Skald 0.4.0

What's new

• Multi-line input. Long phrases now wrap at word boundaries; the panel grows upward while the bottom edge (and icons) stay anchored where the panel originally appeared. Cap at ~360pt height — past that the field accepts more text but the panel stops growing.
• History recall. Press the Up arrow in the input field to walk back through the last 10 phrases you typed (translated or not). Down arrow moves forward; bottom-most position is a clean field. History persists across restarts.
• Outside-click dismissal is reliable again. Replaced the global mouse-down monitor with a windowDidResignKey observer — the old monitor could occasionally fire during NSApp.activate / NSPopover lifecycle races and dismiss the panel while you were still clicking inside it.

Install

Mount the DMG, drag Skald to Applications, eject. First launch should be a single double-click — no Gatekeeper warning.

Existing 0.3+ installs get this update automatically on next launch (or via menu-bar → Check for Updates…).

Skald 0.3.0

Skald 0.3.0

No more Gatekeeper warnings. Skald is now signed with an Apple Developer ID, notarized, and shipped as a DMG. Double-click and it opens — no right-click "Open", no "developer cannot be verified" warning.

What's new

• 🔒 Signed + notarized. Apple has verified this build. First launch is a single double-click; no security workarounds needed.
• 📀 DMG distribution. Mount the disk image, drag Skald to Applications, eject. Standard macOS install flow.
• 🔄 Auto-updates wired up. Skald now checks panic-kit.com/skald/appcast.xml once a day and offers updates in place — no more manually downloading each new version. (You'll need to do this last manual install once; future versions install themselves.)
• 🌐 Product page at panic-kit.com/skald.

No app-level feature changes since 0.2.2 — this release is entirely about install + update infrastructure.

Install

1. Download Skald-0.3.0.dmg below.
2. Double-click to open. A window with the Skald icon and an Applications shortcut appears.
3. Drag Skald onto Applications.
4. Eject the disk image. Open Skald from Applications.
5. macOS asks for Accessibility permission once — this is required for Skald to paste translations into the focused app. Grant it in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility.

Upgrading from 0.2.x

The 0.2.x builds didn't have a working appcast feed, so they can't auto-update to this version. Download and install 0.3.0 manually once — from 0.3.x onward, updates roll out automatically in the background.

Your settings, hotkeys, and API keys carry over.

Verify

• Min macOS: 15.0 (Sequoia)
• Architecture: universal (Apple Silicon + Intel)
• Signature: Developer ID Application: Ivan Shestakov (975ZZPJQNB)
• Source: https://github.com/ivshestakov/skald.app

Skald 0.2.2

Three input-panel improvements:

• ⌘V now works inside the input field — also ⌘C, ⌘X, ⌘A.
• Dictation works — put your cursor in the field, hit Fn-Fn (or whatever shortcut you've set) or trigger Whisper-style apps. The field is recognised as a normal text input.
• Settings gear icon in the panel for one-click access without going through the menu-bar.

Same engines, languages, tone slider, and shortcuts as 0.2.1. The 0.2.0 prompt-injection guard for Claude is still in place.

Install

Same as 0.2.1 — download Skald-0.2.2.zip, unzip, replace /Applications/Skald.app, restart.

Skald 0.2.0

Quick-translate hotkey: translate without opening the panel.

The new default ⌥ ` (option-backtick, customisable) does one of two things:

• If you have text selected in the active app, the selection is replaced with its translation in place.
• If nothing is selected, the current clipboard contents are translated and pasted at your cursor.

Same engines, same languages, same offline fall-back as the panel — just no glass UI in the way.

Changes since 0.1.0

• Second customisable hotkey (⌥ ` by default) for in-place translation
• New Pasteboard helper extracted; both flows share paste logic
• Settings → Shortcuts now has two recorder rows
• Default hotkeys: ⌥/ opens the panel, ⌥ ` quick-translates

Install

1. Download Skald-0.2.0.zip.
2. Unzip → drag Skald.app into /Applications.
3. First launch: right-click → Open → Open.
4. Grant Accessibility when prompted.

See INSTALL.md for the full first-run walkthrough.

Known limitations

• Self-signed cert → first-launch Gatekeeper warning
• Auto-update is stubbed (real Sparkle feed comes in a later release)
• Requires macOS 15 (Sequoia) or newer

Skald 0.1.0

First public build of Skald — a macOS menu-bar translator that pastes into the active app on a hotkey.

Install

1. Download Skald-0.1.0.zip below.
2. Unzip → drag Skald.app into /Applications.
3. First launch: right-click → Open → Open
   (Gatekeeper bypass; needed once because Skald isn't yet under an Apple Developer ID.)
4. Grant Accessibility when prompted.

See INSTALL.md for the full first-run walkthrough and API-key setup.

What works

• Five engines: Apple (on-device, offline), Google, DeepL, Claude
• 13 languages with on-device source detection
• Auto offline fallback when the network drops
• Customisable hotkey (defaults to ⌥/)
• Tone slider for Claude (Corporate → Vulgar)
• Universal binary (Apple Silicon + Intel)

Known limitations

• Self-signed cert → first-launch Gatekeeper warning
• Auto-update is stubbed (real Sparkle feed will be wired in 0.2)
• Requires macOS 15 (Sequoia) or newer