Top all-time · #3428
Matthew Palmer
Personal blog · matthewpalmer.net/blogprogrammingproductivity
Matthew Palmer's personal blog at matthewpalmer.net covers programming and productivity. Since 2014, 23 different Hacker News readers have linked it 31 times, most often “Hide menu bar icons on Mac”. The last post was in 2024, but the archive is still widely read.
Too few sampled comments (14) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Matthew Palmer's pages mainly as product pages for his Mac apps: Rocket emoji picker, Vanilla menu bar manager and Horo timer. Comments praise the apps, not the writing.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 14 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Matthew Palmer is a software developer from Sydney who has created apps like Rocket & Vanilla, written a Kubernetes book, and published popular open source projects.
Most-linked posts?
- Hide menu bar icons on Mac7 people · 7 mentions · first linked 2018-10-14
- Rocket: Slack-style emoji selection for Mac6 people · 8 mentions · first linked 2019-07-09
- Slack style emoji's using a: for any app on Mac3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2016-07-14
- /horo-free-timer-mac/2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2023-05-17
What Hacker News says?
On macOS I use Rocket [0]. It's not perfect but it's the best I've used and it does make finding the emoji you want pretty easy. You can add custom alias/shortcuts for the emojis and you can also use it to insert images/gifs from the searcher. [0] https://matthewpalmer.net/rocket/
Comment linking /rocket/
on “I bought 300 emoji domain names from Kazakhstan and built an email service”Submitted Slack style emoji's using a: for any app on Mac as a story · 3 points
HN discussionIf anyone is looking for alternatives, I've been using Vanilla for a while and have ben happy with it. https://matthewpalmer.net/vanilla/
Comment linking /vanilla/
on “Ice – open source menu bar manager for macOS”Submitted OS X: Slack-style emoji everywhere on your Mac as a story · 3 points
HN discussionAnother option is Vanilla: https://matthewpalmer.net/vanilla/
Comment linking /vanilla/
on “BitBar: Put the output of any script on your macOS menu bar”Submitted Rocket: Slack-style emoji everywhere on your Mac as a story · 3 points
HN discussionFwiw there are some apps to hide menu bar icons: - Open source https://github.com/Mortennn/Dozer - Freemium https://matthewpalmer.net/vanilla/ - $15 https://www.macbartender.com/
Comment linking /vanilla/
on “TrackerZapper Mac app silently removes tracking parameters from links you copy”Submitted Remapping Keyboard Keys on Mac OS X Mavericks For Boosted Productivity as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThis looks like a light version of the Vanilla app [1] but free and open source. Also, a clever solution to hide the unused icons! [1] https://matthewpalmer.net/vanilla/
Comment linking /vanilla/
on “Hidden Bar: macOS utility to hide unused menu bar icons, written in Swift”Submitted Rocket: Slack-style emoji selection for Mac as a story · 2 points
HN discussionim a big fan of https://matthewpalmer.net/vanilla/
Comment linking /vanilla/
on “Show HN: Badgeify – Add Any App to Your Mac Menu Bar”Submitted Visual Cryptography is the Coolest Thing Ever as a story · 2 points
HN discussionRocket ($10) [0] is my current favorite emoji picker though sometimes it does drive me crazy (css properties in chrome dev tools and the like, I understand it's impossible to avoid, it still drives me crazy). Also there are emojis with spaces in the name but the picker just closes if you type a space so you have to add aliases to make them searchable. But overall it's a great tool and you can also use it to insert g…
Comment linking /rocket/
on “Tell HN: Never Trust 'Lifetime' Licenses”Submitted Vanilla–hide Mac menu bar icons for free as a story · 2 points
HN discussionWell there are use cases where this is appropriate, the common multi-pod design patterns -> https://matthewpalmer.net/kubernetes-app-developer/articles/... Generally I don’t see them and where they might be useful, I end up using a K8S Cronjob instead. But why? I want each pod to have its own liveness probe and be able to scale independently.
Comment linking /kubernetes-app-developer/articles/multi-container-pod-design-patterns.html
on “Using Kubernetes to rethink your system architecture and ease technical debt”Submitted Rocket – Faster emoji for your Mac as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThis is cool and potentially useful. I can imagine turning caps lock into Compose. I will note two alternatives, depending on what you're trying to do: * System Preferences > Keyboard > Text lets you specify replacements. For example, if I type ! ? (without the space) I get ‽, because who doesn't want an interrobang? * https://matthewpalmer.net/rocket/ Rocket lets you add emoji anywhere using a syntax like Slack's
Comment linking /rocket/
on “Show HN: Compose Key on macOS”Submitted That’s Apple as a story · 2 points
HN discussionVanilla -- ‘hide Mac menu bar icons’ ( https://matthewpalmer.net/vanilla/ ) Clocker -- ‘Menubar World Clock’
Comment linking /vanilla/
on “Ask HN: What are you favorite tiny tools?”Submitted Apple Needs to Quit iAd as a story · 2 points
HN discussionIn no particular order: Prologue [0] - iOS Audiobook player, used Plex as a media source Overcast [1] - iOS Podcast player CleanShotX [2] - macOS screenshot/video/gif capture with annotation Drafts [3] - iOS/macOS note taking tool Paprika [4] - Cross platform recipe app YNAB [5] - "You Need A Budget" - web/mobile budgeting app 1Password [6] - Cross platform password manager Carrot Weather [7] - iOS weather app Color…
Comment linking /rocket/
on “Ask HN: What software sparks joy when using?”Submitted A Pro’s Guide to the Best Secret Mac Features as a story · 1 points
HN discussionThat's actually the one I was thinking of as being awkward to activate :) I love the picker itself but the activation method is pretty clunky in my opinion. I wish I could just hit one key instead of having to simultaneously press three. I've been using Rocket for awhile now ( https://matthewpalmer.net/rocket/ ) which kind of takes the Slack style ":emoji_name" format to the whole computer, but it's still kind of aw…
Comment linking /rocket/
on “It’s Time for Caps Lock to Die”Submitted Rocket as a story · 1 points
HN discussionHoro - free timer app for Mac: https://matthewpalmer.net/horo-free-timer-mac/
Comment linking /horo-free-timer-mac/
on “Ask HN: What lesser known apps do you use to leverage your performance at work?”Submitted Hide menu bar icons on Mac as a story · 1 points
HN discussionhttps://matthewpalmer.net/horo-free-timer-mac/
Comment linking /horo-free-timer-mac/
on “Give your brain time to think and remember”Submitted Rocket – the best emoji app for Mac as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted The Downsides of Storyboards and Interface Builder [Short] as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted How to Deploy Node.js Apps on DigitalOcean with Dokku as a story · 1 points
HN discussion