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Few applications on macOS are as understated, yet valuable as PopClip by Pilotmoon Software. Lee uses it countless times each day and when he recently carried out a clean install of his MacBook Pro, it was one of the first utilities to get reinstalled.

With PopClip, you select text and carry out any of a large number of actions, right inline. We have covered this utility a few times at ScreenCastsONLINE and with many news extensions now available, Lee walks you through four that he uses regularity. PopClip is available as a standalone purchase from the Pilotmoon site, as well as in the Setapp subscription bundle.

Converting media files to different formats is an occupational requirement for many of us, whether it's audio, video or image files and there are lots of tools out there to choose from. Permute is, without a doubt, one of the best, due to its speed and range of options.

It also offers some optional add-ins that expand its functionality even more. Perhaps you want to create a video file using a static image alongside an audio file, or how about a text file you'd like to convert into speech? Permute is here to help.

In this video, Lee walks you through simple conversions, batch conversions, configuring groups, stitching videos using modules, and more.

When Lee covered BetterTouchTool in Shows 1543 and 1547, he intimated that he wasn't done and would be releasing some tip videos in the future covering more nuanced features within the app. Well, it didn't take long for the first one to land and it could prove to be a game-changer for you. Floating Menus aren't talked about much however they pack a lot of power and you can configure them to display clickable triggers anywhere on the screen.

In this video, Lee walks you through two of his favourite setups. The first one is a small menu button that sits in the corner of your screen however when you hover over it, it expands to reveal 16 clickable buttons. The second showcases how you can configure different floating menus for different applications and this can really take your efficiency to another level.

After growing increasingly frustrated at some limitations with using the Safari browser, Lee was advised to use an extension called StopTheMadness Pro, which aims to streamline your experience by eradicating some of the pain points that can be placed on you by websites. If you grow weary of not being able to select text and use your clipboard, or worry about where those shortened URLs are actually taking you, then StopTheMadness Pro is well worth checking out and in this video, Lee walks you through some of the key features he's found useful in his time with it so far. That includes installing this Safari extension onto other browsers, such as Chrome!

When it comes to editing photos most photographers forget an important part of the process and that's adding metadata to their photos! The process of adding metadata can often be application specific and adding in one application like Apple's Photos App does not carry that metadata over to other applications. Writing the metadata to the file itself before it is used in any application is the best way to go and that is where HoudahGeo 7 comes in. In this screencast Todd will cover all the features and options in HoudahGeo 7's well thought out workflow for adding metadata to your photos of Load, Process, and Output. Hopefully you will see how HoudahGeo 7 might fit into your own photo editing workflow.

Lee has mentioned BetterTouchTool in a lot of videos recently, so it's finally time he dedicated a video series to showing you the many features this excellent Mac utility provides.

BetterTouchTool has come a long way since our last deep dive almost eight years ago. In the first of this two-part series, Lee walks you slowly through the interface, and demos some of the gestures you can trigger using the trackpad to execute actions on macOS. This includes launching apps and moving and resizing your windows. You also learn how to use keyboard shortcuts and key sequences as triggers, to automate almost any action you can think of on your Mac.

Join Lee on this exploration by following along in BetterTouchTool so you get the most out of this video.

When the news recently broke that MacUpdater was being sunsetted by its developers, a collective groan was heard throughout the Mac community. It was the go-to app for so many people for managing app updates through a variety of sources.

Updatest is a new indie application by Huge Ideas, that is looking to fill the gap — and it's making a splash. Originally designed by the developer for their own use, it's now been published and is a great utility for managing updates from the App Store, Homebrew, as well as Github. It can keep Electron apps and those that use the Sparkle framework updated, too.

In this screencast, Lee walks you through the basics of the Updatest app as well as looking at how to adopt an application so that it switches to Homebrew updates, rather than manual ones.

Many Tricks are most famous for Moom, the window management utility that holds a dear space in the hearts of Mac users around the globe. They actually have more apps in their locker and this one, Witch, takes the regular App Switcher and brings it to another level.

In this video, Lee shows you how to configure different actions that allow you to get to apps, windows, and more, far quicker than the built-in tools. It's an impressive app.

After covering Perplexity in show 1517, it was only a matter of time before their web browser, Comet, received Lee's attention. Comet attempts to take browsing to the next level by incorporating AI features to further improve the user experience, and it makes a solid fist of doing this.

This video is split into three distinct parts. In the first section, Lee looks at the regular web browsing features that warrant attention. It isn't a deep dive into how to use a browser, but rather a look at how Comet takes things like Tab Groups and makes them work differently to other products. In the second part, he show you the AI-agentic features such as summarising pages, ordering productions and looking at multiple tabs to get information. You may be surprised at some of the results! Lee then wraps up by looking at just a few of the settings that you may want to tweak to improve your experience. It's certainly a glimpse into the future of web browsing.

When looking at options for password management, most of the discussions centre around 1Password vs Apple Passwords. There are, however, other options that are worthy of consideration. In this video, Lee takes a look at Strongbox which, if you have a Setapp subscription, is definitely worth a look. It's available on macOS, iOS and iPadOS and has lots of options for storing your database.

Local or cloud sync? Up to you. Encryption level? Up to you. It's got an awful lot going for it and Lee takes a look at some of the basic features Strongbox has to offer in the macOS app. You learn how to create new databases, items, look at tactics for grouping and tagging and also audit your passwords to ensure you are on top of your security game.

In this episode, we're completing our Kagi trilogy by exploring Orion Browser, the privacy-focused WebKit browser. Unlike most modern browsers that run on Google's Chromium, Orion is built on the same WebKit engine as Safari—giving you exceptional speed, energy efficiency, and battery life on Mac, while using half the memory of Safari and far less than Chrome.

Lee walks you through everything from vertical tabs and Focus Mode to profiles, web apps, and Kagi service integration, showing you how Orion delivers both simplicity for everyday users and powerful features for advanced workflows. He also dives into some truly unique capabilities that set Orion apart, including programmable buttons that let you automate browsing tasks, and the ability to turn any website into a standalone app.

Whether you're looking for a Safari alternative with more flexibility, want to escape the Chromium monoculture, or simply need a browser that respects your privacy while giving you complete control, Orion noe offers a compelling option.

The more you use macOS, the more you can grow frustrated with the amount of manual intervention you have to take when it comes to keeping your file system organised. Whether it's keeping your Downloads folder tidy, looking for screenshots (you remember taking one, you just can't remember when…) or going through a huge array of different files on your desktop, well, that's not what you enjoy doing on your Mac.

With macOS Tahoe, Shortcuts gained the ability to automate actions on folders. In this video, Lee walks you through three different examples that may have a quick-win style impact on your workflows. Example 1 will keep your Downloads folder organised while the second will automatically resize image files for you when they hit a specific folder. In the third automation trick, Lee will guide you as you level up your scripting skills and stop screenshots from building up on your desktop at the same time.

This video was created on macOS 26 Tahoe.

There are a lot of apps you could use for your library of notes and ideas. But if you struggle actually making something of the things that you've collected, Sublime may be just what you need. Sublime is primarily a web & iOS app that is designed to help your curiosity fuel creation, not distraction. It helps you to capture what sparks your attention and provides related human-curated ideas to help you make something new out of the dots you've collected.

Whilst researching last weeks video on Kagi Search, Lee started playing with their news service - originally called Kagi News to see how it compared with other news products. Kagi News is very different, in that it doesn't periodically update during the day. Instead, you have one digest, at 12pm UTC with no more than 12 stories per category. This helps prevent overwhelm and whilst it may seem like a strange tactic, it works surprisingly well and in this video, Lee shows you how to use it, and tailor it to your own needs.

Kagi Search has rapidly gained in popularity over the last twelve months, so Lee thought it would be a good idea to put it through it's paces and see what the fuss is about. Initially reluctant, because why pay for web searching when Google is free, it didn't take long for him to see why people love it so much and in this video, Lee shows you what he found and walks through the product end-to-end. You'll learn how to configure basic searches, personalise results, create shortcuts to target your searches to specific sites and locales, and much more, including touching on Kagi Assistant, Kagi's AI helper.

MacPaw have recently released Moonlock, a protection suite for macOS that gives you real-time malware protection, a built-in VPN, network inspector, and clear system-security advice — all in a sleek, Apple-style interface. In this video, Lee uses the app for the first time and offers his views on both the strengths and weaknesses of this first version of Moonlock.

Moonlock is available as part of a Setapp subscription or on the MacPaw website, and runs on macOS 13 (Ventura) or newer. Current pricing information is in the Resources below.

It's said that we are the sum of our habits so to improve as people, it's important to track them - whether positive or negative. Lee has been using Streaks for just over ten years and whilst there has been a smaller tip video on the app, it's iterated so much, he felt it's time for a deep dive.

In this video, Lee walks you through the app end-to-end, from the simplicity of setting up a task and editing properties, through to automation using the Shortcuts app to automatically start timers and mark them as complete.

It's a great app and we're thrilled to give it the attention we feel it deserves.

Streaks is currently $5.99 in the App Store on all platforms.

Following on from his recent show organising and optimising his Photo Library, Don turns his attention to his iCloud Storage organisation. In this tip show, Don explores why his iCloud storage has grown and uses a tool to identify large files and folders to either download and archive or simply delete.

Having been first released in 2022, Perplexity has continued to develop and add new features so we figured it was time to put it through it's paces. Lee has actually been using Perplexity for around a year now, and it's safe to say that 'Google searching' for him now is a thing of the past. Perplexity allows you to be more efficient by carrying out lots of the heavy lifting when it comes to searching for information online. In this video, Lee walks you through the main features that Perplexity has to offer and uses real-world scenarios from his use in the last twelve months to demonstrate how you can make good use of this tool - from planning travel itineraries, to creating research pages for sharing with others. Perplexity is well worth checking out if you are not familiar with it already.

Finder alternatives are great because despite some recent improvements, the macOS Finder is still lacking in functionality. QSpace is a utility that can be as simple or as complex as you need it to be. Its main selling point is the multi-pane view for Finder windows, which is enough to make the app popular. However with the ability to do things like connect to cloud services, customise contextual menus, quickly launch apps, services and shortcuts, as well as tweak the app with page upon page of settings, QSpace is an app almost anyone can make use of!

In this video, Lee walks you through some of his favourite QSpace features.

QSpace requires macOS 10.15 or later.