The Omni Group (Sponsor)




This week MacSparky is sponsored by the Omni Group. One of the most interesting things I saw last week at WWDC was Sal Soghoian’s presentation about JavaScript integration with the Omni applications. The Omni Group has been hard at work adding JavaScript integration. They currently have it on betas of OmniOutliner and OmniGraffle. Using this, Sal was able to prepare an outline in OmniOutliner that automatically generated presentation slides in OmniGraffle. The documents were linked and making changes in one affected data in the other. Impressive! It was really powerful and available on both Mac and iOS.

Seeing how much time the Omni Group is spending putting this advanced automation in place just affirms my decision to buy their software. The Omni Group truly wants to make the best possible software for Mac and iOS. If you’re looking to be more productive, I recommend checking them all out.

OmniFocus — to get more productive

OmniGraffle — to make beautiful diagrams and images

OmniOutliner — a powerful outlining tool

OmniPlan — for project planning

Check out the Omni Group today and let them know you heard about it at MacSparky.

WWDC Reflections and Future Hopes

Now having returned from WWDC, I can’t help but take a few minutes to reflect upon the general mood in San Jose this past week. Developers were a lot less surly this year and I spoke with several developers inspired by Apple’s work to go and create the next big thing.

Why wouldn’t they? We got new Macs, iPads, and the software updates addressed many priority issues, like iPad productivity. I can’t really put my finger on it but it seems like Apple just has its eye on the ball better this year than it did last year. Talking to folks around San Jose, one explanation was that Apple had a lot of focus on the new building and the car project. I’m not sure if that’s the case. It may just be that the features they announced this year took longer than expected. 

Indeed, it really doesn’t matter why it suddenly seems Apple is addressing these issues so much as the fact that they are addressing these issues.

The iPad gets a lot better with iOS 11. I have a long list of critiques having used it under fire for several days but, fundamentally, the iPad gets more useful when iOS 11 ships.

The bottom line is people are generally happy with what Apple announced last week. Now let’s keep the the momentum rolling. I’ve got three hopes for the next year:

  1. I’d like to see that Apple is listening to feedback particularly on the iOS 11 iPad improvements. Beta users have some great ideas and I’d like to see the best of them make it in before iOS 11 ships.
  2. I would also like to see Apple continue to do incremental updates to the Macintosh hardware. The fact that they upgraded the MacBook Pro to the most current processor in less than a year is a great sign. That is, however, just one data point. I hope that they continue to upgrade hardware as soon as the appropriate upgraded chips are available.
  3. With the improvements of the iPad and the iPad operating system, we now need a healthy ecosystem where developers can spend the time necessary to make professional iPad applications and then sell them for enough money to justify the effort. Hopefully Apple can work with developers to find a way to make that happen.

MPU 381 – WWDC Special




The latest episode of Mac Power Users is live. I spent a lot of time this week speaking with developers at Apple’s WWDC. In this week’s episode, Katie and I break down Apple’s latest announcements along with what I’ve been hearing in San Jose and our analysis of what it all means. The episode came out great.

Sponsors Include:

  • The Omni Group We’re passionate about productivity for Mac, iPhone and iPad. 
  • Fujitsu ScanSnap ScanSnap Helps You Live a More Productive, Efficient, Paperless Life. 
  • MindNode MindNode makes mind mapping easy.
  • Fracture Bring your photos to life.

A Little iPad Productivity with iOS 11

I’m writing this post sitting in San Jose Airport. I didn’t have any WWDC plans today so instead I arrived at the airport ridiculously early, found a comfy chair and did about a three hours of real work on my iPad running beta one of iOS 11. I did this not wearing my MacSparky hat but instead my lawyer one. I wrote contracts, sent and received emails (with multiple attachments no less!), tracked changes in Microsoft Word, scheduled meetings in Fantastical, took notes with my pencil in Apple Notes, and otherwise made myself productive.

It’s still early days. This is the first after all. I wouldn’t recommend loading this early beta on your production iPad. I know of at least one person that managed to severely crash his iPad with the beta. Also, the battery life running the beta is about half what it normally is. (That’s normal for early betas.)

What I can say is that once iOS 11 releases, people that want to be more productive on an iPad most certainly will be. iOS 11 is very kind to iPad power users.

SaneBox for Email Sanity While Traveling (Sponsor)

This week MacSparky is sponsored by SaneBox. SaneBox is the mail service that keeps you … well … sane. With a SaneBox account you can have your email automatically sorted for you so you only see the most important email in your inbox with less important email put in other folders for later viewing. You can also take your email and defer it for as little or as much time as you want. I’m traveling this week and I deferred several less important emails to next Monday, when I’ll be in a much better position to deal with them.

Those, however, are just two features. There is so much to the SaneBox service. You can, for example, throw unwanted email into the SaneBox blackhole and you’ll never receive email from that sender again.

Between attending the Apple Developer conference and managing the law practice, this week SaneBox has really been clutch for me. It has allowed me to manage the most important email but at the same time kept me from drowning in email.

SaneBox is a great service for anybody struggling to keep up with email. I hear from listeners all the time that love using SaneBox. If email is causing you any grief, you should check out SaneBox. Use this link and get a discount and let them know you heard about it here at MacSparky.

Insight on Apple from Craig Federighi

Last night I attended the live Talk Show episode where John Gruber interviewed Phil Schiller and Craig Federighi. (I’ll update this post with a link as soon as there is one.) John did a fantastic job. The star of the night was Craig Federighi. He did most of the talking and that’s exactly what I wanted.

It’s rare that Apple engineers get to speak publicly about what gets them excited but at these Talk Show events you get a fully un-restrained Federighi. He literally ran on to the stage when introduced and then spent the hour and a half sitting on the edge of his seat.

The overall takeaway I got is that Craig, who’s in charge of Apple software, is obsessive about delivering quality software. Among the tidbits that came out:

  • Apple “practice” installed the new Apple File System on millions of devices before releasing it to everyone with the 10.3 update.
  • Apple spent a lot of effort figuring out how to sync your text messages while still maintaining your secrecy.
  • When you say “Hey Siri” in a room full of your Siri enabled devices, they have a quick computer-style conversation to figure out which device is closest to you and which device you’ve used most recently. They then decide which device is most likely the one you were talking to and act accordingly.

The thing about these little stories is that they often were disclosed in passing, on the way to explain something else or answer a different question. They jump through these hoops every day.

The most telling part of the evening was when John asked if Apple could protect user privacy and make Siri competitive with Google’s assistant. In a rare moment when he was not smiling Craig looked at John, dead-serious, and said “Yes”. There was some mettle behind that answer and I have no doubt he fully believes Apple can compete.

Apple is such a secretive company that we rarely find out exactly how the sausage is made. That makes it easy to imagine magical things are happening (or just the opposite). What I took away was that Craig Federghi and his small army of engineers have a plan and are working hard on making it happen. It was really nice getting this message and I wish Apple would let Craig talk a little more often.

Initial Thoughts on iOS 11 iPad Improvements

I took a lot of notes this morning watching the WWDC Keynote right up until the point they started talking about iPad improvements. At that point I was completely absorbed by the presentation. That’s a good sign. I’ll be writing/podcasting more about this in the coming days but in the meantime, here are a few thoughts:

  • It’s a Mac … in a good way. So many of the features were very Mac-like. Spaces for instance is very similar to what we already have in macOS but probably even more useful with a touch interface
  • Selecting between multiple pre-arranged spaces is a feature I’ve always wanted without verbalizing.
  • The redesigned control center is a significant improvement over the iOS 10 three-page version. I still would have preferred to exchange stock apps for better third party alternatives, like switching PCalc for calculator.
  • Files. Amen. My biggest white whale on iOS is dealing with multiple files. Often I’m required to work with multiple documents and until today this was a huge pain point on iOS. With the Files app and Drag and Drop, my iPad got a lot more useful.
  • They only demonstrated iCloud in the Files app. Will we get “favorites” from third party cloud document providers like Dropbox?
  • Does the existence of the Files app indicate they’ll make it easier to open and save files to cloud services directly in Apps? That’s still pretty clunky.
  • The new 512GB iPads may make sense if you can locally store massive amounts of cloud data locally on your iPad.
  • Multiple file selection with gestures? Yes, thank you.
  • The Dock is another super-useful feature for power users. I need to get hands on this before saying more but that won’t be long now.
  • I have a feeling we are going to be wanting app suggestions in our iPhone docks before long.
  • They went through the multitasking stuff very quickly. There’s a lot there but it looks like a much-needed improvement.
  • I like the semi-transparency on drag-out multitasking. It really makes the old system feel pedestrian.
  • I am impressed with the scope of Drag and Drop but want to get my hands on it before saying more.
  • Interesting how much focus there was on Apple Pencil. It looks like we’ll also still be able to use the Apple Pencil to navigate but we’ll know soon enough as the beta gets out.
  • There were significant new improvements to Notes. I didn’t expect that.
  • Scan and Sign looks really clever. I hope it works as well as demonstrated.
  • The new QuickType keyboard looks pretty useful. How much time have you spent switching between keyboards on your iPad? Related – the 10.5 iPad software keyboard does not quite appear to be the awesome monster that the 12.9 iPad software keyboard is.

WWDC Table Stakes


I spent a good portion of the day today walking around San Jose with other bloggers and podcasters as the WWDC crowd starts rolling in. There are lots of familiar faces and several new ones. Moving the conference to San Jose seems to be generally welcomed by most folks I talk to. Hotel rooms are less expensive and downtown San Jose is pretty, with lots of good weather and trees.

There is also an underlying buzz of general excitement for Apple’s new announcements tomorrow at the keynote. There seems to be more energy than I’ve witnessed before prior WWDC keynotes. It’s as if following the attention-sucks that the new campus and the mythical Apple car created, folks expect Apple to come back home with focus on its existing (and possibly a few new) consumer electronic devices. 

My own feelings on the WWDC keynote are mixed. I’d like to get into the excitement but I also, frankly, feel a little exhausted. I’ve spent a lot of the last year doing work on the iPad and while there is much to love about the iPad, it often feels like swimming upstream when, at this point in the iPad’s lifespan, it shouldn’t. The general consensus here in San Jose is that tomorrow we’ll get a lot of power features for iPad but that doesn’t bring out joy in me as much as it does a sense of … well … “finally”. If Apple wants to impress, that is the starting point, not the ending one. If we don’t have significant iPad improvements tomorrow to file management and multi-tasking, I’m going to have to reconsider the iPad as a platform. To me, fixing several of the iPad productivity shortcomings tomorrow is table stakes.