The one with my first MacOS App

Because WhyNote?

Hey friends,

I’m incredibly excited (and a little nervous) to share something I’ve been working on in my spare time: my very first macOS app.

It’s called WhyNote (you know why 🙂)

WhyNote is a simple, no-frills text editor designed with a few very specific things in mind:

• It automatically strips formatting from any pasted text. No more weird fonts or colors sneaking in.

• It has a clean find & replace feature with the option to go word-by-word or replace all at once.

• It includes a live word counter.

• And it just… looks clean. Minimal. Like something you’d actually want open on your desktop.

This is my first time ever building an app like this. I have no team. No developer buddy. Just me clicking around, learning as I go. So if you give it a try, please be kind — and more importantly, let me know what could be better.

The app isn’t on the App Store just yet — I want to take some time to polish and improve it based on your feedback. So please, drop a comment with anything you’d like to see added or fixed.

And if you have no idea what I’m talking about, I made a whole episode about it here:

Thanks for being here — seriously 🙏🏻
This community is the reason I try things like this.

⚠️ Important note:
Because WhyNote hasn’t gone through Apple’s notarization process (I’m still tweaking things!), macOS will likely block it when you try to open it the first time. Don’t worry — the app is safe, and here’s how you can open it anyway:

1. Download the app and move it to your Applications folder.

This is optional but recommended, so it stays where macOS expects apps to live.

2. Try to open it.

You’ll likely get a message saying:

“WhyNote can’t be opened because Apple cannot check it for malicious software.”

3. Click “Cancel.”

Don’t worry — this is just the first step.

4. Open your Mac’s System Settings.

Go to the Apple menu  → System Settings (or System Preferences if you’re on an older macOS).

5. Navigate to Privacy & Security.

6. Scroll down to the section labeled Security (on some systems, you’ll see “Allow apps downloaded from”).

7. You’ll see a message that says:

“WhyNote was blocked from use because it is not from an identified developer.”

Next to it, click “Open Anyway.”

8. You’ll be prompted one more time. Confirm again by clicking “Open.”

And that’s it — the app should launch normally from now on. You’ll only need to do this once.