Glassboard: Draw over anything on your Mac! For screensharers and content producers
I built and released a Mac app I always wanted to exist: Glassboard let's you draw over anything on your Mac, across every app and every screen, Khan-academy style! Problem: Want to highlight something you're presenting? Need to doodle something quickly? Hold a keybind and draw over anything on your Mac. Release and it fades away. That's all! Well, except colors, shapes, a radial menu switcher and keybinds galore. But the basic concept is simple hold, draw, release, continue presenting without losing flow. No more awkwardly wiggling my mouse pointer at what I want to highlight while screensharing. Comparison: Fills a similar hole as apps like Scribbble and ScreenBrush, but both didn't really click with me. I don't want UI chrome on the screen, to avoid distracting clutter while presenting. Pricing: It's completely free and will stay that. Try it at https://stem.ps/glassboard. Transparency information: I'm a freelancer and indie developer, not a business. You can find me on Github, LinkedIn or my website. I use TelemetryDeck to collect aggregate analytics about the number of doodles created, but collect to personal data or identifiers.
Collected discussion
Seems a lot like Presentify.
From what I can see, the main difference to Presentify (and other tools) is that Glassboard is meant to work completely without UI on the screen. The only UI in Glassboard is the radial tool/color switcher and that's entirely optional if you use the keybinds. This is a big differentiator for me, given that the tool is meant to be used when presenting. I don't want drawing UI to clutter my screen. It's a bit hard to compare for real to be honest because Presentify doesn't even have a free trial, which is a no go for me.
Well, Presentify does work without any UI, no toolbar is shown. You can simply change colours and tools with keyboard shortcuts. Presentify trial is only available via Setapp, not elsewhere. That's right.
Got it. The lack of any UI didn't register with me. Presentify can do that as well with a hotkey. I purchased it in the past, otherwise Glassboard would be a good alternative.
Also... Glassboard is completely free
Oh neat. I didn't realize Apple allowed this sort of thing.
Thanks! Yes it's possible when the users grants accessibility permission.
i cannot hear this accessibility settings discussion anymore. apple is killing so many apps because they wont allow it. sux. they built something extremely versatile, we us it and then it ends as dmg. just because. back to your app idea: great!!!!
Presentify works without any accessibility permissions, for what feature do you need this permission for?
one trust detail i'd put right beside the download is exactly why Accessibility permission is needed, plus whether the app needs Screen Recording or network access. for presenting, a panic shortcut that instantly clears every display would also be useful - especially when someone switches Spaces or starts sharing the wrong monitor.
👍 Thanks for the tips. I'll add that to the website.
Forgot to answer your suggestion about the panic button 😀. Once you let go of the trigger-keys (ctrl-option by default), your drawings fade away within a second. There's also a keybind to immediately erase everything (trigger + X), or undo the last one (trigger + Z). So I think this is covered already.
make it available for sequoia please
I'll look into it but unfortunately I don't have a computer with sequoia to develop and test on anymore. So it won't be easy to verify that it works well. And I don't really trust that all behavior works the same in a VM, particularly permission stuff.
Does this work if you're sharing a single window on apps like Teams & Zoom? Will it show the drawing through the single window screen share? (nice app!)
No, it won’t work in that case. I don’t think there’s a way to do this. I’m currently working on a 2nd app which allows sharing any custom area on your screen by mirroring it to a hidden virtual display for screensharing. It’s made particularly with ultrawide monitors in mind. There it will work.