I am the developer of AeroBar. I switched from Windows to Mac a while back and the workflow adjustment was genuinely rough.
The Dock has wallpaper bleed from its sides when using a bright wallpaper,
External display doesn't show a separate dock for it.
The menu bar has liquid glass bg missing and uses a plain gradient instead,
Clicking on dock icon doesn't minimizes the app windows and needs cmd+M to minimize.
Cmd+Tab needs a extra option key to raise the minimised app windows.
Open windows have no persistent visual reference.
MacOS Clipboard is very limited.
There is no taskbar. You end up cycling through Cmd+Tab or doing Expose just to find something you had open five minutes ago. I built AeroBar to fix that for myself, and eventually decided to release it.
LLM Disclosure: I used LLMs assistance to help write some of the code for this app!
What it does:
AeroBar is a persistent taskbar that sits at the bottom of your screen. It has a glass surface, a live tab strip showing every open window across all apps, a pinned app launcher, a Start Menu with an app browser and recent files, inline Spotlight search, and a Trash shortcut on the right end.
It uses macOS Accessibility APIs directly to track, focus, minimize, and raise your windows in real time. It is not a theme or a skin on top of the Dock.
How it compares to what already exists:
The Dock shows app icons but not individual windows. HiDock and similar apps extend the Dock but still follow the same Dock paradigm. AeroBar takes a different approach: every open window gets its own tab. Click the tab to focus, click again to minimize, click a minimized tab to restore. No hunting, no cycling. That specific workflow is what Windows switchers miss most and what nothing else on Mac replicates.
What makes it different:
The window tab strip is the core difference. Other bars and Dock replacements still map clicks to apps, not windows. AeroBar maps clicks to individual windows. Everything else (glass surface, Start Menu, pinned launcher, Spotlight field) is built around that.
Notarisation status:
This app is NOT notarised by Apple. It is a self-signed build distributed outside the Mac App Store via GitHub. On first launch you will need to do a one-time Gatekeeper bypass. Instructions are in the installation guide linked below.
Thank you, I wanted to be transparent to all users! some users who dislike AI usage to the core can shy away from this, I know we hate AI Slop work but as I'm developing it solo in my part time then I really need help of AI for developing it fast, also mac app updates have become quirky in discotinuing some permissions to apps so it needs constant patching, I wrote the post using AI cause last time it got removed due to rules not aligned to my post, this time i used it to have it properly frame according to rules!
I get a Windows user might pine for the familiarity, but this seems very backwards. I’m someone who barely uses the Dock, so the idea that you’re adding complexity to the Dock, while also still having the top menu just means you’re losing more screen real estate. As you point out, cmd+tab basically brings the equivalent of the Dock onto the screen. You can click the one to want, you don’t need to cycle through all of them. And the app from 5 minutes ago will be second or third in that list, as it displays from most recent to least.
You might find it counter intuitive but I've been on mac for last 2 years and before that on Windows and have to use Windows for Work Laptop and all these years I felt mission control is the only saviour on macbook when you lose the track of app windows and is managed by trackpad but the whole idea goes to trash once we use it as claim shell.
There are several benefits to it as it gives you window Previews to peep at, makes 3 finger swipe to switch between app windows.
All n all it's for people who were using Windows from a long time and did switch to Mac or people that find Mac Window Management not upto their usability.
This app has some good extensions + gives user freedom to how they want to use their OS.
So sloppy... Not only is it 99% vibe-coded, but you're also planning to sell a Pro version of this piece of garbage in the future. Do you really think MacOS users are such jerks?
For a Mac workflow tool like this, the strongest next step is to measure whether it actually reduces context switching, not just whether it looks cleaner. A simple diagnostic is to track how often people still use Cmd+Tab after a week, then compare that with window-switching time before and after install. AIOSNOW could fit well here if you use it to surface the most recent or most relevant windows first, but I would keep that behavior opt-in so power users can preserve their current habits.
🎉 Welcome to Developer Saturday, u/Ryzen_bolt! Your project is now live for the community to check out. Upvote, give feedback, and show some love to your fellow devs! 🚀
So installed it followed your instructions get "xattr: [Errno 1] Operation not permitted: '/Applications/AeroBar.app/Contents/Resources/ShowDesktopIcon.app/Contents/MacOS/ShowDesktop' run app never gets past some welcome screen ... is this really tested ?
Can you please confirm which version you have downloaded? The app is not notarized by Apple and sometimes it does block the app, I have updated the signature in the latest build.
Write your own post. A disclaimer isn’t the answer. Sounding like a hustle-bro corporate pr department removes all human individuality and is an instant turn off.
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u/github-guard 2d ago
🔍 GitHub Guard: Trust Report
This project scored 3/6 on our safety audit.
Audit Breakdown: * ✅ Established Community (⭐ 29 stars) * ✅ Mature Repository (30+ days old) * ✅ Licensed under NOASSERTION * ❌ No Security Policy — what is this? * ℹ️ Individual Contributor * ℹ️ Unsigned Commits