Show HN: I built a Mac app to restore Dock-click minimize and avoid tiny buttons
I'm the developer behind Click2Minimize. This app is my personal fix for two long-standing frustrations with the macOS interface.
First, I wanted to restore Dock-click minimize. On other operating systems, I was used to clicking an app's icon to minimize its window—a simple, fast toggle. On a Mac, that second click does nothing, which always felt like a dead end in my workflow.
Second, I was tired of having to deal with the tiny buttons. So much of window management—minimizing, maximizing, arranging—forces you to stop what you're doing, carefully aim your cursor at one of three small dots, and click. It's a constant micro-interruption.
The Solution: A Fluid, Mouse-First Approach with Alternative Trackpad Gestures
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Click2Minimize is a lightweight, native utility that turns your entire window title bar into a powerful gesture area. The goal is to let you manage your workspace without ever needing to aim for those little dots.
* Consistent Dock Behavior: Click on Dock icon to minimize/hide the app.
* Minimize Window Under Mouse: Simply hold down left mouse button and click the right one, or double-click the right button.
* Maximize Window Under Mouse: Simply hold down right mouse button and click the left one, or double-click the notch area.
* Snap Window to Left/Right: Simply hold down right button and rock the scroll wheel, or use fn key while swipe on trackpad.
* Restore Window Size & Position: Holde down right button and click middle button, or user fn key with right-click on trackpad.
* And many other useful gestures, such as the App Switcher and changing workspaces, were also included. Most importantly, it handled macOS full-screen mode smoothly and no longer felt intrusive.
It is designed to resemble a missing feature of the operating system, with all gestures being highly intuitive, especially when using a mouse, as there is no need to remember keyboard shortcuts or bring the window to the front.
Feedback, Discount & Free Licenses:
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I'm here all day and would love to hear your thoughts. I genuinely want to make this app better, and the HN community's feedback is invaluable.
Furthermore, I'll be sending a completely free license to the commenters with the most thoughtful feedback, bug reports, or feature suggestions I see. You're not just buying an app; you're helping to shape it.
Your personal fingers might work well that way, but there is a reason those combinations are "unused" and "available" for your app. Countless other devs over the years have all concluded "yeah, that doesn't actually work for most people's hands." I don't have specific examples, but lots of early 3D modeling apps (possibly including early blender?) used weird combo clicks. The industry learned from that mistake and newer tools use more conventional hotkeys.
You've built something very cool and useful. It will be much more successful if you don't try to innovate in an unrelated area. Just use normal hotkeys, and let people customize them in case the ones you default to don't work for them.
Window management on macOS is awful.
Stage Manager almost gets this right but then I go through months with turning it off again.
It seems like Windows and Linux users tend to favor having everything maximized and Mac users tend to have multiple windows on screen at once by virtue of the design of Mac apps. I want something somewhere between the abandoned Single Window Mode of older Mac OS X builds and Stage Manager with Rectangle for moving windows around.
Usually I want two windows on my screen: an editor (Nova, TextMate, BBEdit, or mg inside Prompt) and a web browser (Safari, Firefox) side by side with the ability to command-tab to a different virtual desktop with say Slack and my email client open. I don’t have that part yet.
It also works well with Stage Manager mode, and makes it a breeze to side windows and most importantly - restoring them to the original size and position when needed.
No. Show HN needs to be free or free trial historically. This feels like an ad and uses engagement bait tactics. This post doesn’t really feel right for HN, nothing personal against you or the product.