By Jason Snell

March 31, 2022 10:33 AM PT

Last updated May 18, 2022

Automating Audio Hijack 4 with Shortcuts and JavaScript

Note: This story has not been updated since 2022.

Rogue Amoeba’s Audio Hijack 4 is here, and while it’s got a bunch of interesting new features, my favorite is its support for automation via JavaScript and Shortcuts. While not quite everything in Audio Hijack is controllable (yet), most of it is—and it leads to some really interesting possibilities for users.

Audio Hijack can be controlled by scripts saved within the app itself (the app includes several built-in scripts as samples, and more are available on Rogue Amoeba’s website), via scripts saved as .ahcommand text files on your Mac, and via scripts sent directly from Shortcuts. Individual Sessions can run scripts via the new Scripting tab in each session; automations can fire off when a recording, session, or timer stops or starts. One script provided by Rogue Amoeba, Discard Small Files, will delete any recording less than five seconds in length. It’s a perfect match for the Session Stop event.

But Audio Hijack really unfolds when you integrate it with Shortcuts. Right now, the app provides three Shortcuts actions: Run a Script, Run JavaScript, and Run/Stop Session. Run a Script will run a script stored within the Audio Hijack app; Run JavaScript will run a script passed to the app from the shortcut, and Run/Stop Session lets you turn a particular session on or off. (There’s an “allow execution of external scripts” setting in Audio Hijack’s preferences that you’ll need to turn on first.)

That’s a very limited set of actions. But even if only the Run Javascript in Audio Hijack was available, all things would be possible. That’s because Audio Hijack 4’s initial JavaScript implementation allows you to detect the status of sessions and of individual blocks within sessions, and then turn them on and off. You can also affect some, but not all, of the variables within a block. You can set the filename and destination of a recording block, for instance, so a shortcut or script can adaptively name and place a file.

Continue reading “Automating Audio Hijack 4 with Shortcuts and JavaScript”…

By Jason Snell

March 31, 2022 9:41 AM PT

Last updated May 18, 2022

Audio Hijack 4 arrives: The definitive Mac audio utility just got better

Note: This story has not been updated since 2022.

Rogue Amoeba has released Audio Hijack 4, a huge update to its all-purpose Mac audio recording tool. It’s the app’s first major update since Audio Hijack 3, way back in 2015. I’ve been recording all my podcasts with Audio Hijack 4 for months now, and it’s got new features that will please loyal users and dazzle potential new ones.

It all starts with the look of the app, which has been refreshed throughout and now includes a light mode to go with the existing dark mode. The master list of sessions is now a compact list that displays what sorts of things are being recorded (including app icons!), with the ability to run and stop sessions without opening them at all. There’s also a corresponding menu bar item, from which you can start and stop sessions.

Each session view has also been given a refreshed look. Each session now keeps track of its own historical recordings and timers via new tabs in the session-specific sidebar. Every “popover” item containing details about individual blocks in a session can now be torn off and allowed to float anywhere on screen. An optional pinning feature lets those items float above all other windows, so you can monitor or adjust individual items even if Audio Hijack isn’t in the foreground.

Perhaps the biggest boost to Audio Hijack’s productivity is the introduction of a manual connection mode. The flow-chart-like style of arranging blocks introduced in Audio Hijack 3 was brilliant—but for complicated sessions, it required very precise positioning of blocks on screen for the app to properly route audio where you wanted it to go.

In Audio Hijack 4, you can opt out of Automatic Connections mode on a per-session basis, drop blocks down on a project, and wire them up yourself. You can even take an existing session, turn off Automatic Connections, and delete and add connections as you wish. It’s more complex, and there’s more possibility to make mistakes, it’s true, but if you know exactly what you want to do, you can get it done without having to drag a bunch of blocks around into weird positions just to get the automatic routing to work right.

This version also adds a bunch of new blocks, including a mixer that can combine as many as five different sources, and two huge additions for smoothing out volume—Magic Boost and Simple Compressor. Magic Boost makes quiet sounds louder; Simple Compressor makes quiet sounds louder and loud sounds quieter, driving them toward balance. Since different audio sources often have very different volumes, a compressor can be a huge help in making the output of a session listenable.

And then there’s what is, for me, the biggest new feature of all: scripting. Rogue Amoeba has built a JavaScript-based scripting system into the app itself. It’s accessible from the new Script Library window. Scripts can be run manually, or automatically on a per-session basis based on starting or stopping of sessions or recordings. The scripting engine lets you turn sessions and even individual blocks within a session on and off, and while it doesn’t reach into every single setting in every single block yet, it covers a lot of ground.

Best of all, Audio Hijack 4’s scripting language is also accessible from outside the app via Shortcuts. You can use a Shortcuts action to run a script in Audio Hijack’s script library, or just run arbitrary JavaScript sent directly from Shortcuts. The app will also return data back to Shortcuts for processing. Rogue Amoeba probably needs to build many more individual Shortcuts actions (because for now, everything will need to be couched in a JavaScript command), but what’s already there is enough to create some pretty mind-blowing automations.

Audio Hijack was already an indispensable tool in my podcast recording toolbox. Version 4 improves on it in an awful lot of ways. While I’m excited by the app’s automation potential, it’s also gotten more flexible and functional. If you record audio on your Mac, Audio Hijack was already the best choice—and now it’s even better.

By Jason Snell

March 31, 2022 8:00 AM PT

Apple in the Enterprise: A 2022 report card

Note: This story has not been updated since 2022.

Last year, device-management startup Kandji approached Six Colors to commission a new entry in our Report Card series focusing on how Apple’s doing in large organizations, including businesses, education, and government. We worked with Kandji and the hosts of the Mac Admins Podcast, Tom Bridge and Charles Edge, to formulate a set of survey questions that would address the big-picture issues regarding Apple in the enterprise. Then we approached people we knew in the community of Apple device administrators and asked them to participate in the survey.

This year, we’re repeating the process. Over the last couple of months, we took the temperature of 71 admins, roughly half of whom report that they manage more than 1000 devices. (If you’re an admin who didn’t take the survey, feel free to fill it out.) They rated Apple’s performance in the context of enterprise IT on a scale from 1 to 5 in nine broad areas.

Below, you’ll see the survey results, plus choice comments from survey participants. Not all participants are represented; we gave everyone the option to remain anonymous and not be quoted. Though Kandji commissioned this survey—and we thank everyone there for doing so—it had no oversight over the survey results or the contents of this story, which was compiled by Jason Snell and the Six Colors staff.

Overall scores

In general, scores were up a bit from last year’s survey. Apple’s strongest results were the same as last year: its hardware and its commitment to security and privacy. The company scored worst on macOS identity management.

Now that there have been two surveys, we can compare last year’s scores with this year’s and see how sentiment has changed. Except for macOS identity management, which took a drop, and security and privacy, which remained the same, all scores were up. Biggest moves were software reliability and deployment, followed by the future of Apple in the enterprise.

Here’s what Tom Bridge of the Mac Admins community had to say when viewing the final results:

“There’s no question that over the last year, the Mac’s position in the Enterprise has improved, and that’s in no small part thanks to key changes made to macOS Monterey. With increased reliability, the addition of new software update commands for MDM, and the improvement of return to service workflows, Apple is working to make Enterprise admins happy.

“It’s not all roses, and the identity management score should come as no surprise to Cupertino. Though Apple announced recently that they intend at a future date to work with Google Workspace to federate Managed Apple IDs, this still leaves many customers having to provision users by hand — yes, in 2022 — instead of through automated methods of some kind. An important note here: Apple made their announcement concerning Google Workspace after the close of this survey, and while it is welcome news, it is also not yet released. Perhaps there will be some improvements in the score for next year.”

Though we asked participants for the number of devices they administer and whether they work in business or education, the truth is that very few of the scores varied between any group. If there’s a notable deviation between groups, we’ll mention it in the section for that category.

Continue reading “Apple in the Enterprise: A 2022 report card”…

By Dan Moren

March 31, 2022 6:37 AM PT

Demystifying that viral iOS copy-and-paste video

Note: This story has not been updated since 2022.

There’s a good chance that you’ve already seen that viral video making the rounds over the past week, in which a self-described former Apple employee is blown away by picking up a photo from one iOS device and dropping it on the other. If not, check it out below.

PLEASE tell me I am not the only one who didn’t know about this feature 😅😅😅 pic.twitter.com/iBAYEV3JbG

— michael tobin (@initialfocus) March 29, 2022

Yep, that does indeed work as shown, and it’s a very cool feature.

I’m sure there are some readers of this site who will dismiss this as “obvious”, just as there are others who will have been totally unaware of the possibility.

But here’s what I find fascinating about it: this is actually two different features, introduced years apart in different OS releases, working in delightful harmony.

The first is Universal Clipboard, a feature introduced in iOS 10 and macOS Sierra back in 2016 as part of Continuity, a whole set of enhancements to make it easier to move back and forth between Apple devices. With Universal Clipboard, if you’re logged into multiple Apple devices—iPhones, iPads, Macs—using the same iCloud account, anything you copy to the clipboard on one is immediately and invisibly¹ transferred to the clipboard of all your other devices.

This is exceptionally handy when moving text and images between devices, because it avoids having to retype things or mess with files. It’s also one of those innumerable Apple features that is awesome when it works, but also just sometimes doesn’t, and there aren’t really any specific settings for it anywhere in iOS or macOS. (It’s falls under the umbrella of the Handoff settings that also control a bunch of other Continuity features.)

The second feature working along with Universal Clipboard are the three-finger copy/paste gestures that were added to iOS and iPadOS 13 in 2019. These let you “pick up” text or images and then paste them elsewhere—they’re basically just gesture equivalents of keyboard shortcuts command-C and command-V on your Mac. (There are similar three-finger gestures for undo and redo if you swipe left and right, respectively.)

The thing about those gestures are that they’re not particularly discoverable. I admit, I’ve rarely thought of the copy/paste gestures since iOS 13 came out, and even the Undo/Redo gestures—which are often the only way to perform those actions—are often critical, every time I try to undo something I generally end up swiping the wrong way first.

But none of this should take away from the coolness or enthusiasm over this trick. What I love about this particular application finding its way into the cultural zeitgeist is that the combination of these disparate features feels magical, in the best Apple tradition. (It certainly helps that the TikTok is shot in a way to emphasize it being mind-blowing.) None of these features may truly be “discoverable” in the usual sense of the word, but it’s still fun and exciting when someone does stumble across them: not only does it open it up to a new audience, but it may encourage us old-hands to revisit something that we’d forgotten about.

[Dan Moren is the East Coast Bureau Chief of Six Colors, as well as an author, podcaster, and two-time Jeopardy! champion. You can find him on Mastodon at @dmoren@zeppelin.flights or reach him by email at dan@sixcolors.com. His next novel, the sci-fi adventure Eternity's Tomb, will be released in November 2026.]

By Jason Snell

March 25, 2022 6:00 AM PT

Alto’s Adventure gets a spirited Apple Arcade expansion

Note: This story has not been updated since 2022.

Last year, I revisited one of my favorite iOS games, as Team Alto updated Alto’s Odyssey, bringing it to Apple Arcade with new levels, music, and artwork.

It turns out that Alto’s Odyssey: The Lost City was only half of Team Alto’s Apple Arcade project. The new Alto’s Adventure: Spirit of the Mountain returns to the snowy, llama-filled slopes of the original game. People who haven’t ever played Alto’s Adventure will be able to start from the beginning. At the same time, veterans will be able to transfer over their saved progress and immediately begin advancing toward new challenges.

The big difference between the two games is that in Alto’s Adventure, you endlessly glide over snow, rather than sand. Other than that, it’s very similar, with some slight detail changes. (In Adventure, you can capture stray llamas, you run from an elder instead of a lemur, and there aren’t any nasty vine cables that break out from under you.) But they are almost exactly the same in terms of gameplay, as you flip and grind to build up speed and activate the ability to fly via the wingsuit.

Much to my surprise, I discovered that I never quite finished Alto’s Adventure. I truly became obsessed with Alto’s Odyssey, and the skills I built up in the sequel let me dive right back into Adventure and blast through challenges that once stymied me.

Like last year’s The Lost City expansion, Spirit of the Mountain adds the new concept of “Lost Goals,” little glowing bottles that you pick up that provide you with new goals on top of the game’s level-based challenges. Players have to pick up 10 different wooden objects scattered throughout different runs as they advance through levels to enable the collection of Lost Goals. (Hint: The objects always appear in the game expansion’s one new terrain type, a red forest.) Even if you exhausted the entire level tree of Alto’s Odyssey back in the day, you’ll find new challenges inside the Lost Goals.

The Lost City added a biome and new soundtrack music to the game. Spirit of the Mountain takes a slightly different approach. Since Alto’s Adventure allows you ride the mountain as different characters, Spirit of the Mountain adds a new playable character who is powerful and fun but also takes a little getting used to. I won’t spoil the details here, but it was a delightful moment when I unlocked that character and discovered their unusual characteristics. And yes, there’s new music—but it only plays when you play as the new character.

Is this more of the same, in a way? Yes. But the game is beautiful and fun and, again, these are my favorite iOS games ever. If you haven’t played the Alto games and are an Apple Arcade subscriber, they’ll be as new and fresh as the day they launched. If you played them and loved them, the new content and challenges will be a delightful invitation to revisit an old favorite. I couldn’t be happier to spend more time on the slopes with Alto and his good friend, the Spirit of the Mountain.