Hi,
as SecondBar got featured on Lifehacker today (thank you!!) and thus many people came here, now a few words to SecondBar:
I know there are a lot of things that don’t work good and I didn’t work on it for quite a while because of the success of BetterTouchTool and limited time… A few days ago I began working on SecondBar again and I hope to release a updated version tonight. Unfortunately it will never be possible to support all apps perfectly because apps like adobe photoshop don’t support the accessibility api very well and make it impossible to fetch the needed data or slow the process down extremely which causes the menu in SecondBar to behave very slowly.
A solution I thought about was to allow you to create own menus for programs which are not supported well. So you could define menu items and then define actions those menu items should trigger. So e.g. you add a Menu “Drawing” and add various menu items to it like “Add Circle” and then assign a shortcut this menu item should trigger like “ctrl + cmd + c” or something. Do you think this could be useful for you? (You can assign shortcuts to every MenuItem in every program you use in the System Preferences =>Keyboard => shortcuts)
Also I hope to add the possibility to have multiple SecondBars (for systems with more than two monitors) soon.
//edit: here a first bugfix release download & use at your own risk It’s currently not on autoupdate because it’s the first version after a long time and maybe I missed some things.
These features will take at least one week to program so be patient but I hope this will be a good solution.
written by Andreas Hegenberg
Hi,
thanks for all your comments.
The two finger tab has some bugs and doesn’t work perfect yet. I’ll fix this today. Also I’ll add something like a two finger click. Also it seems the three finger click is a bit broken, so just stay with the previous version until the evening.
Now I have to do some “real” work 
so wait until the evening (GMT+1)
written by Andreas Hegenberg
//edit: please use the previous version, because this one has a silly bug that should be fixed soon. If you want to use it, you have to restart it everytime you opened the preferences window in order to work properly.
This version introduces the first step into a new user interface… atm it just puts the “advanced” prefs in a separate tab but in future trackpad and magic mouse gestures etc will be in own tabs too.
I’m using this for the interface: http://www.mere-mortal-software.com/blog/details.php?d=2007-03-11 so thanks to Dave Batton!
Additionally you can now select parts of the surface that are ignored, atm they are just ignored for two finger tap and single finger tap but I’ll add this for everything.
//edit 0.33 => two finger tap shouldn’t be triggered after swiping anymore
//edit 0.331 => scrolling with more than one finger down allowed if no custom up / down gestures are set
Sorry download link removed because this version sucks Please read the last few posts before using
Todo for tomorrow:
- make seperate swipe left / two finger swipe left and right for touchpad and magic mouse (atm they are the same)
- make seperate three finger click for magic mouse and touchpad
- scrolling behavior
- debug debug debug….
- add new features
written by Andreas Hegenberg
Here an experimental version with tap2click (you have to add single tap as gesture and then set Leftclick as action.
Download
Important Note:
There seem to be some programs that are not compatible with BTT and may make your system freeze (in combination with BTT). I’ll add a list of those to the documentation soon. These programs have in common that they need the Accessibility API (access for assistive devices) enabled (but not all programs that need this API can cause crashes).
One program I know about yet is TypeIt4Me
I’ll try to find a solution to this asap.
To clear things up: Macbooks without mutitouch touchpads are not supported. Still, if you connect a magic mouse to your “old” macbook you can configure the mouse with BTT (therefore the selection of your mactype)
written by Andreas Hegenberg
Hi everyone.
In very rare conditions every version of BetterTouchTool (in combination with other programs you have installed and may use an interfering technique) could cause your system to freeze so you’d have to restart. (From ~10 000 downloads 3 -4 user reported a freeze but still this is an important issue)
This version brings a new global shortcut which you should remember.
CTRL+ALT+CMD + Q
this key combo quits BetterTouchTool immediately and should work even if your system froze. After hitting this combo everything should work again.
Please download here but still, use at your own risk
written by Andreas Hegenberg
- fixed three finger swipes, rotate etc on macbook
- added experimental two finger tap to magic mouse
Download here, use on your own risk
//please don’t use btt if you do important work atm. I’ll release a version which can’t crash your system soon.
written by Andreas Hegenberg
so… I’m up for more than 24 hours now (thus I’m not very productive today )
here a last version which should hinder the three finger tap from triggering (at least a bit) after executing a three finger swipe on the magic mouse.
Only for people who want to test. Use on your own risk, this is a total nightly build for productive use try 0.316/0.317)
//edit: okay this is now really the last
//reading your comments this version seems to work okay. Here again short summary of things this version does:
- fixes bug which caused global gestures to stop working
- middleclick behavior has changed (if you middleclick the click “holds” until you release your fingers from pressing). If you don’t want this behavior use cmd+click, it does basically the same like a middleclick
- fixed many little things.
- 3 finger click is working on the touchpad too (if you set the one for the magic mouse, atm there is no seperate one for the touchpad)
Today I’ll focus on this:
- Performance
- Better scrolling behavior of the magic mouse using BTT (do not disable 2&3 finger scrolling when swipes for the magic mouse are set)
Download 0.325
written by Andreas Hegenberg
Hi everyone,
I’m back from Stockholm (really a great city!). So expect new version with many bugfixes today.
written by Andreas Hegenberg
So I’m offline till monday. Have a nice weekend (and stay put)
written by Andreas Hegenberg
- two finger scrolling should work if there is no custom two finger swipe shortcut set
- three finger scrolling should work if there is no custom three finger swipe shortcut set
- fixed some memory leaks (maybe not all)
- fixed some performance issues, but there is much room for improvements (next week)
- three finger swipes on magic mouse are back and MAY be better, but I have not really tested it yet
- will be available via autoupdate in about an hour if no major bugs are posted, you can now download it here:
//edit: 0.316
//edit: 0.317 download this! Fixes crash after reconnect (hopefully)
If you have problems (e.g with 4 finger swipes) and you already had installed a previous version, try deleting the bettertouchtool plist from your /Library/Preferences. But you’ll lose your settings of you do.
If your three finger swipe gestures or three finger click stops working regularly try activating the “risky option in the preferences” (but read earlier posts about it).
Todos for next week:
- make all gestures better (better algorithms for recognizing swipes etc.)
- implement tap2click on magic mouse
- implement a good working two finger click on magic mouse
- implement remote mode for magic mouse so you can use it as remote for your media mac (I think about using it basically as touchpad to move the cursor with the finger so you could hold it in your hand while moving the mouse) (would imho be a great looking remote )
- fix many bugs reported by YOU! thank you!
- implement more gestures (definitely coming: 4 finger tap for macbook)
Your contribution:
- report bugs
- suggest new things
- spread the word
Pico Mitchell sent me a GUI proposal, what do you think about it? (Pico please describe it in the comments, I don’t have time now 
)
TrackPad Pane Mockup by Pico Mitchell
written by Andreas Hegenberg