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UqWBcuFx6NV4rtoday at 11:26 AM2 repliesview on HN

OK, thanks. We understand what a menu bar is.

How is this conducive to the typical usage pattern of an app like this?


Replies

krannertoday at 11:52 AM

For some reason the app supports a separate standalone window mode as well [0]. It's not clear why the developer took the trouble to support two different modes when the menubar mode doesn't seem to add anything (like a live-updating icon for throughput).

Well, I can think of one reason why it wasn't that much more trouble. François Chollet had a nice tweet [1] on why removing human cognitive friction is resulting in needless software complexity.

[0] https://github.com/darrylmorley/whatcable/blob/main/Sources/...

[1] https://x.com/fchollet/status/2045929951539707957

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awakeasleeptoday at 11:46 AM

Are you saying you wish this was a desktop app and you would just open it occasionally when curious?

If so, it feels like a needlessly indirect and combative way to go about it.

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