TOKYO (MacHouse) – About a week ago, I introduced an analog clock app called aClocks for iOS. So now what!? You’ve guessed it right. A new desktop application that I submitted to Mac App Store minutes ago is called aClocks Desktop.
Tom Bluewater
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Tom Bluewater
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aClocks Desktop is a desktop version of an existing iOS app that lets you run multiple analog clocks at a time. Just as the iOS version does, aClocks Desktop covers more than 200 cities around the globe. aClocks observes day light saving time and Japanese holidays. If you have a clock that is under the day light saving time, then a clock will have a graphic notation at the top-left corner.
Features
- Run multiple analog clocks at a time. Scroll the clock section left to right or vice versa to locate a clock when necessary.
- Tap the name of a city at the bottom view to quickly locate the corresponding clock, which will appear on your left regardless of the number of clocks you currently run.
- The application covers more than 200 cities around the globe. They are divided into 8 regions including Africa, Asia, Atlantic, Australia, Europe, North America, Pacific, South America.
- The user can choose one of 18 area languages including English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Danish, Dutch, Russian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Vietnamese, Hebrew, Arabic, Turkish, Indonesia. The area language is responsible for showing the names of 8 areas and all 200+ city names in the selected language.
- If a clock is under the day light saving time, a graphic notation appears at the top-left corner.
- If the corresponding city of the clock is Japanese and the time is under a Japanese national holiday, a graphic notation will appear at the top-right corner of the clock.
- The app prevents the user from installing multiple clocks from the same city.
- Tell the time difference of each clock from GMT.
- There is no WiFi or WWAN required at any time to run the application unless you access iTunes Connect for in-app purchases.
- Application file size: 24.7 MB.
- Languages: English and Japanese only.
- The application comes with a built-in 16-page user guide. Choose Show Quick Tour under aClocks Desktop whenever you need to see it.
System requirements
- 10.11 (tested with 10.11.6), 10.12 (tested with 10.12.2)
- 64-bit system
Limitations
- If you choose to use this application as freeware, you can run as many as two clocks at a time. There is no limitation as to how many clocks you can run at a time once you purchase the Unlimited Clocks add-on. Yet, you should be prepared for some memory consumption. For example, if you want to run 20 clocks at a time on a non-retina screen desktop computer, you may need as much as 110 MB of RAM.
- The application does not connect a remote server to get the accurate time for each time zone. Rather, it will figure out all time zone differences relative to the time on the system clock. Therefore, it is essential that the user keeps the accurate time on their system.
- The application window is not resizable. It has a fixed size with its width extending from left to right on your desktop.
- The fullScreen mode is not supported.
Version history
Version 1.1.0 (Released on February 14, 2017)
- The user can now create a clock by searching a city name. When they click on the + button over the navigation menu, a new menu button will appear at the bottom. Note that the search function will run case-sensitively.
- The user can now switch clock skins by choosing Clock Styles under Clock.
- A new add-on purchase is available. With ‘Clock styles,’ the user will have access to a total of 22 clock skins.
- Several other minor changes are made.
Video tutorial
There is no video tutorial at this time.
aClocks Desktop is a product of Tom Bluewater.
Apple and the Apple logo are trademarks of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries. Mac App Store is a service mark of Apple Inc.
Hi,
Is Greenwich not available? I use GMT and at this time the closest I can get is London (where Greenwich is). London however is currently at GMT +1. Perhaps this is because London has daylight savings between end of March to October. But that means with Greenwich absent I cannot actually get GMT as a clock. The daylight savings mode is a good feature and It is not too difficult to subtract an hour. As a purest however, it aught to be there I reckon.
Either that or I’ve not figured out how to use the app yet, that happens. ;p
Cheers,
Hello, Shane. Thank you for your posting a question. No, I’m afraid you cannot select GMT. If you open Date & Time in Preferences and navigate to Time Zone, you won’t set Greenwich, either. That’s a very interesting point, though. If a next version comes up for development, I’ll consider adding it to the list. For now, I cannot since the application is based on Swift 2.2 or 2.3. It’ll be easier to develop a new application than to make revisions to the current Swift version.
Am using the clocks for MacOS
(1) Choose Show Quick Tour under aClock Desktop. (2) You can’t. See Limitations No. 3.
Hello, Shane. There will be a new application titled aClock Desktop 2 in a few days. This upgrade will let you create a clock with the Greenwich Mean Time.
Why can’t I make the window width I want? It is taking too much dead space. I only need 4 or 5 clocks.
I can’t see any buttons with city names at the bottom either.
A “small” version with clocks the size of the old Apple clock widget would be great.
(I am trying to make a desktop with all my old Dashboard widgets in macOS Mojave.)
As explained in ‘Limitations,’ you cannot resize the application window. If you need to resize the application window, please try out ‘aClock Desktop 2,’ which is a successor to this application.