Glide

Assistive macOS menu-bar utility for simple, reliable window move and resize — modifier keys + your mouse.

Description

Glide helps when title bars and resize edges are hard to reach. It stays focused on one job: move and resize windows with minimal effort. No tiling, no rules engine, no window-manager bloat.

Defaults (Cmd + Shift):

• Move (Glide): hold your keys and move the mouse over a window — it follows the cursor. No title bar, no click.
• Resize: hold your keys and right-click anywhere in a window, then pull. The edge or corner nearest your click sets the direction (for example, top-right grows from the top-right corner).

You can turn off hover-move and use left-click drag instead, or change which modifier keys are required, from the menu bar dropdown.

Customization

Open the menu-bar icon to adjust settings. All selected modifier keys must be held at the same time for move or resize to activate.

• Disabled — turns Glide off globally (when disabled, move/resize actions are ignored)
• Option, Command, Control, Shift — toggle required modifier keys (all selected keys must be held)
• Glide — hover to move without clicking the title bar (tooltip: “Hover to move”)
• Resize — right-click to resize (tooltip: “Right-click drag”)
• Reset to defaults — restores defaults (Cmd + Shift, hover move on, resize on, Glide enabled)
• Quit — quits Glide

Installation

Glide is distributed as a signed, notarized DMG via GitHub Releases. The landing site download button points at the same release zip.

• Download the latest Glide-{version}.zip from the Releases page

• Unzip Glide-{version}.zip, then open the extracted DMG and drag Glide to Applications (do not run directly from the disk image)

• Launch Glide from Applications

• Enable Privacy Settings during onboarding

  

• Click the menu icon for the dropdown to change hot keys

  

Developing

Quick start

• Clone the repo, then open the project with make open (or open Glide.xcodeproj in Xcode)
• First-time Xcode setup: xcodebuild -runFirstLaunch (or make check, which runs this idempotently)
• Daily dev: make run-debug — Debug build (ad-hoc signed, no Developer ID cert required)
• Release-like local build: make build / make run / make install — Release build (Developer ID signed; cert must be in your login keychain)
• Run tests with make test
• Clean local build output with make clean
• Regenerate README/site screenshots after a version bump with make screenshots (macOS only)
• Install your current Release build into /Applications: make install
• Package an unsigned DMG for local testing: make dev-package
• Build a signed + notarized DMG for distribution: make release (see notes below)

make build, make clean, and make test pipe xcodebuild output through indented dim logging (-quiet by default). Pass VERBOSE=true for the full log, e.g. VERBOSE=true make build.

To bump the version before a release: echo "1.3.2" > VERSION && make bump-version (reads VERSION; does not take the version as a make argument).

Full details of the Release Process.

Releasing locally

make release codesigns and notarizes a distributable DMG. It signs with the Developer ID Application identity in your login keychain and notarizes using credentials from secrets/secrets.env — it does not create or switch keychains, so it won't disturb your macOS session.

Note: Your Developer ID Application certificate must be installed in your login keychain. If it isn't, make release fails with a clear message — import it once by double-clicking secrets/DevIDCertificates.p12, then retry. Override the identity with make release SIGN_IDENTITY="Developer ID Application: Your Name (TEAMID)" if needed.

Tagged releases (pushing a v* tag) are built and published automatically by GitHub Actions, which signs independently of this Makefile target.

Xcode and dependency requirements

• Xcode with macOS SDK support (project LastUpgradeCheck is 2630)
• macOS deployment target is 13.0
• Swift language version is 5.0
• Uses Apple frameworks only (Cocoa, SwiftUI, XCTest) and Accessibility APIs
• No third-party package dependencies (no SwiftPM/CocoaPods/Carthage required)
• Brew tools (for make dev-package / make release): create-dmg — install with brew install create-dmg
• Run make check to verify all dependencies (Xcode, brew, create-dmg)
• Code signing: Release builds use Developer ID Application (manual signing in the Xcode project; sandbox off — required for Accessibility). Debug builds are ad-hoc (CODE_SIGN_IDENTITY = -) so local dev does not need a distribution cert. CI release still archives unsigned and re-signs in GitHub Actions (unchanged).

Roadmap

• Add support for registering to start automatically at startup
• Enable users to select their own color scheme
• Add an About dialog with version
• Add "check for updates" functionality

Contributing

Contributions are welcome and appreciated.

• Open an issue first for bugs or feature ideas (details help).
• For code changes, use the standard fork -> branch -> pull request workflow.
• Small or WIP pull requests are great for early feedback.