Desktide user guide

Desktide turns your Mac’s desktop into a place you write, organize and plan. Notes, a calendar that is your real Apple Calendar and Reminders, and zones that keep files in order sit on the desktop itself, under your icons, in one of 24 designed themes.

Getting started

• Find it in the menu bar. Desktide lives in the menu bar (the small display icon). Click it for the Today popover: today’s plan, a field to add anything, and the layout and theme controls. It has no Dock icon.
• The first launch opens on the Board with a short note that walks you through the basics, and a welcome window. You can reopen it from the popover: … › Welcome Guide.
• Your desktop keeps working. Finder’s icons stay on top and still open, move and rename as usual. Desktide draws under them and only takes the clicks it needs.
• Permissions are asked only when needed: Calendar and Reminders the first time you connect them, and your Desktop folder only if you let zones hold files.

Layouts

A layout is what fills the desktop. There are four:

Layout	What it shows
Wallpaper	Your theme with a quiet summary: the date and what’s next. Room for notes.
Month	The whole month as a calendar you type into, with zones at the side.
Today + week	Today’s list, a strip with the week, room for notes, and zones.
Board	An open surface for notes.

• Switch with the layout buttons at the bottom of the Today popover, with ⌃⌥⌘L (next layout, on the display under the pointer), or in Settings.
• Setups save a layout together with a theme, for example “Work” and “Weekend”. Popover … › Setups › Save Current Setup…, then pick a setup to switch in one step.
• A Focus can switch the layout for you; see Shortcuts, Siri and Focus.

Notes

• Write: double-click any empty spot on the Board or in a layout’s notes area and start typing. Return starts a new line. Esc or ⌘↩ finishes.
• Checklists: start a line with [ ] to make a checkbox; [x] is a ticked one. Click a checkbox on the desktop to tick it.
• Select, edit, move: click a note once to select it, click again to edit. Drag it anywhere. With a note selected, the arrow keys nudge it (hold ⇧ for bigger steps), Delete removes it and Return edits it.
• Handwriting: right-click a note and choose Use Handwriting for the theme’s hand-lettered face.
• From any app: press ⌃⌥⌘N (quick add) and switch to Note, or use the field in the Today popover with the pencil button on. Notes land on the current layout, or on the Board if the layout has no room for notes.
• Icons under a note: hold ⌘ to click straight through a note to the Finder icon underneath.
• Undo: every change can be undone with ⌘Z for a few seconds after it, or with Undo in the confirmation at the bottom of the screen.
• Notes sync between your Macs through your own iCloud account.

Calendar and Reminders

Desktide shows and edits your real Apple Calendar and Reminders. There’s nothing to import and no account: a change on the desktop is a change in Calendar and Reminders, and the other way round.

• Connect with Show Calendar & Reminders here in the month header or the Today list. macOS asks once for access.
• Add: double-click a day (a month cell, the Today list or a day in the week strip) and type. Return saves.
  • With a time it becomes an event: Dentist 10:00, 10:00 Dentist, Gym at 7pm, Lunch 12.30.
  • Without a time it becomes a reminder: Call the bank, Pay rent.
  • Name a day and it goes there: tomorrow, today, tonight, Friday, on Fri, next tue. Days count from the day you typed into.
  • In regions that use a 12-hour clock, Lunch 1:30 means 1:30 PM and Gym at 7 means 7 PM; Wake 6:00 stays in the morning. Add am or pm to be exact.
  • A confirmation such as “Event · Fri 30 Oct, 10:00” shows what was made, with Undo.
• Tick a reminder by clicking its ring. Clicking an event’s dot opens it in Calendar. Click a title to rename it.
• Right-click an entry for Rename, Mark as Done, Make It an Event, Open in Calendar or Reminders, and Delete. Repeating events and events with invitees ask before they’re deleted, since that can’t be undone from the desktop.
• Overdue reminders appear at the top of today, marked Overdue, so nothing is lost.
• Events over several days run as one bar across the days they cover.
• Busy days: when a day is full, +N more opens its whole list.
• Other months: use the arrows in the month header; Today jumps back.
• From any app: ⌃⌥⌘N, or the field at the top of the Today popover, adds an event or reminder the same way, with a preview of what it will make.

Zones

Zones are the labelled areas at the side of Month and Today + week. They’re for the files on your desktop, not for notes.

• Rename a zone by clicking its title. Right-click the title to add a zone below it (up to five) or remove one.
• Without Desktop access zones are a visual guide: you can drag Finder icons into them yourself, and Finder keeps them there.
• Let zones hold files to make them real. Click Hold files here in the first zone, right-click a zone’s title and choose Hold Files in Zones…, or use Settings › Zones hold files › Choose Desktop…. Pick your Desktop folder once.
  • Each zone then keeps its files in a folder on your Desktop with the zone’s name (the Work zone is ~/Desktop/Work).
  • Drag files from Finder onto a zone to move them in. They leave the desktop’s clutter and appear inside the zone with their icon or a preview.
  • Double-click a file to open it. Right-click for Open, Show in Finder and Move to Desktop. +N more opens the zone’s folder in Finder.
  • Renaming a zone renames its folder, so its files go with it.
• Tidy the Desktop: right-click a zone’s title, choose Collects When Tidying and pick what it gathers: Screenshots, Images, Documents, Video & Audio, Archives & Installers, or Folders. Then Tidy Desktop into Zones… (popover … menu or a zone’s right-click) shows what will move where and moves it after you confirm. One Undo puts everything back.
• Stop in Settings leaves the folders and their files exactly where they are.
• Desktide never reads or changes the positions of Finder’s icons. The zone folders themselves appear on your desktop wherever Finder puts them.

Themes and appearance

• 24 themes in 10 families, each with its own art, colours, type and texture, made for light or for dark. Pick one from the theme menu at the bottom of the Today popover or in Settings.
• Appearance (Settings): As designed keeps each theme in the light or dark it was made for, so Paper white stays white and Midnight stays dark. Match macOS switches every theme with the system’s light and dark mode.
• Your wallpaper keeps your own desktop picture and draws on top of it. Text on your wallpaper reads the picture’s brightness (Automatic) or uses white or dark text. Behind text is Clear (a soft halo, the picture stays sharp) or Frosted (glass behind text for the strongest contrast). A wallpaper with patches too bright or too dark for Clear gets Frosted on its own, and so does one Desktide can’t read (most photos outside the system wallpapers).

The Today popover

Click Desktide in the menu bar.

• The field at the top adds an event or reminder (or a note, with the pencil button) and shows what it will make before you press Return.
• Today and the next six days list everything planned. Click a ring to tick a reminder; right-click an entry to open or delete it.
• Notes on your layout are listed with how many checklist items are still open.
• At the bottom: the layout buttons, the theme menu, and … for New Note, Add to Calendar, Undo, Tidy, per-display layouts, Setups, the welcome guide, Settings and Quit.

Widget

• Right-click the desktop, choose Edit Widgets, and add Desktide › Today in small, medium or large.
• It shows today’s events and reminders, the next days with something on them and, in large, the notes on your layout, in your theme’s colours and appearance.
• Open Desktide once so the widget has something to show. It updates when your plans change and turns the page at midnight. It needs no Calendar access of its own.

Shortcuts, Siri and Focus

Keyboard shortcuts work from any app. Change them in Settings › Shortcuts: click one, press the new keys (with ⌘, ⌃ or ⌥), or Esc to cancel.

Default	Does
⌃⌥⌘N	Quick add: a note, event or reminder from anywhere
⌃⌥⌘L	Next layout on the display under the pointer
⌃⌥⌘D	Show the desktop (hides other apps; press again to bring them back)
⌃⌥⌘K	Use the desktop with the keyboard (see Accessibility)

Shortcuts and Siri: the Shortcuts app lists Desktide’s actions: Add Note to Desktop, Add Event or Reminder, What’s on Today, Switch Desktop Layout and Show Desktop. Ask Siri, for example, “What’s on today in Desktide”.

Focus: in System Settings › Focus, choose a Focus, then Add Filter › Desktide and pick a layout. The desktop switches to it while that Focus is on and goes back afterwards.

Accessibility

• Text size (Settings): Small, Default, Large, Larger or Largest. Desktop text, notes and calendar rows grow together; from Larger, calendar rows are at least 24 points tall, and Largest is 1.7 times Default.
• The desktop from the keyboard: press ⌃⌥⌘K. Tab or the arrow keys move through notes, each checklist item, calendar entries, a day’s “+N more” and zone files. Return edits, renames or opens; Space ticks a reminder or checklist item, or opens an event; Delete removes a note or entry (⌘Z brings it back); ⌥← and ⌥→ turn the month; Esc gives the keyboard back. Press ⌃⌥⌘K again to move to the next display.
• VoiceOver reads notes, entries and zone files, and announces confirmations with a reminder that ⌘Z undoes them. The Today popover is a full planner for VoiceOver and keyboard users, with the notes of every display. The widget reads each row as what it is (“Reminder, done, Buy oat milk”).
• Desktide follows Reduce Motion, Increase Contrast and Reduce Transparency, and keeps text at a contrast of at least 4.5 : 1 in every designed theme. On your own wallpaper, Frosted gives the strongest contrast; with Increase Contrast or Reduce Transparency on, Desktide uses it automatically.

Several displays

• Every display gets the desktop. Each can follow the main display’s layout or have its own: popover … › Layout on [display].
• Notes belong to the display you wrote them on.
• The desktop scales with each display, so it reads the same on a laptop and on a large monitor. On very wide displays the calendar keeps a comfortable shape.

Trial and unlock

• Free for 14 days, with everything. The trial starts the first time you write or change something: the App Store asks you to confirm it once, then try again. You can also start it from the Today popover. It’s a free in-app purchase, so it stays with your Apple Account: a second Mac or a reinstall doesn’t start it over.
• Desktide reminds you when three days are left, on the last day and once the trial has ended, with a short message on the desktop. It never opens a window while you’re typing.
• After the trial the desktop stays as it is, read-only. Your notes, calendar and zones keep showing, and you can still copy a note’s text (right-click › Copy Text). Changing anything shows a short message with Unlock.
• Unlock once for $9.99. There’s no subscription and nothing is charged automatically. The unlock covers every Mac signed in with your Apple Account.
• Restore Purchases is in Settings and in the purchase window, for a new Mac or a reinstall.

Privacy

• No account, no analytics, no tracking.
• Calendar and Reminders stay in Apple’s apps; Desktide reads and writes them on your Mac.
• Notes sync through your own private iCloud database.
• Desktide reaches your Desktop folder only if you let zones hold files, and only the folder you chose.
• Full policy: qiffe.com/privacy/#desktide.

Troubleshooting

• Double-clicking opened a file instead of starting a note. The double-click was on a Finder icon; Desktide leaves those to Finder. Double-click empty space.
• I can’t click an icon under a note. Hold ⌘ while you click.
• The calendar is empty. Click Show Calendar & Reminders here, or allow Desktide in System Settings › Privacy & Security › Calendars and Reminders.
• Zones don’t show my files. Let zones hold files (see Zones). Files appear once they are in the zone’s folder.
• A shortcut does nothing. Another app may use it; Settings › Shortcuts says so. Choose a different one.
• The widget is empty. Open Desktide once, then wait a moment.
• Open at login stopped working after I moved the app. Turn it off and on again in Settings.
• Everything looks dark although I picked a light theme. Settings › Appearance is set to Match macOS; choose As designed.

Questions or ideas: info@qiffe.com.