devlog #2: UI prototyping
i began working on what the UI might look like using photoshop.
this is in particular for the main screen, where the user will be looking out a window into an ambient background.
The UI will be split into layers, the sky in layer 0, skyline in layer 1, sun/moon in layer 2 (typo on document), background + windows in layers 3 and rest of UI on top, so that each layer can be independent and give a better depth of field.
Idea: we all work from desks (at least i hope we all do), and so what if a webOS could take that familiar look?
deskOS: a comfy desk overlooking scenary from a window. You work on a desk where the windows become books, tablets, stationary…
i hope this can be cool.
Right now, I’m using React Three Fiber to create a 2.5D scene using 2 combined 2D scenes. This is done as a test by setting up a 3D cartesian system and mapping two rectangular planes which will become the viewport/workspace, and now i’m prototyping the transitions. Once this is polished, I’ll move to actually creating the webOS content such as apps, the welcome screen, etc…
@qb
on
[Miniaturised] Custom Server Rack
2h 53m 1s logged
notdev log #2
basically finished every major hardware component.
worked on:
next step is to finalise DRAM attachment system on the motherboard.
@qb
on
[Miniaturised] Custom Server Rack
4h 56m 28s logged
DRAM prices so bad that I’m building a server rack (in fusion)
The goal is to build a full 4U server rack, scale it down and 3D print it. Then, print a full shelf of racks. Keep going and you get infinite compute.
What I’ve done:
Every part has been modelled by hand to reference materials. As the end result will be scaled down, many parts have been widened to accomodate that.
Thank you for your support!
@qb
on
[Miniaturised] Custom Server Rack
1h 50m 4s logged
after some time thinking about it, i decided at this scale it was better to take the two piece locking mechanism design of a typical dimm slot to one piece (no reference intended).
this was because of:
image: a rough diagram showing flaws (oh yeah first design also bent because of unstable base because the ram stick would push the unevenly extruded latching arms out)
@qb
on
[Miniaturised] Custom Server Rack
1h 50m 4s logged
after some time thinking about it, i decided at this scale it was better to take the two piece locking mechanism design of a typical dimm slot to one piece (no reference intended).
this was because of:
image: a rough diagram showing flaws (oh yeah first design also bent because of unstable base because the ram stick would push the unevenly extruded latching arms out)
i swear this is the last devlog even tho i shipped already…
Bug Fixes:
issues #1 #2 on github
#1: wallpaper capture only works for sometimes (due to beta feature)
wallpaper capture is currently a beta; it uses NSWorkspace.shared.desktopImageURL(for:) to get the URL for the wallpaper, then prompts access to your folder where the wallpaper is actually stored even with sandbox disabled.
This only works for static wallpapers. Apple built-in dynamic / slideshow / video wallpapers will NOT work.the API has also been depreciated since macOS 14.
(This also looks incredibly suspicious when it’s just retrieving an image).
Fix 1: use CGWindowListCreateImage to take a screenshot of the wallpaper/desktop and then theme from that, but that requires screen capture permissions + couldn’t get it working
Fix 2: feature removed in favour of using desktop system accent + light/dark theme.
#2: window layouts switch sometimes.
fix: profile editor puts row 0 at bottom (based on +/- grid system). but absoluteFrame (LayoutProfile.swift:25) applies row 0 to the top of the screen. switched indexing to be correct way.
Theming is now determined by system set accent colour + light/dark theme to avoid requiring any additional permissions.
some redundancies removed.
New dmg installation background.
Finished up unisnap and the proper README docs (formatting issues previously). You should now be able to follow through on that README and install it for yourself with no problem!
A few things worth mentioning that I didn’t get into in my previous devlogs:
unisnap just utilises the AXUIElement API, reads the window position/size/title and writes them to match the set layout. it is also that coordinate math that caused most of the pain for me.
unisnap was designed to be ultra-compact, taking up the least possible footprint while maximising your productivity. That’s why I decided to put it in your toolbar, so that you can access it anytime without occupying a large window to configure all the settings/profiles etc.
The drag-to-create custom profile editor is where the 3727+4 (custom+default) possible layouts number comes from. It is max 1-4 columns × max 1-3 rows, and accounting for every combination + merged cell you get 3731.
Wallpaper theming is a beta. It’s not really that big of a deal either as this project has limited UI.
Known limitations/bugs include:
It is available as proper .dmg release (or you can download v0.1 zip version).
this is unisnap - a lightweight macOS toolbar utility for window management.
I made it because it was bothersome to keep rearranging my windows to maximise my productivity, and traditional methods like raycast commands are too slow. So, I've merged all the features I want into one, and condensed it into a tiny footprint that fits in the top toolbar.
This was basically my first time building a macOS anything in Xcode, so that was certainly challenging. A lot of the times the coordinates weren't matching; the alignment was offset; and it didn't quite work how I wanted it.
But after many attempts, I've finished it, and I'm quite proud of that. In the end, the result was rather polished and I liked it a lot, so I guess that's great!
now available on github for v0.1 (macOS only…)
here -> https://github.com/qubixal/unisnap
I wanted to solve a long time problem I had. In Windows 11, there was a set option where dragging the window above the screen could reorganise them into halves/quarters of the screen. This is doable with raycast, but it takes long (manually config each window). So, I made:
unisnap!
There are:
3731 possible custom layouts for you to try!
hope this helped anyone? or just me lol
@qb
on
[Miniaturised] Custom Server Rack
2h 53m 1s logged
notdev log #2
basically finished every major hardware component.
worked on:
next step is to finalise DRAM attachment system on the motherboard.
@qb
on
waifmark-2
3h 2m 22s logged
devlog 3:
it’s been even longer but I’ve finally done enough to call this a “devlog”.
basically everything has been fully rewritten in python. A few (quite detrimental) bug fixes are:
To work on:
Image 1:
much more simplified run system (compared to before).
Image 2:
the og graph, now in v2!
@qb
on
qubixal.xyz
I made (added) to my personal website, and published it!
however it certainly doesn't look outstanding so I will be polishing off the UI when I have time.
I just wanted to try registering a domain and having a website of my own so it was rather rushed.
Image: the tech stack animation was really cool...
@qb
on
qubixal.xyz
43m 40s logged
@qb
on
[Miniaturised] Custom Server Rack
4h 56m 28s logged
DRAM prices so bad that I’m building a server rack (in fusion)
The goal is to build a full 4U server rack, scale it down and 3D print it. Then, print a full shelf of racks. Keep going and you get infinite compute.
What I’ve done:
Every part has been modelled by hand to reference materials. As the end result will be scaled down, many parts have been widened to accomodate that.
Thank you for your support!
@qb
on
waifmark-2
5h 5m 9s logged
Dev2
It’s been so long but the UI looks a little better now (?) The process has been basically fully streamlined:
Progress related to benchmarking:
@qb
on
waifmark-2
2h 35m 35s logged
Devlog 0.1
(For a future project.)
I’m trying out LLM benchmarking on my M1 Macbook Pro that probably needs a break!
Prior to Stardance -
Waifmark 1 was a benchmark testing local agentic capabilities and speech persona of small locally hosted (V)LLMs.
However, my benchmarking process for Waifmark 1 was unstandardised and troublesome, and I kept all the data in excel out of all places.
Current stage -
Waifmark 2 is in the works. The benchmark is now evaluated by an LLM-as-a-Judge that can flag and pass low-confidence outputs for human review (as is industry standard).
Using the wonderful streamlit library I built a basic app that can download you a model from hf, serve the model and benchmark it in 3 steps. Unfortunately I cannot show any more behind the process as of now, but I’m very excited to join Stardance and to see what changes can be observed moving from Waifmark 1 -> 2!
