1.7 is the release where I stopped letting that slide.
The pitch for Pocket Trip Planner hasn’t changed: one place for your itinerary, packing lists, budget, important dates, and notes for a trip, without an account, without ads, and without your itinerary getting parsed on someone else’s server. Everything runs on-device, and Pro is a one-time unlock, not a subscription.
What I wanted for 1.7 was for the Mac version to actually feel like it belonged on a Mac. Same SwiftUI codebase as iPhone and iPad — I’m not maintaining a separate Mac app — but built to expect a keyboard, a mouse, and a window you can resize, instead of assuming every tap is a finger and every list only ever gets swiped.
I’ve been a software engineer since 2012, and Pocket Trip Planner is very much a nights-and-weekends project — built in the margins between a day job and a family, one trip’s worth of frustration at a time. I plan our vacations in it, so most of what changes in this app started as something that annoyed me personally on an actual trip. The Mac work was no different: I opened the Mac build to plan a trip, reached for a keyboard shortcut that didn’t exist, and started a list.
There’s now an actual menu bar, not just the default Edit/View boilerplate macOS gives you for free. ⌘N starts a new trip, ⌘F jumps straight to Find Trips & Plans, and ⌘, opens Settings — the shortcuts you’d expect from any Mac app. The Help menu points to the in-app guide and About screen instead of sitting empty.
Every list in the app that had a swipe action on iPhone — budget entries, transactions, transportation legs, packing items, imported events — now has the matching right-click menu on Mac. Rows also reveal their actions on hover, so you’re not left guessing that a menu exists at all. None of this is new functionality, exactly; it’s the functionality that was already there, finally reachable without a touchscreen.
Trip Files — the per-trip vault for confirmations, boarding passes, and screenshots — now accepts a drag straight from Finder instead of forcing you through a file picker every time. While I was in there I also found and fixed a genuinely annoying bug: a PDF downloaded from Safari would silently fail to import. Turned out macOS tags downloaded files with a quarantine attribute, and the app was choking on it during the copy. Fixed now, and it also opened the door to accepting images alongside PDFs.
The rest of 1.7 is a pile of things that were each small on their own but, together, were the difference between “runs on Mac” and “works on Mac”:
None of this required a separate Mac codebase or a bunch of #if os(macOS) branches scattered everywhere — almost all of it is the same SwiftUI views iPhone and iPad already use, just given the extra affordances a mouse and keyboard expect. That was the whole point.
Pocket Trip Planner is free to download, with Pro as an optional one-time unlock — no subscription, no account required. It now runs natively on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Vision Pro.
The screenshots below show the rest of the story better than I can in words.
]]>That is how Pocket Trip Planner started. At first it was deliberately small: a countdown to my next trip and a few utilities I actually used—a packing list and a simple day planner. I built it for myself, used it on real trips, and kept iterating. Features grew because I needed them, but the goal stayed the same: stay simple, stay useful, and stay out of the way.
The app is built around low friction. You create a trip, see the countdown, and keep the pieces of planning together without turning the UI into a dashboard.
In one place you get:
It is ad-free and does not require an account. Your data stays on your device. The app is built natively in Swift for iOS and runs on iPhone and iPad, with Mac support through Mac Catalyst.
If you want more—PDF export, extra packing templates, themes, alternate app icons, and the import helpers described below—Pocket Trip Planner Pro is a one-time upgrade, not a subscription. The free app is the full planner; Pro is for travelers who want an extra hand.
I have been a software engineer since 2012, and I am happiest when I am building something—often in the margins, between work and family. Side projects like this are how I scratch that itch: solve a problem I actually have, ship something focused, and learn along the way. Pocket Trip Planner started as “make my next trip easier to see coming,” not as a pitch deck.
Version 1.6 is about getting real trip plans into the app—the confirmations and itineraries you already have, instead of retyping everything by hand.
Trip Files is a vault attached to each trip where you keep confirmations, screenshots, and PDFs together with everything else you are planning. Files live on disk in a shared app container so the database stays light; you get thumbnails and quick access inside the trip.
This release improves how those files get in and how they behave once they are there:
For Pocket Trip Planner Pro, 1.6 adds stronger ways to turn messy source material into structured plans:
All of these helpers are optional. They run on your device using Apple Intelligence and local text recognition—no account, no cloud processing step for your trip details. If you prefer to plan by hand, the free experience is unchanged: trips, daily planning, packing, budgets, widgets, and the rest of the core app work the same way they always have.
If you want a simple, ad-free place to plan your next trip—or you are curious what 1.6 adds for Pro—you can download Pocket Trip Planner on the App Store or read more on the product page.
The screenshots below show the rest of the story better than I can in words.
]]>Most of the music I care about is already in my library—albums I’ve bought over the years, things I’ve added from Apple Music. What I wanted wasn’t another way to discover music. I wanted a fast path back to the albums I love: load them up, tap one, and listen. A few clicks, not a project.
The app is built around that idea. You create CD magazines from the albums in your Music library—like the six-disc changer in the glove box, but digital. Browse by artwork, fill the slots with albums you actually want to hear, and play. One tap starts the album. The album is the unit; there are no playlists, recommendations, or “what should you listen to next?” loops. It’s deliberately constrained, the way a physical changer was.
It works with the albums already in your Music library—purchased music and Apple Music titles you’ve added—not a separate catalog to manage. You can open an album, see the track list, and start from anywhere; recently played albums stay easy to jump back into.
On the road, that matters even more. CarPlay is a big part of the experience: large artwork, simple navigation, glanceable controls so you’re not fighting the interface while you drive. Pick an album, let it run.
I’ve been a software engineer since 2012, and I’m happiest when I’m building something—often in the margins, between work and family. Side projects like this are how I scratch that itch: solve a problem I actually have, ship something small and focused, and learn along the way. Digital CD Changer started as “make playing my albums easy again,” not as a product pitch.
With version 1.1, the app is free on the App Store. You get one six-disc magazine out of the box—enough to load a starter changer and start listening right away. I made it free so more people can try it without paying upfront; if your collection grows, Pro is a one-time upgrade (no subscription) that unlocks unlimited magazines and slots.
This release also adds a CD Changer menu for Pro and About (with links to the site, terms, and support), plus reliability improvements around artwork and purchases.
If you miss album-first listening—or just want your favorites a few taps away—you can download Digital CD Changer on the App Store or read more on the product page.
The screenshots below show the rest of the story better than I can in words.
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