm beams when they bring you a habit or reminder, instead of rockets.

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Installing

1. Unzip, drag Hangabout.app into Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.9

Reminders and habits, sorted out.

• Reminders at a date and time. Reminders → Custom… lets you pick the day, the hour and minute, and AM or PM — no more counting minutes from now.
• Reminders that repeat. Every day, weekdays, every week or every month. "Standup, weekdays at 10:00" is one setting.
• Keep chiming until I respond. For the ones you really can't miss, the chime repeats until you answer, like a phone alarm.
• Habits count your day. The repeating nudges are now called Habits, and the menu shows today's tally beside each one: "5 done, 2 skipped". No targets.
• Clearer names. Habits repeat while you work; Reminders go off at a set time. "Set an alarm" and "set a reminder" both still work by voice.

Your existing habits and pending reminders carry across unchanged.

Installing

1. Unzip, drag Hangabout.app into Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.8

Notes now follow up, and you can talk to it.

• Speak a note. Hold ⌃⌥⌘N, or press and hold the character, and say it. It lands on a notes list in the menu.
• Spoken commands. "Remind me in 20 minutes to call Sam", "remind me to call Sam at four", "set an alarm for 2 hours", "focus for 25 minutes", "mark X as done", "what's left". Anything else is just a note.
• Notes come back. An open note drops in as "Still on the list" with Done and Later. Later waits longer each time, up to four hours.
• Morning carry-over. The first time you're at the keyboard each day, one drop lists what's still open.
• Tick notes off without the menu closing, and Mark all as done.

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Installing

1. Unzip, drag Hangabout.app into Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.7

Ironbot — the first companion drawn for this app rather than borrowed. It stands on the floor, lights its thrusters when it has somewhere to be, and fires a beam from each palm. Double-click it and it does both, or pick an animation from the menu.

Character packs can now set a pose's scale and the points a beam leaves from, so your own character can do the same.

Installing

1. Unzip, drag Hangabout.app into Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions

Hangabout 0.6

Hangabout now updates itself. When there is a new version your companion asks — Update downloads it, swaps itself over and reopens, with no download, no drag and no Gatekeeper warning. Later puts it off for a day. The manual install below is only ever needed once.

Also: a Screen menu for picking which display to hang from when you have more than one.

Installing

1. Unzip, drag Hangabout.app into Applications.
2. Double-click it — macOS refuses the first time. Click Done.
3. System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, click Open Anyway.

Once only. Needs an Apple Silicon Mac on macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Full instructions