Mastodawn

Just saw:

#import <objc/objc-runtime.h>

in a .m file, and my heart sunk a little because new Apple devs these days are missing out / missed out on a lot of fun.

Gus Mueller May 27

Got the new Studio Display XDR and I’m playing with Acorn w/ variable refresh and I’ve got to say, having “inf” show up as a refresh rate is nice (yes, I realize it’s messing up):

Gus Mueller May 21

I swear I must visit @marioguzman’s layout guidelines for MacOS once a week: https://marioaguzman.github.io/design/layoutguidelines/

Layout Guidelines

Learn fundamental Mac layout principles of center equalization, text and control alignment, and visual balance.

Mario Guzman

Gus Mueller May 18

The Journal app on the Mac is … not great.

I launch it, it shows my last entry I wrote. Which is good.

I hit ⌘N to make a new entry. Nothing. File ▸ New Entry is disabled. Why? I have no idea. I have to hit the back chevron to view the journal entries list, and then it’ll validate.

Not good. Such a bad port of an iOS app. Apple used to do better.

Gus Mueller May 15

I’ve been rewriting Acorn’s brush tool to use Metal shaders for the upcoming release of v8.6. It’s amazingly fast!

I also had it do linear blending so green on red strokes don't cause dark fringes.

And the smudge tool? :chefs kiss: It fees amazing.

Give it a spin: <https://flyingmeat.com/download/latest/>

Latest Builds from Flying Meat

Gus Mueller May 10

Wearing a DF hoodie.

Gus Mueller Apr 29

Some Crop Keyboard Shortcuts in Acorn: https://shapeof.com/archives/2026/4/some_crop_shortcuts_in_acorn.html

Gus Mueller Apr 24

A little mind wondering post about a new AI built app in Rust for the Mac. Tolaria, Rust, and Questions About What Makes a Mac App Feel Good to Me: <https://shapeof.com/archives/2026/4/tolaria_ai_and_rust.html>

Gus Mueller Apr 22

Acorn 8.5 is out! Bendable arrows, SVG things, UI things, other … things: <https://shapeof.com/archives/2026/4/acorn_8.5_is_out.html>

Gus Mueller Apr 21

There needs to be a German word for when you find dumb show stopping bugs in your app as you’re working on the documentation for the release you’ve already submitted to the App Store, and then you need to reject it and start over again.

Anyway, Acorn 8.5 is hopefully coming soon.