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· 4 min read
Martijn Smit

We’ve added new stats in this release: mouse scrolls and distance moved. The mouse details page is completely redesigned to show off the new metrics. Scrolls and distance are also available on the website, including rankings and per-application stats.

Ever wondered how long you’ve been behind your computer this week? The new Computer Uptime page answers this question beautifully.

There are now also hourly mouse coordinate exports for Premium members, Geek Window customization is improved, and many tweaks that make WhatPulse easier to use.

We’ve also added support for macOS Ventura (13.0), and there’s a brand new client for Apple Silicon chips next to the existing Intel client. This’ll improve performance on Apple’s M1/M2 processors. WhatPulse also won’t require Rosetta anymore.

Before I dive into the WhatPulse 5.0 details, we’re also launching our yearly premium promotion to celebrate the start of the holiday season! Redeem the code HOLIDAY2022 at this link to get three months of free Premium.

Now, on with the WhatPulse 5.0 details!

Activity Tracking Made Easy with WhatPulse Statistics

New Stats: Mouse Scrolls and Distance

Ever wondered how far you move your mouse across your monitors? Wonder no more! WhatPulse 5.0 measures mouse distance and translates it into kilometers and miles (depending on your location). Using the same historical recording as current stats (keys, clicks, etc.), you can see how far your mouse travels during the workweek compared to your gaming sessions. 😉

The Mouse page has been redesigned to fit the new stats, and you can switch between the heat map page and the details page easily:

New mouse heat map and detail pagesNew mouse heat map and detail pages

Additionally, we also measure mouse scrolls in every direction: up, down, left, and right.

Both scrolls and distance are available throughout the WhatPulse software and website. Put them on your Geek Window, export the data, look at your global rank on the website, and see in which applications you move the most.

MacOS Ventura (13.0) and Apple Silicon Support

Apple released macOS Ventura (13.0) a few weeks ago, and WhatPulse 5.0 now fully supports it. There is now also a different download to support Apple Silicon processors. Up until now, the WhatPulse software was built for Intel processors, and while the Intel software ran pretty well on Apple’s M1 and M2 processors, it depended on Rosetta. That could impact performance and ease of use.

If you have a Mac with an Apple Silicon processor, please reinstall WhatPulse by removing the current version and downloading the Apple Silicon version here: https://whatpulse.org/downloads/

New Computer Uptime Chart

First appearing in the Weekly Updates and Dashboard for the uptime throughout your entire account, the client now also displays the uptime of the last eight days in the redesigned Computer Uptime page. How much time have you spent on your computer during the week and weekend? Have a look:

New Computer Uptime pageNew Computer Uptime page

Keen eyes also notice that the Favorite reboot days chart has changed from a dot chart to a pie chart, blending in with the new uptime chart. It looks like I’m not particularly eager to restart my computer on Mondays. 😉

User Experience, Feedback, and the Help Center

Every release, we invest time in making WhatPulse easier and more intuitive to use, and this release is no different. For example, the Geek Window is better at remembering its previous position and is easier to edit. On another note, the update process is now completely automatic with one click update.

Another addition is a direct link to our Help Center to help you find articles on how to use WhatPulse. Next to that is a direct link to our Feedback form, as we increasingly would like to know your ideas about WhatPulse to drive the future of the software and website.

Feedback and Help Center linksFeedback and Help Center links

So, when you’re using WhatPulse and have an idea to improve it or find something that can work better — click the feedback button and let us know!

Conclusion

Sporting twenty-two changes and three new major features: WhatPulse 5.0 is another big step forward and increases your computer activity and productivity insight.

There’s more in this release than I can cover in this blog post, but I wanted to highlight a few more:

  • Bug fix: Input and Network applications could show fewer stats than recorded when applications have multiple different folders from where it runs. An example of an application that does this is Discord.

  • New: Add support for hourly mouse coordinate exports.

  • Improved: Upload the computer profile (specs, hardware) after pulsing if the website doesn’t have a profile. Speeds up the computer profile visibility.

Find the complete list of new features, improvements, and bug fixes here: https://whatpulse.org/releasenotes/5.0/

· 3 min read
Martijn Smit

Center Clicks (aka the Red Dot)

If you’re a gamer, you might’ve seen the below result in the mouse heat map after playing a game. I won’t bore you with the details; just know that sometimes a game locks the mouse pointer to the center of your screen.

the Red Dot.the Red Dot.

With help from our community, we’ve added logic to ignore these center clicks. They won’t appear in the heat map, but they still count against your click statistics. You’ll also still see them in the per-application click stats.

Activity Tracking Made Easy with WhatPulse Statistics

Remote Desktop & Virtual Machine Support

Due to the explosion in remote workers, this feature has been requested a lot. Keys and clicks inside Remote Desktop (RDP) sessions and Virtual Machine consoles are more challenging to measure than on “regular” computers. We’re excited that v4.2 now supports RDP and VM sessions to count statistics while remote working. This is a Premium feature.

Network Stats

There are two fixes in v4.2 relating to network stats. On Windows, the network measurements could sometimes stall when you wake your computer from sleep. A few changes within Windows could cause the client to miss the “hey, we’re waking up” messages and not reactivate the network measurement engine.

On macOS, the client needs system permissions to be allowed to measure the network traffic. Sometimes macOS overrules these changes (i.e., during upgrades), causing WhatPulse to stop measurements. We’ve changed how the client sets these permissions, which is now persistent. A new installer runs during the WhatPulse installation that guarantees correct permissions. Check out this help article for more details.

Running as Administrator on Windows

Similar to games locking the mouse pointer to the center of the screen, sometimes applications that run elevated as admin lock us out from counting the keys and clicks. This is why we’ve had the setting called “Run as Administrator,” which elevates the WhatPulse client to also run as administrator allowing it to count the input from apps that would’ve otherwise blocked it. Due to a rising number of applications that block the client and most Pulsers enabling the setting, “Run as Administrator” is now enabled by default.

There is (or was) one drawback with enabling the setting, every time the client starts, you had to approve it.

Permission popup while running as AdministratorPermission popup while running as Administrator

Thanks to a suggestion from ThanoslBsl, v4.2 won’t show this popup when you start your computer. It does this by adding a scheduled task that runs the client on system start, meaning that the first time you run the client — you’ll still see the prompt. But after the first run, you won’t have to see that popup anymore. 🙌

Manual Computer Profile Upload

When you click on a computer name in your profile on whatpulse.org, you’ll get a profile page that shows the information about that computer. Things like operating system, memory, processor, and the stats for that computer. WhatPulse checks your computer settings regularly for changes and sends those changes to the website to show on the profile page, but if you don’t want to wait you can now trigger an upload from the Settings page:

Uploading your computer informationUploading your computer information

Updating

Version 4.2 is now available when you use the Check for Updates function, and you can download it from: https://whatpulse.org/downloads

· 2 min read
Martijn Smit

New Weekly Update Email

It’s my favorite email of the week, telling me how I did in the last week. Building on additional data the software is collecting like application stats and uptime details, I’m excited to reveal the new weekly update:

The first thing you’ll notice is the chart that shows how many hours per day you’ve spent behind your computer. Cool, right? The second thing is my favorite; the top five applications you’ve used this week. Awesome. It also helps that the new design looks fantastic. 😄

WhatPulse 4.1 fuels this data, so make sure you’ve upgraded. Without it, you’ll miss the chart and application list. Per-application statistics is also a Premium feature, make sure you subscribe.

Coming to your inbox next Thursday!

Activity Tracking Made Easy with WhatPulse Statistics

New Security Improvements

We’ve always focused on security at WhatPulse, from the granularity in selecting which statistics you’re tracking, the privacy options on our website, and the backend security. With this update we’re introducing two additional security controls for your accounts.

Two-Factor Authentication

First, an additional two-factor authentication method; text messages. We’ve supported two-factor authentication with an app (i.e., 1Password, or Google Authenticator) for a while, but not everyone has one of those apps.

With text message two-factor authentication, you first log in with your email and password. Then a six-digit code is sent to your phone, with which you can log fully into the website.

Set up two-factor authentication here, with either an authenticator app or the new text messages. You can find a step-by-step guide here.

Confirmations of Account Changes

Significant account changes now require confirmation. When you change your accounts username or email address an email will be sent to your current email address requesting you confirm these changes.

New Help Center

As our products are growing, being able to find the right documentation is essential. To make that easier, we’ve overhauled the Help Center into a brand new site.

The search bar is your friend when you’re looking for something specific. If you’re new to WhatPulse, a Getting Started series explains the basics. Check it out here: https://help.whatpulse.org

We’ll start integrating the new Help Center into our website and software client soon, giving you contextual help where it’s needed.

· 2 min read
Martijn Smit

AppImage for Linux (& SSL fixes)

Thanks to the hard work of Krzysztof, we now have an AppImage download available! This is in addition to the Snap and gives Linux users flexibility in choosing which format works for their system. Head over to the downloads to get it!

Keep in mind that due to the nature of the AppImage and Snap, unpulsed and application network traffic does not work. We’re working on an architecture that solves this in a future release.

Design Updates

After introducing the dark theme in v4.0, I’ve used your feedback to tweak a few things, like redesigning the drop downs, making the buttons softer, giving the settings more room to breathe, you can read them easier. There are more subtle changes that make the client easier to use.

You can see a glimpse in the below screenshot.

Activity Tracking Made Easy with WhatPulse Statistics

Did you know you can look at keyboard heat maps per application? There’s a drop down on the keyboard heat map page where you can select an application. You can now search for an application to make it much easier to find the application you’re interested in.

But wait, there’s more..

We’ve also started to translate the facts that are at the bottom of each page. There’s also cool new statistic (uptime per hour) that will play a role in an upcoming change to the weekly updates and in v4.2. For this and more, check out the full release notes here.

· 5 min read
Martijn Smit

New Design

Looks aren’t everything, but after years of the same, the client is now sporting a fresh and modern design:

Left: Keyboard heat map with dark mode — Right: Mouse heat map with light modeLeft: Keyboard heat map with dark mode — Right: Mouse heat map with light mode

Here’s a quick summary of the design changes:

  • Dark Mode! Choose between Dark and Light Mode in the settings.

  • Replaced the carousel for sub-pages with tabs. This exposes all sub-pages at a glance, so you can easily see what’s available.

  • Better indicate when specific stats are disabled

  • A new installer & update system that works the same on Windows and macOS. (Linux tbd) – There’s a new program added to the WhatPulse installation directory called WhatPulseMaintenanceTool. We’ll use it to install, update, and uninstall the client. – Update notifications now only happen within the client. You’ll see a banner at the top of the window saying there’s an update available.

The new update alertThe new update alert

We love how the new design and dark mode turned out, and we hope you do too! 💖

Activity Tracking Made Easy with WhatPulse Statistics

Application Uptime History

Ever wonder how long you’ve been in an application this week, or month? So did we! In version 3.6 and below, the application uptime was accumulative and you could only see uptime for specific dates by exporting it to CSV. We’ve now added the time selection on the application uptime, so you can select the most used date ranges, or even select a custom date range to see how long you’ve used an application.

Application Uptime History set on the last month viewApplication Uptime History set on the last month view

Network Improvements

Many of you have a great internet connection with high speeds. During high download or upload traffic, the 3.x versions could be inaccurate. We’ve improved the integration with npcap on Windows and the native pcap on macOS, to optimize for higher speeds.

The result: when downloading with 200Mb/s or more, the accuracy has gone from ~80% with 3.x, to ~98% accuracy with 4.0. 🚀

Automatic Bug Reports and Usage Data

Starting WhatPulse version 4.0, the client can automatically collect and send us anonymized data about bugs and usage. This information is important to us for improving your experience and helps us prioritize features and bug fixes. Data collection is controlled by the setting called Send bug and usage reports. If you’d like to learn more about what’s collected, how it’s sent to us, and how we use it, please check out this Help Center article.

Our Privacy Policy has been updated to mention this data, as well.

New Settings

There are a few new settings available, let’s walk through them:

  • Back by popular demand, a setting called Pause notifications. This lets you mute all notifications coming from the client (i.e., successful pulse).

  • The ‘Open Window on Startup’ setting is now also available on the General Settings tab, instead of just the Overview tab.

  • There’s also a select box for the client theme. This is where you can choose between the light or dark theme.

New Languages

We’ve added support for Arabic, Bulgarian, Spanish, and Polish. This makes a total of 12 available languages. These updates are driven by our awesome community; thank you to Ammar, Rado, Inktest, and Krzysiek!

Is your language not available and do you want to help translate the client? Find out how here.

Bug & Stability Fixes

A bunch! Here are all of them, just in case you’ve run into one of these.

  • GeoIP is a database that links network traffic to certain countries. WhatPulse 3.x had a few issues with handling GeoIP, which could cause the client to crash instantly after starting. The GeoIP database itself was corrupted in that cause, which the client didn’t handle well. Now it does.

  • Fixed a client crash when your Windows or macOS username has non-Unicode characters in it. (i.e. РПК)

  • Fixed high CPU and unresponsiveness, which sometimes happened on Windows after waking up after sleep when networking is enabled.

  • Fixed fact statistics sometimes being displayed as “%VAR%”

  • Fixed the %InstantKeyRate% and %InstantClickRate% Geek Window variables. These were showing 2x the actual value.

  • Improved the way applications are uploaded to the website so that they show up faster

  • An online database restore now downloads to your system’s temp directory. This fixes restores when using portable mode.

Conclusion

We’re really excited about WhatPulse 4.0 and hope you like it as much as we do. Upgrade using the built-in updater, or download 4.0 from here.

Thank you to everyone that participated in the beta, 4.0 is the most extensively tested and stable release yet because of you. 💪