Tact 1.6
December 19, 2023
Jaanus Kase
Tact 1.6 is now available in App Store for both iOS and macOS. Here’s what’s new.
New List
We completely redesigned the main view of Tact that we simply call “the List.” It presents the list of your chats and connection requests, and provides a gateway to other features like creating new chats, connecting with other people, and editing your profile.
We previously tried a bottom-aligned list without a title control. While possibly being easier to access, it was somewhat unconventional and not expandable. An important part of List is accessing various views of your chats, for example accessing the ones that you have archived. In the previous list, you accessed archive through a bottom toolbar control that only appeared if you had any archived chats. Connection requests appeared with yet another dynamic control under your chats.
The new list provides a clear title that makes it clear what the current screen is about, and also works as a filter picker. We really like this control, and it’s surprising there is no such control available out of the box in SwiftUI: we had to do a bit of hacking to get there. In the end, we are pretty happy with the result.
The list also has many smaller visual updates:
Increased the size of controls, texts, and chat avatars.
All chat avatars now have a uniform size and treatment with a background.
Unified row heights, so there are less unwanted visual artifacts during animations when you read the chats.
Updated user interface for “Create chat” views.
On macOS, there is no more visible control to open Settings. You can open Settings on macOS using the system standard shortcut Cmd-, or use the menu.
Updated visuals
Throughout the whole app, we revisited our internal system for how we manage color and typography, and you’ll notice small changes here and there. The navigation bar buttons now have a uniform circular treatment. Some navigation bar buttons were not visible correctly in dark mode.
Smaller technical fixes
There are several. One worth mentioning: chat message previews in List no longer show the backslash escape character when the message text contains an exclamation mark.
Updated app identity, icon, and web site
Last but not least, we have refreshed our visual identity. You’ll notice the updated app icon of Tact which we feel captures the essence of what we are about, while providing some freshness. Instead of black, the icon now has a distinct dark navy color that you will also see throughout the app itself as an accent color. We have also simplified the website to focus on the essentials.