Perch for Safari
The Safari extension is inside Perch itself, and it updates whenever Perch does. You turn it on in Safari’s settings.
- Launch Perch. Safari lists an app’s extension only once the app has run.
- In Safari, open Safari → Settings → Extensions and tick Perch Companion.
- Allow it on every website: from Perch’s button in Safari’s toolbar, choose Always Allow on Every Website.
- Leave “Allow in Private Browsing” unticked.
- Check Perch’s menu: the Safari row reads Safari instead of Safari (basic).
Turning on Perch’s Safari extension, step by step, is in the manual.
Safari’s basic connection
Safari basic is off on a new install until you accept it in setup; macOS may then ask whether Perch may control Safari. Your Safari tabs turn up in the palette and the Tab Overview, and choosing one brings Safari forward with that tab showing.
“Basic” because Safari tells Perch only each tab’s address, title and position, so Safari rows have no mute or group buttons, no pictures and no page text. Safari doesn’t say which of its windows are private, so basic mode lists their tabs too, and nothing from Safari is remembered. Basic mode in the manual.
Perch closes the Safari tab you point at, after checking it’s still the same page in the same place; if it changed in the meantime it stays open, and Perch says so. Perch can’t see whether a tab is pinned, so sets are reviewed first: Tidy Up’s Close all and the Duplicates screen list the tabs they’d close, and close only the ones you tick. Reopen puts a page back only into the window it came from, which may be private, so a page from a window that has since closed doesn’t come back.