The weekend is so close…so very close, we can almost touch it. As ever, TypeIt4Me has kept us busy this past month. In addition to implementing some much-requested new features, we’ve made further progress on whittling down The List of Reported Annoyances. With the font size set to 8 and the display in portrait orientation, this wince-inducing catalogue of failures is now almost short enough to view at a glance without scrolling. How about that? Anyway, if you head over to the Mac App Store you’ll see that TypeIt4Me 7.1 is now available to download. Read on for an overview of what you can expect from this latest update.

What’s New and Improved in TypeIt4Me 7.1 (203):

Added features:

• By popular request, there’s a new setting to stop the main TypeIt4Me window opening on launch.
• “New Predefined Set” has been added to the TypeIt4Me menu, for increased discoverability.
• There are several new predefined date formats to choose from when inserting a dynamic date in a snippet.
• When the “Show in Menu Bar” app icon setting is selected, you can now choose whether the TypeIt4Me icon should also show temporarily in the Dock while the main app window is open.

Bug fixes:

• Fixed a bug that would add an unwanted carriage return after expanding a prompt snippet.
• When TypeIt4Me is in the Dock but the window is closed, clicking the Dock icon now opens the window.
• Fixed a bug that would cause the TypeIt4Me icon to reappear in the Dock despite “Don’t Show App Icon” being selected in Settings.
• Fixed a bug that could prevent adding multiple fill-in options / prompts to a rich formatted snippet.
• All options in the View menu for sorting snippets now work correctly and the sort order for each set is reflected in the point-and-click menu.
• Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause the snippet formatting popover menu to close immediately when opened.
• Improved compatibility with WhatsApp.
• Fixed a bug affecting nested snippets that contain rich formatting and / or pictures. Formatting and pictures are now correctly retained on expansion.
• The position cursor special function now works correctly in rich formatted snippets.
• Fixed a bug where abbreviations would remain when expanding snippets in File > Save dialogs.
• Fixed a bug that struck when TypeIt4Me was set to show only in the Dock and the window was closed. Selecting “New Set” or “New Snippet” from the menu now opens the main TypeIt4Me window.
• When you delete a snippet while in “Show duplicates” view it no longer reverts to showing the full snippet list, so you can continue to view, edit and delete duplicates.
• Fixed a bug where the wrong fill-in option / prompt would be renamed when saving changes if more than one fill-in option / prompt with the same name was present in the snippet.
• Fixed bugs that would result in the wrong popover preview content sometimes being shown. This could happen when quickly moving the pointer over adjacent fill-in options / prompts in a rich formatted snippet.
• When adding a “Don’t expand in” or “Only expand in” rule to a set, Safari now correctly appears in the list of apps you can apply the rule to.

…Phew.

This one turned out to be quite a substantial update. Thanks again to everyone who has been in touch to suggest new features and / or to make us aware of stuff that’s not working as expected. Together, we’ll whip this app into shape yet.

Thursday! What a concept. After weeks of hard graft spent sweating our way through Operation Midnight Ham Sandwich Operation Bug Spray we can at last announce that TypeIt4Me 7.0.2 is available to download. Coming hot on the heels of last month’s update, this one contains a veritable cornucopia of bug fixes. You should also find that it’s generally more robust, performance-wise.

Release notes for TypeIt4Me 7.0.2 (171):

• Fixed more bugs that could cause CSV import problems. Also added support for a third column, for those who wish to import labels along with abbreviations and snippet content.
• Fixed a bug affecting German keyboards that would prevent expansion of abbreviations containing these characters: ^ ° ` ´ §
• The “All punctuation resets abbreviation” option in Expansion settings was not working correctly. Now it does.
• Fixed a bug that would cause problems attempting to save changes to snippets containing emoji.
• After you type something in the search filter above the snippet list, it’s now correctly cleared when you switch to another set.
• Fixed a bug that broke Pause / Resume in the TypeIt4Me menu.
• After selecting a file in Finder and pressing the Enter key to rename it, expansion now works as expected.
• Fixed a bug that would leave the first letter of an abbreviation behind after expanding a snippet in the Chrome URL bar.
• Usage metadata and statistics now update correctly for rich formatted snippets that contain dates and / or special TABs
• Fixed: the Add a Snippet window now correctly displays a warning again when you attempt to define an abbreviation that already exists. It once again gives the option to create a duplicate or overwrite the existing snippet.
• Fixed a bug in the text formatting popover menu that could cause the SF symbols on text alignment and hyperlink buttons to display as question marks.
• Rich snippets with abbreviations that involve holding the shift key or that begin with 2 numbers or more no longer expand in Unwanted Title Case.
• The app now prevents attempts to combine special function characters (e.g. ⌫⇥⇤⏎␊↓↑←→⎢) in a snippet with fill-in field options and / or pulldown menu prompts. Mixing these is not supported.
• The “Add a Snippet” window now does a better job of preserving rich formatting attributes when you select text and invoke it.
• Improved support for formatting and saving non-latin alphabet characters.
• Attempting to expand a snippet that contains an empty autocue placeholder no longer results in a crash.
• Fixed a bug that could cause a square symbol to be appended to the end of expanded snippets when using the esc key as a trigger.
• Numerous stability and performance improvements.

Once again, many thanks for your patience. There are of course further bugs still on our list of things to fix, as well as a number of requested features to add. We hope to be able to submit the next build to Apple for review in a couple of weeks.

Phew! It’s with great relief that we’re able to report the promised TypeIt4Me 7.0.1 bug fix update is at last available to download. Riccardo and I were growing a bit apprehensive: despite no major changes, it took nearly 3 weeks and 3 submissions for this update to get the nod from Apple’s review engineers.

In contrast, the initial 7.0 launch build was approved for release on the Mac App Store within hours of submission. We got there in the end, though and that’s what matters. It’s reassuring to know that Apple is vigilant when it comes to protecting its customers.

These are the release notes for TypeIt4Me 7.0.1 (143):

• Adding a word to ignore in AutoCorrect settings works as expected (no more crashes)
• The “starting with a capital” checkbox in AutoCorrect “ignore” settings is selectable again
• We fixed an issue where dragging a CSV file into the sidebar would not convert it correctly
• The AM / PM option in the “Add a time” menu works again
• The snippet list column now displays correct previews for snippets that contain a mixture of both dates and prompts
• Dates now correctly expand in the default system language when no language has been specified
• Stats and metadata now update correctly after expansion for snippets that contain prompts
• Date snippets in search window results no longer need to be clicked twice to be inserted
• This build now correctly prevents unsupported mixing of autocue placeholders and input field prompts in the same snippet
• Turning off accessibility permission while the app is running no longer causes lock-ups (it’s still best to quit the app before removing its permission altogether, though)
• This build corrects some minor localization omissions

Thank you for your patience. There are still more bugs that we are working to fix and we’re aiming to submit the next build for review in a week or so. Hopefully, future TypeIt4Me bug fix updates will go smoothly from this point on. We think we have a better grasp of reviewers’ chief concerns and how to address these up front.