jslegendre / afloatx

An alternative to Afloat that lives in the dock icon menu

AfloatX

An alternative to Afloat that lives in the dock icon menu. Although AfloatX has some of the same features as Afloat, it is not meant to be a clone. AfloatX is a simple and unobtrusive plugin made to add some additional window management features.

Current Features

• Keep window on top (floating window)
• Keep window on behind all other windows
• Transient mode: Always come to focus in current space. Won't force you back to that windows last active space
• Sticky mode: Window stays visible on all spaces
• Invert window color
• Click-Through window: Window is invisible to clicks (best paired with a floating window)
• Outline Window: Outline window with 1 of 8 colors
• Window transparency

Requests?

Open an issue here describing a feature you think would fit well.

Download

• Download the latest build here
• Download and install directly from MacForge here

Install

I use and recommend MacForge for managing plugins.

Contribution

If you would like to contribute to AfloatX feel free to send a pull request or open an issue! If you're not a great programmer or don't have any issues, consider getting me a coffee :) https://paypal.me/jslegendre

Screenshots

afloatx's Issues

Color inversion not affecting side panels and some custom UI elements

Seems to work normally with global (screen) color inversion but not with CIFilters. Don't really have much time to work on this myself at the moment so any help/insight is appreciated.

GrayFocus:

GrayFocus:

Originally posted by @kevinjohncutler in #2 (comment)

Feature Request: Adjust whole dock transparency

I am not keen on showing/hiding the dock, I would like to be able to set the level of transparency for the whole dock for preserving OLED monitor life. I have enabled cycling through wallpapers every 5 minutes and this would be an added bonus if possible.

Big Sur: AfloatX launch bug causing desktop/dock/menu bar to become unresponsive/greyed out

When I restart my system or just MacForge with AfloatX enabled, the menu bar goes gray and desktop navigation stops working (no dock, gestures to show desktop, etc.). It can be fixed by 'disabling injection' from the macforge menu bar dropdown. Any apps that were open still have the AfloatX context menu too (I only use the inversion, which as I mentioned in another thread now works like a charm).

As far as I can tell, MacForge is not the issue - disabling AfloatX and relaunching MacForge does not reproduce this bug.

AfloatX doesn't work on Big Sur M1

I downloaded through Macforge, but when I installed it, nothing happens -- no new option comes up.

Click through transparency

I like to have some windows set to a low transparency percentage in the corner of the screen, but I would like to be able to click through to UI elements of the current screen BEHIND the floating window (for example a tool bar button or a scrolling arrow).

In other words, it would be great to have a way to ignore the floating window when convenient. Maybe a modifier key?

In any case, thank you for the application. It's a life saver.

How to install?

I'm non tech. How exactly do i install this .bundle file for AfloatX (looks like a plugin lego cube)? Does it work with BigSur on Mac M1?

Can I always on top for one window?

I have multiple chrome windows. And I only want keep one of these window on top and don't affect other windows?
Can I achieve it now?

*system requirements

Hi!
Sorry to bother, what are the system requirements for afloatx?
Currently I have MacOS Catalina installed.

I'm just kinda scared it will break my computer ..

Best,

Halem

Any way to add window filters, like CIColorInvert?

I tried to implement it myself, but I'm just not familiar enough with the programming language to know what (probably small) errors I am making.

Feature Request : Focus follows mouse

`AfloatX loaded` printed in terminals

When I'm using iTerm2 or Warp and fish (possibly other shells too) and run a command that takes a few seconds or longer, sometimes this is added to the logs of the command:

2024-01-03 09:11:16.515 terminal-notifier[86954:7853565] AfloatX loaded

I narrowed it down to the NSLog:

AfloatX/AfloatX/AfloatX.m

Line 150 in 8c6907e

NSLog(@"AfloatX loaded");

I patched the binary, no-oping the NSLog call and it fixed the issue.

Maybe there's a way to still log it without it affecting terminals? I even tried adding iTerm2 and Warp to MacForge's blacklist and the message was still logged. My only guess is that it's due to what it says in NSLogv()'s docs (although I'm still unsure whose log it's collecting since if it is another app's then a random shell shouldn't be capturing it?):

If the STDERR_FILENO file descriptor has been redirected away from the default or is going to a tty, it will also be written there.

• macOS 13.6.2
• MacForge 1.2.2 (2)
• AfloatX 1.6

Feature Request: Visor mode

Add the ability to pop in (animation optional, I suppose) a window from any one of the screen edges, and have it pop out when focus is lost.

You could bind the windows to hot keys, and have them appear on top of anything, wherever you are. Imagine being able to pull a terminal or a Finder window up with a key press at any time.

iTerm has it built in, and I’ve used TotalFinder for the longest time to add it to Finder, but it would be nice to do it on any window.

Transparency UI remains there on Facetime Call

Hello, Amazing plug-in. Working as promised.

I am on Big Sur 11.1, MacBook Pro Early 2015.

Only problem I found is that the transparency UI works fine on some apps like Terminal, TextEdit etc.. But when trying to do a Facetime call, I am able to do make it into a Float window, Sticky Window, Click-Through window and Transparent window. Which is exactly what I want in order to keep working while still making the Facetime call.

HOWEVER, the Transparency UI is stuck there on Facetime call after I set the slider and click the tick. I can no longer change the slider, and not click on the tick. Also, I can no longer ask for the transparency setting again on the same window if I want to change the transparency again. Also the UI is not transparent so my work behind this UI cannot be seen. Click-Through is working though so I can click on my work through the UI.

I am attaching a screenshot. Any chance to fix this so the transparency UI disappears after clicking the tick? Thank you :)

unwanted settings reset

when I make mac-native apps (e.g. finder, mail etc.) transparent, they turn back normal upon closing the respective window.

Installing without MacForge...?

I started installing MacForge (just to install AfloatX) but I'm not a programmer and when I got to the part where it asks me to disable system integrity protection, I did a 180 and uninstalled MacForge.

Is there any other way to install the AfloatX bundle that doesn't require me to compromise my OS in ways I understand nothing about?

Can't work in Catalina 10.15.7

hello creator,i disabled spi but it seems that this floatx dose not work well.


it's no label in my dock window.

Please help me ,thanks!

AfloatX menu not appearing in apps initially

MacForge 0.14.1 is installed with AfloatX 1.3.5 on macOS 10.15.3, both AMFI and SIP is disabled (and reporting so in MacForge.

The menu didn't appear for most apps that launched at boot, but appeared in others after quitting the applications and starting them again. For other apps it didn't appear at all, until it suddenly did after a number of application restarts. Now I've got my apps to have the menu.

I wonder if there's some kind of cache that should be cleared automatically by AfloatX.

Menu doesn't show when apps are 'Hidden'

Doesn't work on 12.5.1

FeatureRequest: Shortcuts

Hi jslegendre,
Got any plan to embed some shortcuts in this bundle?
Thanks,
Walter

non-mac windows

windows like my firefox browser etc. don't pick up afloatx, how could I make those work to be transparent as well? thx :)

How to delete the plugin from Macforge?

No Icon on Big Sur 11.4 (M1)

I installed AfloatX through MacForge on my Mac M1 running Big Sur 11.4.

However no icon appears in the dock. I also tried restarting the computer after installation. But still no icon.

Is this a known limitation?

I guess this is a copy of #25 However that one is closed so I am therefore raising a new issue.

Thanks in advance for any help solving this issue.

Big Sur: AfloatX works only when I enable and disable Afloat

Ok this is strange. I've been using Afloat for quite a while. Recently I upgraded to Big Sur and, when I enable Afloat, my Dock crashes permanently: it's not possible to use Application Switcher so I can only switch apps by clicking on one of the application's windows.
What I do then to get out of this situation is: disable Afloat and restart Dock.

I disabled Afloat and installed AfloatX. On its own, every time I restart my computer, AfloatX stops working.
To fix this, I open MacForge, enable Afloat, disable Afloat, restart Dock.

This is a bit cumbersome to have to do.

Is there any way I can help debugging this?

Oddly enough, CMD+CTRL+A shortcut works after this.

Also, I don't see any AfloatX icon, neither in the Menu nor in the Dock.

Feature Request: Remember app preferences

Hi, I think being able to activate Afloat settings upon every app launch could be useful instead of manually setting them on windows each time. There would probably have to be some sort of menu to set configurations for apps, which I'm not sure is within the scope of this plugin. Thanks for the updates though.

Cannot run normally on mac with big sur or m1 chip

Big sur 11.4, MacBook Pro with m1. AfloatX cannot run normally. Right-click the app in the dock, and no corresponding option appears.

Automatic transparency for active and inactive windows

Would that be possible with AfloatX?

I currently use yabai, which works, but requires enabling "Displays have separate Spaces", which is bad, as I have three displays and like them to also as one Desktop.
A workaround was using Total Spaces 2, but that doesn't work anymore on Monterey.
Then I got back to using macOS shortcuts, but after the last update of Monterey they refuse one key to more than one space.

I just want to have e.g. active window 1.0 opacity, any other window 0.8.

Could that be done?

more descriptive description

hello,

a friendly thought: describe your project on its own terms.

your project description assumes the reader will be familiar with something called "afloat".

I searched for something by this name and everything I found was related to this: Kansas City woman launches 'Afloat' app to lend a helping hand. 

Since this repo predates that app and the need for it, I assume that's not correct.

perhaps if you describe what you are doing you will get users who would never have used the original afloat, whatever that my be. :)

Chroma key ?

Some kind of chroma key would be really nice to make one or more colors totally transparent

Feature Request - macports addition

Why use MacForge? Brew has it's issues, and macports is proven and has a very strong support system and library of software. I don't want to have to install yet another OS X software manager.

Functionality notes from MacForge

Loading plugins into system applications requires that System Integrity Protection is disabled
Loading plugins into some applications may require Apple Mobile File Integrity to be disabled
Loading plugins into some applications may require the plugin must be signed and in the /Library directory
Applications installed by MacForge may not require SIP to be disabled to function

Afloat not working on Monterey Beta

Hi there,

I disabled both SIP and Library Validation.
And it looks like AfloatX is installed in MacForge, as it shows up as plugins.

However, I'm not sure if I'm suppose to do anything else after that as it doesn't do anything/show up anywhere.

I really want this to work (made my github account just for this) so I'm just trying to figure out if it's the Monterey/Beta issue or if I didn't install it correctly on MacForge (as I'm not too code saavy)


.

Thank you!!

Some apps do not have an AFloat menu

Xcode,Simulator .
This feature is especially needed when using Simulator

how to get Chinese language？

how to do

Installation without MacForge?

Is it possible to install without MacForge? It has a pretty big warning about needing System Integrity Protection:

I'm not sure I'm comfortable disabling that, especially with a work machine.

FeatureRequest:Avoid

I've been using AFloatX a lot and it works perfectly fine, but recently I saw an extension called "Screen Bandit". This keeps an image floating but moves it automatically when your mouse comes near. I would love to see this with AFloatX because it would work with programs instead of just photos. Keeping my program afloat, click-through, and transparent is what I've been doing, but I think it would be cool if you could also add this option, so I could use every part of the screen, without having to make my image transparent. Thank you!
screenbandit.com

Doesn't work when opening multiple Chrome PWAs

1. Install two different PWAs with Chrome (go to the menu -> More Tools -> Create desktop shortcut on two different websites)
2. Open both the PWAs
3. Only the first opened app has AfloatX controls, the second doesn't

Afloatx causes applications to crash when you close all of the application's windows and right click the application's dock icon

Hi,
I am using a MacBook Pro 16 inch with macOS 10.15.3 beta 3. I am using AfloatX 1.3.0 with the latest MacForge. This problem occurs every time I take the following steps and can occur for any specific application.
Steps:

1. Close all of the application's windows with the top left window's red x circle
2. The application remains open (black dot beneath it) in the dock.
3. Right click the dock icon.
4. Then you get a crash.
   The example crash report in the screenshot is produced when using the application TextEdit.
   I have also copied the entire output of "Problem Details and System Configuration" to the attached text file.
   
   Problem Details and System Configuration.txt

Is there a way to install AfloatX without disabling System Integrity Protection?

The description provides 2 ways to download AfloatX (directly from GitHub or via MacForge) but only 1 way to install it (via MacForge) which requires disabling System Integrity Protection, which I'd like NOT to do.
Is there a way to install AfloatX without disabling System Integrity Protection?