WebWatcher
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Changelog

Every release of WebWatcher, newest first. Latest release on GitHub ↗

1.10.10

Build 35 ·

Changed

  • The email watcher's link opens Gmail's search for the unread mail from the watched senders, so it always matches the count. Every check is recorded in ~/Library/Logs/WebWatcher/checks.log. Settings: the Gmail poll interval is readable, no duplicate Safari Automation row. Add Watcher: the zero-confirmation check only appears for badge watchers.

1.10.9

Build 34 ·

Changed

  • Vendored Herald client re-synced with Herald 1.5.0 (manifest and model fields for the cloud relay).

1.10.8

Build 33 ·

Changed

  • Vendored Herald client re-synced with Herald 1.4.1: rich text (lines/markup), host-app resolution for Open, reply action kind

1.10.7

Build 32 ·

Changed

  • Vendored Herald client re-synced with Herald 1.4.0: action arrangements (actions.include/align/wrap/spacing, button.actionId), button styles, the openApp action kind, agent apps, and the client routes for the parity API

1.10.6

Build 31 ·

Changed

  • Vendored Herald client re-synced with Herald 1.3.0: SF Symbol styling on buttons, icons and badges (HeraldSymbol), the updated component schema, template, bundle, stack and quiet-hours models; WebWatcher's Herald manifests and banners can now carry symbols

1.10.5

Build 30 ·

Fixed

  • The menu-bar icon is the hourglass-with-eye again (1.10.3/1.10.4 drew a plain hourglass while fixing its size and centring); it is scaled to the standard glyph height and centred, badge included
  • A Herald template that adds extra values to a button's callback no longer makes WebWatcher reject its Gmail and Open buttons: the extra key is set aside before the payload is compared with what WebWatcher sent
  • The Herald email banner now shows the title and body the email-watcher editor produces (custom text, the "[Preview]" marker, the recent-subjects list, the snippet) instead of only sender, subject and snippet; an install that still has the earlier untouched default template is given the new one
  • Herald banner buttons now act before Herald is told they worked: the callback server answers with the outcome of the Gmail action (200 done, 409 failed, 504 still running), so Herald keeps the banner and shows a failure instead of dismissing a banner whose email was not archived, deleted or marked read
  • After WebWatcher relaunches, buttons on banners that were already on screen still work: the callback payloads are re-learned from Herald's history, and the table holds 1024 notifications instead of 256
  • Vendored Herald client files re-synced (request limits, loopback-only callbacks, URL placeholder fix)

1.10.4

Build 29 ·

Added

  • Herald stacking group keys: email notifications carry the sender address (lowercased; an email watcher's accumulated banner uses its first sender pattern) and web watcher notifications carry the site host, so Herald stacks per sender or site. Both manifests declare family: "webwatcher".

Changed

  • The vendored Herald client was re-synced (new HeraldStacks.swift and HeraldTemplateBundle.swift).

1.10.3

Build 28 ·

Fixed

  • Menu bar icon: the badge variant of the hourglass symbol rendered the glyph small and low; the icon is now a plain hourglass drawn centred on a fixed 22 pt template canvas, matching the size and baseline of neighbouring menu bar items

1.10.2

Build 27 ·

Fixed

  • Menu bar icon was small and off-centre: the status item now uses a variable-length slot and a larger, medium-weight glyph
  • WebWatcher registered a redundant legacy "webwatcher" app with Herald next to its two issuers; only "WebWatcher · Web" and "WebWatcher · Email" are registered now, and leftover banners under the old id are dismissed once on launch

1.10.1

Build 26 ·

Added

  • WebWatcher registers Herald manifests for web and email watchers (fields with samples, actions, icon) and ships default grid templates, so banners can be redesigned in Herald's Designer

Changed

  • Herald client re-synced (grid templates, voice and quiet-hours types)

1.10.0

Build 25 ·

Added

  • Notifications can be delivered through Herald, the standalone banner service, when it is running (Settings → Notifications). Banners are persistent, always on top, carry the watcher's image, and keep the Mark as Read / Archive / Delete / Spam actions; macOS notifications remain the fallback when Herald is not running

1.9.1

Build 24 ·

Changed

  • Notification icons are copied into WebWatcher's own folder when chosen, so moving or deleting the original image no longer breaks the notification
  • Notification thumbnails are a centred square crop rendered at 512 px, so non-square images fill the thumbnail instead of being letterboxed inside it

1.9.0

Build 23 ·

Added

  • Email watchers now keep a live unread count: each check asks Gmail for unread inbox mail from the watched senders, so reading a message in Gmail lowers the count without touching WebWatcher
  • One accumulating notification per email watcher ("2 new from Acme Billing", latest subjects, time of the newest) that replaces the previous banner instead of stacking
  • Custom icon, title and body templates for email watchers, with {count}, {sender}, {address}, {subject}, {time} and {name} placeholders, plus a preview button
  • The menu shows the unread count next to each email watcher

Changed

  • Clicking an email notification opens the email itself when there is one unread message, or a Gmail search for the unread mail from those senders when there are several
  • Mark as Read, Archive, Delete and Spam on an email notification act on all counted messages

1.8.1

Build 22 ·

Fixed

  • Google sign-in ended with "Failed to fetch user profile": the app asked Google's generic userinfo endpoint for the account address, which the Gmail-only scope does not allow. It now reads the address from Gmail's own profile endpoint, and any remaining failure names its cause

1.8.0

Build 21 ·

Added

  • Guided assistant for custom watchers: three steps — Page → Element → Confirm — that find the tab, open it if needed, scan automatically, and explain what they see
  • Pick refinement: after picking an element in Safari, use ↑/↓/←/→ to select its parent, child, or siblings before confirming, with a toolbar in Safari or the app's own "Use this" button
  • New watch type "Anything Changes Inside": fingerprints an element's subtree and notifies when it changes, for elements (like a bell icon) with no visible count to track
  • Editor and Settings windows now appear in Cmd+Tab while open
  • Built-in Google sign-in: "Add Gmail Account" / "Sign in with Google" now works without any console or JSON step, using WebWatcher's own embedded OAuth client; importing your own client remains available under Settings → Gmail → Advanced

Fixed

  • Scan page / Pick in Safari results were discarded by the response parser, so both appeared to do nothing

1.7.0

Build 20 ·

Added

  • Gmail sender watchers: notify when new mail arrives from a specific address or @domain, with the arrival time shown in the menu bar
  • Google OAuth client import: paste in your own Desktop OAuth client JSON from Settings → Gmail instead of relying on a bundled client
  • Per-account "Notify for every new email" toggle for connected Gmail accounts
  • Reconnect flow for Gmail accounts whose access has expired or been revoked

Fixed

  • Placeholder Google OAuth credentials that made "Add Gmail Account" silently fail
  • An empty refresh token from Google being accepted instead of surfaced as an error
  • A redundant read-only Gmail scope requested alongside the scope that already covers it

1.6.0

Build 19 ·

Added

  • Scan page / Pick in Safari assistant in the watcher editor, so adding a watcher no longer requires DevTools
  • Anchor + any-number (autoBadge) strategy for badges that are absent from the page at zero
  • Advanced / Notification disclosure groups in the watcher editor, collapsed by default

Fixed

  • Probing an unloaded ("suspended") Safari tab no longer misreads it as missing and opens a duplicate tab
  • Probes now prefer the visible tab over a hidden duplicate on the same URL
  • At most one reload per check, instead of repeated reloads
  • Built-in Rive profiles now refresh hidden tabs before reading their badge, since Safari pauses background tabs and stops repainting live counts

1.5.0

Build 18 ·

Added

  • Gmail: connect one or more Gmail accounts (OAuth with PKCE over a local loopback redirect, tokens in the Keychain) and get a notification for each new message with Mark as Read, Archive, Delete and Spam actions
  • Built-in site recipes for LinkedIn, Rive Community, Reddit and Contra, plus a generic "tab title (N)" recipe, selectable from the Site menu in the watcher editor
  • Selector Doctor (step-by-step diagnosis) and anchor suggestions in the watcher editor
  • Watchers can open their page in a background tab automatically when no tab is found
  • A watcher that stays broken now sends one notification naming the cause and the remedy

Changed

  • A check that could not observe the page (no tab, signed out, bot check, selector miss) is no longer recorded as "0"; the last confirmed reading is kept and the menu shows the real status
  • Failed checks back off exponentially; failures right after wake from sleep are not counted
  • watchers.json is backed up before each save and an unreadable file is quarantined instead of being overwritten

1.4.11

Build 17 ·

Added

  • New "Open System Automation Settings" button in Settings, alongside the existing notifications shortcut
  • New permission status dashboard in Settings with green/red indicators and action buttons for: - Notifications - Safari Automation - System Events Automation - Default browser automation

1.4.10

Build 16 ·

Fixed

  • Added missing hardened-runtime automation entitlement (com.apple.security.automation.apple-events) so WebWatcher can be listed under System Settings -> Privacy & Security -> Automation and request browser control permissions correctly

1.4.9

Build 15 ·

Fixed

  • Monitoring startup now waits for Safari automation permission instead of launching checks that immediately fail with repeated AppleEvents authorization errors
  • Safari automation authorization failures now trigger a targeted permission flow and user-facing guidance instead of raw "Not authorized to send Apple events" watcher errors
  • Automation alert retry instructions are now browser-specific (Safari monitoring vs Chromium tab-reuse action)

1.4.8

Build 14 ·

Fixed

  • Chrome automation permission requests now retry with WebWatcher activated in the foreground, so macOS can show consent and register Chrome under Automation
  • Added a direct AppleScript fallback permission probe for Chromium browsers when the AppleEvents preflight returns an unknown state
  • Reduced false "enable automation" loops by treating unknown consent state as a fallback-to-open case instead of a hard deny

1.4.7

Build 13 ·

Fixed

  • Browser automation permission requests now use the macOS AppleEvents permission API to more reliably trigger consent for the default browser (including Chrome)
  • Added an in-app "Reset Automation Permission" action when a browser is missing from the Automation list, so Chrome consent can be requested again
  • Updated AppleEvents usage description text to include both Safari monitoring and default-browser tab reuse behavior

1.4.6

Build 12 ·

Fixed

  • Browser automation AppleScript now targets the default browser by explicit bundle identifier (application id) to improve permission targeting and tab reuse reliability

1.4.5

Build 11 ·

Fixed

  • Fallback URL opens are now forced through the resolved default browser app, avoiding unexpected browser routing
  • Added explicit default-browser automation probes and clearer permission-failure handling for tab reuse

1.4.4

Build 10 ·

Fixed

  • Reuse logic now only checks the default browser for existing tabs, preventing unintended focus switches to other browsers (for example Safari) when Chrome is default

1.4.3

Build 9 ·

Fixed

  • Added timeouts to browser reuse AppleScript calls to prevent blocked automation checks from stopping fallback URL opens
  • Row click-to-open now uses an explicit button for more reliable click handling in the popover

1.4.2

Build 8 ·

Fixed

  • Tab reuse now matches by both exact host and root domain (e.g., sibling subdomains)
  • Reuse now checks the default browser first, then other supported running browsers for existing matching tabs before opening a new tab

1.4.1

Build 7 ·

Fixed

  • Browser tab reuse matching now correctly invokes local AppleScript handlers, allowing existing-tab activation in Google Chrome and Safari by domain

1.4.0

Build 6 ·

Added

  • API lookup command support on watchers to resolve message URLs dynamically before opening
  • Clickable watcher rows in the popover (outside toggle/reload/edit controls) to open watcher destinations
  • New setting: "Reuse existing browser tab by domain"
  • Browser navigation service that attempts domain-tab reuse in Safari and Chromium-based browsers

Changed

  • Notification clicks now use the same destination resolution flow as popover row clicks
  • Launch-at-login registration is refreshed from the installed app location when starting from /Applications

Fixed

  • Focus restoration now only happens when Safari is still frontmost after a scrape
  • Safari scraping requests are serialized to reduce focus churn from overlapping checks
  • Per-watcher in-flight guards prevent overlapping checks from stacking
  • Notification replacement now keeps a single active visible notification per watcher
  • Duplicate app instances are blocked at startup, preferring the /Applications instance

1.3.0

Build 5 ·

Added

  • Custom Badge Attribute support - Specify a custom HTML attribute to read badge values from - Essential for modern web components that use Shadow DOM (e.g., Reddit's <dynamic-badge initial-count="5">) - New "Badge Attribute" field appears when Badge/Number watch type is selected - Examples: initial-count, data-count, aria-label
  • Auto-detection of common badge attributes - When no custom attribute is specified, automatically checks: - initial-count (Reddit) - data-count (common pattern) - count - Falls back to innerText/textContent

Technical

  • Added badgeAttribute property to Watcher model with backwards-compatible Codable support
  • Updated SafariScraper to prioritize custom attribute over default detection chain

1.2.0

Build 4 ·

Changed

  • Version display now shows build number (e.g., "v1.2.0 (4)")

1.2.0

Build 3 ·

Added

  • Force Refresh option - Reloads Safari tab before scraping to fix stale content - Safari aggressively suspends background tabs, causing DOM reads to return outdated values - Enable "Force refresh before checking" in watcher settings to force a page reload
  • Configurable settle delay - Slider to set wait time (0.5s - 5.0s) after page reload - Allows dynamic JavaScript content to fully update before scraping - Default: 2.0 seconds
  • Background-safe refresh - Safari stays in background, focus is preserved
  • Version number displayed in menu bar popover header
  • Info button in popover header linking to GitHub README documentation

Fixed

  • Safari background tab suspension causing stale/outdated notification counts
  • Dynamic content not updating without manual page reload
  • Version display in Settings now reads from bundle (was hardcoded as 1.0.0)

Technical

  • Added forceRefresh and refreshDelay properties to Watcher model
  • AppleScript waits for document.readyState === "complete" before scraping
  • Backwards-compatible Codable implementation (existing watchers load with defaults)

1.1.0

Build 2 ·

Changed

  • Major architecture change: Switched from WKWebView to Safari AppleScript integration
  • WebWatcher now reads content directly from Safari tabs instead of isolated WebView
  • No separate login required - uses your existing Safari sessions
  • Removed WebScraper.swift and LoginWebView.swift (no longer needed)
  • Standardized status messages to show "Nothing new" consistently

Added

  • SafariScraper.swift - AppleScript-based Safari tab scraping
  • Focus preservation - Safari stays minimized when checking tabs
  • Better handling of missing badge elements (returns "0" instead of error)

Fixed

  • SwiftUI not updating when watcher results change
  • Badge monitoring now correctly shows "0" when no badge is visible

Removed

  • In-app login browser (LoginWebView) - no longer needed with Safari integration
  • WKWebView-based WebScraper - replaced with SafariScraper

Notes

  • Requires Safari with "Allow JavaScript from Apple Events" enabled
  • Monitored pages must be open in Safari tabs

1.0.1

Build 1 ·

Fixed

  • Fixed Swift task continuation leak in WebScraper causing watchers to hang
  • Refactored WebScraper to use actor-based architecture for better concurrency handling
  • Fixed app sandbox restrictions that prevented file browsing and web requests
  • Disabled app sandbox for proper WKWebView and file picker functionality
  • Fixed notification delegate to properly show banners in foreground

Changed

  • Improved WebScraper reliability with dedicated worker class per request
  • Better timeout handling using Swift structured concurrency
  • Cleaner separation of concerns in web scraping code

1.0.0

Build 1 ·

Added

  • Initial release of WebWatcher
  • Menu bar application with popover interface
  • Support for multiple website watchers
  • CSS selector support for element targeting
  • XPath expression support for element targeting
  • Watch types: - Badge/Number tracking - Element count monitoring - Text change detection - Element existence detection - Element disappearance detection
  • Configurable check intervals (15s, 30s, 1min, 2min, 5min, 10min, 30min)
  • Native macOS notifications with: - Custom notification titles - Customizable body templates with {value} and {name} placeholders - Custom icon support per watcher
  • Notification preview functionality
  • Settings screen with: - Launch at login option - Default check interval configuration - Page load delay configuration
  • Persistent storage of watchers and settings in ~/Library/Application Support/WebWatcher/
  • Custom app icon