I have the same issue with TE crashing shortly after startup on an Intel MBP 16".
There is a new update available (finally), let’s hope this finally fixes the problem.
Needless to say, I also do not have my subscription set to auto-renew currently.
What’s new in TextExpander 6.8.5:
Fixes VoiceOver access to main window
Resolves possible crash on launch when local storage closes unexpectedly
Resolves possible crash submitting stats when local storage closes unexpectedly
So like an idiot, I reported the bug. In the bug report I included the following info:
on a Mac
MacOS 10.15.7
TE version
This is the TE snippet they sent back
Thank you for reaching out to Smile Support.
I believe this might be a bug but will need your help to identify any key factors that might be causing this. Could you please clarify which device this is taking place on and it’s OS Version and Version of TextExpander being used?
They also wanted to know if I tried rebooting my machine…
I was helping my Dad with his Dell computer back in 2008 (I dont remember the problem now but it was not something basic) and the Dell support rep asked us to move the desktop to a different room to see if that solved the issue. I had him repeat it just for the lolz and then I hung up on him and ordered an iMac.
I would have been more forgiving of Smile if they would not have asked for the exact info that I already gave them.
I posted in another thread a similar customer service experience with online courses sold by a recent MPU guest. Frustrating as all get out, and just lazy, lazy, lazy by the vendor. Needless to say I did not purchase his course and I advised others not to either.
On topic, I’ve tried the Smile products, but found them buggy and hard to use. Ditched them years ago. Like others here, I’m still not sure why they are so frequently recommended. And now with Smile selling PDFPen, I think TE’s days are numbered…
That is the one thing that stopped me from using TE. I had sent in about 40 crash reports. No answer. I submitted a ticket and received a well-written TE snippet email that acknowledged my issue and told me to delete the mentioned folder. That resolves this issue temporarily but it comes back after hours our days.
The lack of communication absolutely is not helping.
If it’s inappropriate to discuss, why the need for the lengthy explanation? I don’t personally see anything wrong with the recommendations in the past. However, when Smile took TextExpander to the subscription model they justified it with all the enhancements they were going to make they opened themselves and their partners up to all of the criticism.
Let’s just say that I personally have no reason to criticize podcasters for how they dealt with Smile, TE and sponsorships. I was brought to TE 10 years ago because of that and I do not regret it. And I have stepped away from TE because of a degradation of quality (my opinion). But this degradation happened later. And my experience is that there are podcasters (and the MPU hosts are among them) who have acknowledged that there are users that have issues with TE these days.
I enjoy the MPU community for being open and positive. And I appreciate that it is being hosted and paid for by the MPU podcasters. And I am grateful for that. That is all I tried to convey.
Smile obviously has some management problems, probably centered around the “mid-level” range of managers. What exec would tolerate a company website that is so woefully out of date as this?
started moving away from TE to KM for expansion last week
additional benefit: for my work I sometimes use a Citrix connection, and InfoSec have disabled the paste command, so TE did not work. KM “paste by typing” does, so now all my snippets also work in Citrix
I’ve officially moved my snippets away from TE - although it was timely since I noticed an update was just pushed that supposedly addresses the original crashing issue. Most of my snippets went to Alfred and I had a couple of snippets with hot keys that I had to move to KM. I think the one thing I lose is some fill ins, but honestly I wasn’t using those snippets often enough to justify the expense of TE (I’m sure it’s possible in KM if I spent more time figuring it out). One less app running on my Mac is alright with me. Thanks everyone for the comments in here with alternative solutions. Little did I know the apps I already had were good enough to avoid another subscription.
I use these all the time. You can even chain multiple inputs, storing your values as variables along the way, to paste a longer message with multiple custom arguments.
I also use Superhuman for email, and that allows dynamic snippets on emails for iOS (including filling first/last names) - which is even better than TE because it runs without switching between apps. It makes emailing on iOS on par with desktop.
It’s $10 a month if you work in Education. For me, it’s worth it because it saves a lot of time. As an estimate, I get through my email in half the time compared to when I used Mail.
It’s Gmail only, which I’m not using anymore, so it’s a non-starter for me.
Also, despite being willing to pay for quality apps, I have a hard time believing that an email client could be worth that much.
The education price (10/month) made sense to me as it replaces SaneBox and TE (which cost that combined).
If you’re not in education, I’d say the price is too much unless you live in email and would really save a lot of time. It’s pitched for CEOs and business people who can write off the cost as an expense, not average users.
They are an incredible company. For example, on my first day using it I reported that there was an issue with the Spanish iPad keyboard (a shortcut not working). The next day they sent an invite to TestFlight with the issue fixed and in the next version released on the App Store the fix was applied. I’ve never had customer service that good, especially from an email app developer.
They are strictly gmail only as it is all built around that service.
