Live Session app v1.1.32: Browse past sessions while your call keeps running
You can now open past sessions without ending the call you are in, and the canvas gets a new tool rail, styling options, snapping and attached arrows. This build also makes the Chat button reliable, lets chat answers use your session's screenshots, and shows clearer error messages.
Until now, reading an earlier session meant ending the one you were in, and past sessions sat greyed out in the sidebar while a call ran. This build removes that trade-off and brings a round of canvas upgrades and chat fixes.
Past sessions during a call
You can open any past session from the sidebar while a call is recording, and the call keeps capturing in the background. Links to ended sessions open the same way instead of asking you to stop first.
Moving between sessions mid-call no longer springs the review card open or resumes a paused call's clock.
Canvas tools and styling
The canvas tools now live on a vertical rail on the left, with a "Mock up with Chief" option at the bottom. Hover a tool to see its one-key shortcut:
- V select, P pencil, M marker, T label, N note
- R rectangle, O ellipse, A arrow, C comment
Shapes and notes take fills, dashed outlines and opacity. A floating toolbar above your selection sets stroke, fill, width, opacity, font size, alignment and arrowheads, and lets you copy and paste a style.
Selections show one bounding box with eight handles and rotation, and several objects resize together. Labels grow as you type, notes grow to fit, and double-clicking a shape adds a centred label. Press Enter to commit a label and Shift+Enter for a new line.
Objects snap to each other's edges, centres and equal spacing, with guides. You can align and distribute from the context menu or with Cmd+Shift+arrows, and nudge with the arrow keys. Arrows attach to shapes and follow them when you move, resize or rotate, and you can double-click an arrow to label it. Copy, cut, paste and select all work on canvas objects from the keyboard and the Edit menu.
Chat in live sessions
Questions you ask in the chat bar or about highlighted transcript text now draw on the session's screenshots, so Chief can answer about something shown on screen that nobody read out loud. This works on Windows too. In long meetings, Chief favours the most recent screenshots.
Highlighted transcript text appears as a compact quote card that expands on hover, leaving more room for the thread, with a "Jump to the transcript" link below it. The chat panel also has a close button.
Fixes
Clicking Chat a second time used to close the panel you had just opened, so it looked like chat never opened. Chat now opens on every click and closes only with Escape, the close button, or sending a message.
A revoked watch link or a refused update used to show a generic error. Chief now shows the real reason, such as a revoked link or a request to end the live session before installing. Other install failures tell you to try again and report the issue if it keeps happening.
Pairing a Windows PC used to ask you to "Connect this Mac" on the approval page. The page now names a Mac, a Windows PC, or a neutral device based on the machine Chief runs on.
Chief now stops syncing open documents after its window has been in the background for a while, and reopens and resyncs them when you return. Typing keeps them connected.
Update to get uninterrupted history browsing during calls and the new canvas tools.