Dartboard – A Replacement for the macOS Dashboard

It looks like Apple is killing the Dashboard with the “Catalina” macOS 10.15 update. If you’re like me, this is bad news. I probably press F12 over a dozen times a day. I like checking on the Weather, Stocks and other useful gadgets. It looks like I’m not alone in this disappointment. While the feedback on MacRumors and 9to5Mac is mixed, plenty of people voiced their disappointment with this decision. To help fix this problem, “Dartboard” is the next app from Photics.

I’ve decided to modify my 10-Year plan to address this issue. Instead of creating the “Photics: Tools” in a future year, I’m moving it up to this year. There’s already been significant progress with Dartboard. Tasks that I thought were beyond my ability are now possible. Hype 4 certainly helps a lot too, as this app will basically be built entirely in Hype and then wrapped with Wrapping.

There are some downsides though…

• I only have weather data for the US right now, and among other reasons, this will be a US app only. (At least, that’s the plan for launch.)
• The target price for the app is $5. (That’s 50 widgets at 10¢ each.)
• This will delay the Hype 4 book project. (I simply don’t have the time to work on two major apps at the same time.)

That last bullet point might be a blessing, as I can use the widgets in Dartboard as learning examples for the book.

Here’s the current list of widgets (subject to change)

1. Calculator
2. Dictionary
3. RSS Feed App
4. Note
5. Pythagorean / Pi / Math Calculator
6. Slide Puzzle
7. Text-To-Speech
8. Time (Date / Calendar / Clock)
9. Thesaurus
10. Unit Converter
11. Weather
12. Web – Color Picker

I’m also planning to add a way for people to add their own widgets – something HTML5 based. Hype’s “Export to HTML5” > “Dashboard/iBooks Author Widget” might be an ideal solution. It’s something to investigate. It might not be a straight import, but perhaps the .wdgt files could be converted to something web-friendly.

The plan is to launch the app when the next major macOS update launches. That’s typically in late September.

There’s much to do!