The app
The desktop goat
A small goat on your desktop, on by default. It wanders, grazes, dozes, and salutes when you click it.
The goat is decorative and has no effect on recording, transcription or data. It wanders while you work, grazes, dozes and sleeps, plays with its helmet, dances or moonwalks now and then, and can be picked up. It salutes at launch and when you click it, and a click opens the app.
How to use it
- Click the goat to salute it; the click opens the PrivateGoat window.
- Pick it up and put it down somewhere else on the desktop.
- Watch it while you work in other apps: it wanders, grazes, dozes and sleeps.
- While you dictate, it listens. After the PrivateGoat window has been in front for a minute it sits down to type; switching to another app ends the salute and typing, and it goes back to wandering.
Settings
| Setting | Where | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Show the goat on the desktop | Settings → General → Desktop | On |
What is stored
| Item | Where |
|---|---|
| The on/off preference | App preferences |
| The artwork | Inside the app bundle |
What leaves your Mac
Nothing. The goat is a local animation; it makes no request and reads no meeting data.
When it is off or fails
- Switched off: there is no goat, and the rest of the app is unaffected.
- No desktop space where it stands: it can be picked up and moved.
- A recording in progress: the goat keeps its own behaviour; it does not touch the recording.
Related
- Menu bar and settings — the General page the switch lives on.
- Dictation — when the goat listens.
- Keyboard shortcuts — the keys that do the real work.