Privacy Policy

BuZhan does not keep what you write, never goes online and does not track you. The app, this website and support email each handle different data, so each is covered separately below.

App

BuZhan on iPhone and Mac never goes online, has no accounts and collects no data. It stores only today’s count and its date on your device, plus your interface language if you pick one in the app.

This section covers what is already in the iPhone and Mac apps. Reminder Line, coming soon, stores one more line; it is covered in the next section.

What it doesn’t do

It doesn’t go online. The app contains no networking code. The Mac version runs in a sandbox without network permission, so the system doesn’t let it go online either.
No accounts. There is nothing to sign up for or sign in to.
No analytics, advertising or other third-party SDKs. It doesn’t track you, and it doesn’t exchange data with other apps or websites.
No push notifications.

The two things stored on your device

Today’s count (a whole number) and its date (year-month-day), stored in the system’s UserDefaults. When the date isn’t today, the app counts from 0, so the count resets after midnight.

iPhone: stored in an App Group (group.org.gewill.buzhan) that only BuZhan and its own widgets and Night Pond can read. If the App Group can’t be opened, the data is stored in the app’s own space instead, which only the app itself can read and write.
Mac: stored in the app’s sandbox, which only BuZhan can read and write.

These two items don’t leave your device, except in your own device backups (see below). Deleting BuZhan from your iPhone deletes them too.

Interface language

By default the app uses Follow System and stores nothing for this. If you pick a language under Language, the app records that choice in its own preferences; on iPhone it also keeps a copy in the same App Group so the widgets and Night Pond can read it. Choosing Follow System again deletes both. Like the count, it never leaves your device.

What you write

What you write goes only to the slide-off animation: one bead per character. After about 3 seconds the animation ends, and the text is released from memory with it. It is not written to disk, not logged and not sent anywhere, and there is no history in the app to look back through. Up to 60 characters at a time; spaces alone are not counted.

The Mac input bar works the same way. ⌃⌥⌘D is registered through the macOS global hot key interface: the app is only told when that key combination is pressed and can’t read what you type in other apps, so it doesn’t need Accessibility permission.

Siri and Shortcuts

BuZhan offers three actions: Let Something Slide, Pause Before You Dive In and Five-Second Full-Screen Pause. None of them takes parameters, and none receives any text. The reason: when an action takes a parameter, the system writes the parameter text into its own action history and system logs, and the app can’t stop that. So nothing you write ever passes through these actions.

When you tell Siri “Let it slide with BuZhan”, what you say is handled by Apple’s Siri. BuZhan only learns that the action ran, and adds one to the count. The system may record when the action ran, but there is no content to record.

You build the Before You Dive In automation yourself in Shortcuts. Which apps you chose is saved in Shortcuts and managed by the system. BuZhan doesn’t know which app triggered it.

Live Activities and widgets

Night Pond uses Live Activities and passes along only today’s count and the interface language; the line and source on it are fixed text built into the app. It updates only on the device and doesn’t go through a push service. The widgets also read only today’s count. With Reminder Line, both also show the line you write; see the next section.

They appear on the Lock Screen, in the Dynamic Island and in StandBy, where they can be seen without unlocking. People near you can see today’s count too.

System keyboard

The iPhone and Mac keyboards learn words you type and suggest them later. Sentences you write in BuZhan may be learned too. That is system behavior: the app can’t control it and can’t see it.

On iPhone, you can clear learned words in Settings › General › Transfer or Reset iPhone › Reset › Reset Keyboard Dictionary. This clears every word the keyboard has learned, including words from other apps. On a Mac, how to clear them depends on the input method you use.

Device backups

When you back up your iPhone or Mac, whether to the cloud or to a computer, the backup may include today’s count, its date and the interface language you picked. Backups are handled by the system and the backup method you chose; BuZhan doesn’t read or send them. What you write is never saved, so it never appears in a backup.

Crash reports

BuZhan doesn’t collect crash reports itself. Apple shares crash reports and diagnostics with an app’s developer only if you have turned on Share With App Developers in Settings › Privacy & Security › Analytics & Improvements on iPhone, or in the same place in System Settings on Mac. Apple handles this sharing, and you can turn it off there at any time.

If you install a beta through TestFlight, TestFlight may also pass crash information and any feedback you submit on to the developer.

Permissions

BuZhan doesn’t ask for access to your camera, microphone, location, contacts or photos. On iPhone, the first time you tap Start Night Pond, the system asks on the Lock Screen whether to allow it to show Live Activities. On Mac, once you turn on Open at Login, BuZhan appears in System Settings › General › Login Items (Login Items & Extensions on newer versions of macOS).

Privacy manifest

Each app bundle includes the privacy manifest Apple requires (PrivacyInfo.xcprivacy): no tracking, no tracking domains, no data types collected. The only system interface that needs a stated reason is UserDefaults, used to store the items above. The iPhone app and widgets declare 1C8F.1 (shared within an App Group) and CA92.1 (read and written only within the app); the Mac version declares CA92.1.

Reminder Line

Coming soon, and built only for iPhone. If you use it, one more thing is stored on your device: the line you write. What follows describes the current version; if the feature ships differently, this page will be updated.

Purchase: A one-time purchase. Payment, your account and refunds are all handled by Apple’s App Store. The purchase is verified on your device by StoreKit and doesn’t go through the developer’s servers. BuZhan can’t see your payment method or your Apple Account details.
Unlock status: The app only asks StoreKit whether it is unlocked: once at launch, once each time it returns to the foreground, and once when you open Reminder Line. The answer isn’t stored.
Your line: Up to 24 characters in English or 12 Chinese characters, stored in the same place as today’s count (the App Group on iPhone). Changing it overwrites the old one. No record of edits is kept, and it doesn’t sync.
Deleting: Tap Back to the Zhuangzi Quote at any time and the line is deleted from your device, leaving only the count and date. If StoreKit reports that the purchase was refunded, the app also deletes the line and switches back to the original.
Who can see it: The line shows on the main screen, in Night Pond (on the Lock Screen, in the Dynamic Island and in StandBy), in the widgets, and in Pause Before You Dive In and Five-Second Full-Screen Pause. Others can see it even while the phone is locked, so the editing screen reminds you not to name specific people or events.
Night Pond: While Night Pond is running, its Live Activity carries the line in its content state, alongside today’s count. The line is updated on the device and doesn’t go through a push service.
Shortcuts: The line can only be changed in the app. There is no Shortcuts parameter for it, for the same reason as above: parameter text goes into the system’s action history.

This website

buzhan.gewill.org is a static website hosted on Cloudflare Pages. The site itself uses no cookies, no analytics and no third-party resources.

Browser storage: The site sets no cookies and stores nothing in your browser.
Analytics: No visitor analytics, and no analytics or advertising scripts.
Third-party resources: Pages load only this site’s own files. The fonts, subsets of Noto Serif and Noto Sans (SC and TC), and the images, styles and scripts are all served from this site. The Content Security Policy (CSP) allows only same-origin files and stops pages from making network requests or submitting forms.
Demo: The input on the home page doesn’t send or save what you write. The count lives only in memory and resets when you reload.
Language: When you open the root address, the page sends you to the matching language based on your browser’s language setting. Your choice isn’t remembered.
Host: When your browser requests a page, it sends your IP address, browser and system information, the address requested and the time, as with any website. Cloudflare, as the host, processes this data to deliver pages and protect the site, for example to identify malicious traffic; while screening such traffic, it may set cookies needed for security. This is handled under Cloudflare’s own privacy policy, and those cookies are not set by this site.
Email links: Clicking the support address only opens your own email app. Whether you send anything is up to you.

Support email

When you write to the support address, your email passes through an email provider and is read and answered by the developer. Unlike what you write in the app, an email doesn’t stay on your device.

Address: support@gewill.org, a support address shared by the developer’s apps.
Email service: Emails are received, stored and answered through Resend’s inbox service (Resend Inboxes). Resend, as the provider, stores and transmits these emails and handles them under its own privacy policy.
Where it’s processed: Resend publicly states that it stores customer data, including email content, in the United States. Your email is therefore sent to the United States to be stored and processed there, where data-protection rules may differ from those in your country or region.
What an email contains: Your email address and display name, the subject, body, attachments and headers (technical details such as the sending server and time), plus anything you put in it yourself, such as your device model, system version or screenshots.
Purpose: Only to reply to you and solve the problem you raised.
Who reads it: BuZhan’s developer, and the service provider needed to process the emails (Resend).
Automation: The developer hasn’t connected any external AI tool to read, classify or reply to support email, and hasn’t turned on automatic forwarding or automated exports. Email providers may still offer their own automated features, such as spam filtering, under their own policies and settings.
Please don’t send: The developer will never ask for your passwords, bank card details or Apple Account password. Please don’t put them in emails.
How long it’s kept: After a problem is resolved, the developer manually reviews the conversation within 60 days and moves it, with its attachments, to Trash in Resend. Under Resend’s published rules, items in Trash are deleted 30 days after the move, so the aim is to clear a conversation within about 90 days of its resolution. That is an aim, not a guarantee: moving to Trash is not immediate permanent deletion, and the developer hasn’t yet tested the actual cleanup, including the removal of attachments. For requests still open, only what is needed to handle them is kept, for at most 12 months.
Deletion: To have your emails deleted, write to the same address from the email address you used before. The developer checks your identity by that address, handles the request within 30 days (moving the conversation and its attachments to Trash, after which the provider cleans it up under its 30-day rule), and replies to say what was done and what the limits are. The provider’s backups and logs may have separate retention rules, so immediate deletion of every copy on its side isn’t guaranteed. Deleting the app does not delete support emails.

About this policy

This policy covers the BuZhan app (iPhone and Mac), this website and the support address. BuZhan’s developer, Ge Will, is responsible for it.

Contact: support@gewill.org
Changes: When the policy changes, this page is updated and the date is given here.
Effective date: 2026-10-20