Myke Hurley has re-imagined the Inquisitive podcast. As a podcast producer myself, I really like that Myke is pushing the envelope. I listened to it this morning and it’s great.

I recently joined Adam Christianson and Victor Cajiao to talk about some Apple news including the Apple Watch, Apple and automobiles, and Tim Cook’s greening of Apple. 

∞
 

Mark Miller (Twitter), is a MacSparky.com reader and Mac Power Users listener that recently suggested I add question to the usual assortment of home screen questions about under-used apps. I thought it was such a good idea that I added it to the list and then bent Mark’s arm to be the first person to answer it. So Mark, show us your homescreen.

What are some of your favorite apps?

Almost everything on my homescreen is a favorite, but here are some more interesting ones:

Sleep Cycle – Terrific alarm that wakes me up according to my sleep cycle. When I don’t use it, I can tell the difference in how I wake up.

Human – Fitness app that has helped me be healthier more than anything else. Integration with Health.app is fantastic.

PrayerMate, ESV Study+, ReadingPlan – Great apps I use to pray, study the Bible, and track my Bible reading (respectively).

DayOne – My wife and I are expecting our first child and this app has made it so easy to chronicle the pregnancy.

Which app is your guilty pleasure?

Probably Instagram because of how easy it is to waste time.

What app makes you most productive?

It’s hard to choose just one. Here are the ones that make me most productive with iPhone tasks:

I use IFTTT to load RSS feeds & email subscriptions into Pocket, to create tasks in Things from Gmail, to save articles from Pocket into Evernote, to help import Instagram posts into DayOne, and much more.

I use Drafts to capture tasks, info, or anything else. Integration with Things, Evernote & other apps makes it the best place to capture and process text.

Instead of reading articles, I put them in Pocket. That allows me to prioritize which (few) articles I have time to read each evening.

I couldn’t live without Things to track/organize my tasks for me. Not often that you love your task manager, but I do.

I use Launch Center Pro to pre-populate DayOne entries and trigger them at specific times; I also add geo-location triggers to my Workflows. Both are incredibly useful.

DeskConnect is my go-to app for transferring text/URLs/etc between my devices. Incredibly fast, helpful, and free. (Made by the same folks that made Workflow).

What app do you know you’re underutilizing?

I’m certainly underutilizing Launch Center Pro and Workflow, particularly in the way they can work together and integrate with IFTTT. There’s huge power there, but I haven’t had the time yet to create those connections.

What is the app you are still missing?

I’m still looking for the single photo editor that meets all my needs. Many are too simple or too complex, too poorly designed, or too spammy. Right now I have 6–8 apps I use for a single purpose/feature, but not all have Action Extensions, so that’s a pain point for me. 

I’m also looking for an iPad/iPhone/Mac email client that can add items directly to Pocket and Things. Dispatch is almost exactly what I want, except it’s iPhone-only at present.

I also would like a Dropbox-equivalent app for iCloud Drive.

How many times a day do you use your iPhone/iPad?

Almost constantly. I frequently have to charge midday even though I have an iPhone 6.

What Today View widgets are you using and why?

I ruthlessly organize my homescreen so nothing is more than 3 taps away. That means that it’s almost always faster to open an app than to launch the app/action from the Today. Thus, my widgets almost exclusively show info.

I currently have Things (see/check off tasks), Reminders (time/location tasks), Human (daily activity), Clips (combine copy & paste), Parcels (track delivery), Day One (random pictures), Data Usage (track data usage), Stepz(pedometer), and Tally (currently beta-testing).

What is your favorite feature of the iPhone/iPad?

I love the seamlessness of the entire ecosystem; from integrated TouchID/ApplePay to vibrant app store to Continuity & Handoff. Nothing else comes close. 

If you were in charge at Apple, what would you add or change?

I’d step up efforts on making cloud services more reliable. 95% of the time, iCloud just works for me, but that 5% is very frustrating. For example, I have over 300 keyboard shortcuts that I use, but they have never reliably synced so that my Mac, iPhone, and iPad each have different shortcuts. I only discover which ones didn’t sync after I try to use it and they fail.

I’d also create an iCloud Drive app like Dropbox’s. Or maybe I’d just buy Dropbox as they do excellent syncing in the consumer space.

What’s your wallpaper and why?

I’m using a standard Apple background of a galaxy. I’ve always loved space, so that was the initial attraction, but I found the black background makes the parallax effect shine. If you haven’t liked parallax before, try it with a black background; it’s gorgeous. 

Anything else you’d like to share?

I use emoticons to name my folders; I’ve found I can identify an emoticon faster than I can read text, making it faster to find the folder (especially on my second home screen, mostly of folders)

If you’re interested in following me on Twitter, I try to tweet at the intersection of Apple, China, and humanities. I spent 5 years as an expat in China, so I’m particularly interested in how Chinese culture and politics affect Apple’s strategy. @MarkDMill

Thanks Mark.

Last week I quit my day job. Maybe I should explain.

As the Field Guide publishing business, the podcast, and other MacSparky endeavors have grown, I’ve always felt my life was on a bit of a collision course. For years now I’ve been doing three things simultaneously. 

1. I’ve been growing all things MacSparky.
2. I’ve taken care of my legal clients.
3. I’ve been keeping up with the constant press of additional legal work arising from working in a law firm.

Each one of these priorities has its own pluses and minuses. Keeping up with them all, however, sometimes feels like running so fast that I’m about to fall on my face. 

The things I do as MacSparky have brought meaning to my life. I love the podcast. I love the books. I love all the friends and interactions that come with them. MacSparky saved me. I can’t imagine my life at this point without this website, the podcast, and the books.

With respect to my legal clients, I’ve always taken a country doctor approach to their problems. A lot of my clients are small and medium-size businesses that need someone to tell them when they’re onto something and when they’re running off a cliff. I like being a trusted advisor and I like shepherding my clients from small successful businesses to larger ones. Again, I couldn’t imagine myself not doing this. It is part of me. 

Finally, as a member of a law firm, I was afforded an opportunity to litigate many cases and be involved with many transactions over the years. It was a 21-year run of one crazy case after another and I enjoyed every minute of it. Also, being a part of a successful law practice means you get a really nice salary. For 21 years now the firm has been the foundation of my family’s solvency.

So for the past few years, I’ve been serving these three masters all at once as I watched MacSparky grow, attempted to work more with my own legal clients, and keep up with the ever-increasing workload at the firm. 

I knew I was heading to a point where I’d have to make some hard decisions. I was also doing everything in my power to ignore this looming decision. I told many friends that all I had to do was “just keep pedaling”. If you’ve ever had a similar experience in your life with ignoring inevitabilities, you know how well that works out. 

Last October, I got involved with a big case at the firm that took a great deal of my time and attention for months. Things went well on the case. My “firm” commitments were satisfied. Everything else in my life went to hell. When the dust settled I took stock of my big three things and realized that while I was taking care of that case, my next Field Guide, which I had planned to ship in November was still unfinished and my own legal clients were giving me cryptic phone messages about how hard it was to get my attention. 

It occurred to me that, unknowingly, that fateful day where I’d have to make some tough decisions had arrived and I had been too busy to notice. Put simply, the big case needed me and I pushed aside MacSparky and my own clients without thinking of it. The realization that I’d made a decision without actually considering it upset me. How did I let myself fall into this trap that I’d merely deferred on what is one of the most important decisions of my life?

I stepped back and took stock of my life. I realized I had two options in front of me.

The Safe Road

The benefit of working in a law firm is that there is usually a lot of work to do. When you put a group of lawyers together, they generally are able to combine resources, help each other out, and keep everyone busy. The downside of working in a law firm is that there’s a lot of work to do. You’re always busy. Because you are always busy, there is a regular paycheck. Regular paychecks are a pretty nice thing.

I’ve always known that the “safe” route of sticking with the firm, letting more books slip and cashing the regular paycheck deserves serious consideration. That is the best way to get the bills paid without risk. That also was the option with the most inertia behind it. I’d been at the same firm for 21 years. How do you turn that upside down? Also, I work with some really top notch lawyers and that environment is a pretty rare in the legal racket. 

I grew up with Depression-Era parents. They were awesome. They taught me so much and gave me a fantastic work ethic. They also drilled into me the importance of avoiding risk. Probably the biggest motivation for me to stay at the firm was that conservative risk-adverse mentality I’ve carried my entire life.

Risky Business

My other option was to leave my regular paycheck and health benefits behind and jump into the chaos that ensues from running a smaller, solo attorney law practice and (in my case) a book & video publishing business. I could serve just my clients with my own, smaller law practice and do things a bit more on my terms. This would give me the added benefit of much more control and allow for more time to publish more Field Guides and produce more MacSparky and Mac Power Users content. While all this sounds dandy, it also comes with a big pay cut and the possibility that things could get much worse if I don’t have enough legal clients, or people stop buying Field Guides, or both.

So much of my own neurosis screamed out at me to keep the steady job and continue “pedaling” as best as possible. I laid awake at night. I rambled on about it incessantly with my family and closest friends. They all had excellent, well-meaning advice, much of which was contradictory with one another.

At the end of this process I found myself repeatedly coming back to my hypothetical death bed. If I was laying somewhere right now facing down the reaper, what would I regret more? It then became crystal clear to me. 

If I let MacSparky and the Field Guides linger and wither, I would never forgive myself. 

With that realization, a long tortuous decision process found clarity and purpose. I realized that if I ever had my ladder leaning against the wall of being a hot-shot partner in a big law firm, it had long since moved. I love being a small, crafty country doctor lawyer. The small business David that uses his Mac to sling rocks at big firm Goliaths.

I also love writing Field Guides and being MacSparky. My legal and publishing aspirations could co-exist if I’d just get over my insecurities and leap.

So I leapt.

The people at my firm were baffled when I gave notice but after I explained myself, became understanding and supportive. I’ve spent the last several weeks planning a transition that came to fruition late last week. 

Now I’m a self-employed lawyer looking for a few great clients. Here’s my website.

I’m also a geek writer with a bucket full of ideas that I finally have more time to execute upon.

Finally, I’m a husband and a father that is really excited about a new adventure and more than a little terrified that I’ll blow it.

As I write these words, I’m only a few days into this grand adventure but I decided to write about it here because the MacSparky audience has been such a vital part of this journey. If it weren’t for MacSparky, I wouldn’t have had the option (or the guts) to take this leap.

So What Does this Mean for MacSparky?

This is going to result in more and better content here at the website, on the podcast, and in the books. I’ll have more time to produce things I’m proud of. Some of it will be free. Some of it will cost a few bucks. There will definitely be more Field Guides (both iBooks and video formats) on things interesting to me and—hopefully—helpful to you.

So Are You Still a Lawyer Or Not?

This doesn’t mean I’m going to stop being a lawyer. I like being
a lawyer. I’m one of those weirdos that thinks I actually help people as a lawyer. I’ve opened my own solo practice and have a group of fantastic, loyal clients that came with me from my prior firm. I could definitely use a few more but I suspect they will come.

The two passions of my life (outside my family) are MacSparky and my legal practice. In one I’m able to help thousands of people in little ways. In the other I help far fewer people in much bigger ways. I need the happy chemicals that come with both of those endeavors.

How Exactly Are You Pulling This Off?

I’m doing it the way any self-respecting geek would. I’m pulling pieces of technology together to make me look like superman in both the MacSparky and legal world. I’m having a lot of fun developing new workflows and, yes, I’ll be writing and screencasting about that here.

While I have an office, I’m also going to be spending a lot more time working from home, which lets me do things like take walks with my wife, goof off with my growing kids, and write legal briefs while wearing jeans and a T-Shirt. (My company has a very liberal dress code.) Like I said, I’m only a few days into this but I can already see some pretty interesting content developing out of the experience.

Are You Going To Prattle on About This Forever?

Hopefully not but I’m also sure you’ll hear about it on occasion. I still catch myself with small bits of anxiety. What if the books stop selling or the clients dry up? If that happens I’ll have to figure something else out but I’d rather have to figure out that Plan B than lay in a bed some day upset at myself for not taking a risk.

Despite that occasional anxiety, I find myself with this overwhelming exhilaration that everything in my life thus far has led to this point. Deep down, I truly believe this risky business will not only enable me to take care of my family, it will also lead to some of the best work of my life, both as MacSparky and a lawyer. I feel it in my bones. 

Stay tuned gang.

Following up on my post about the need of Find Friends on the Mac, I received lots of feedback. Turns out, you can find friends on your Mac from the messages app by tapping on the “Details” text button in the upper right corner, provided they are already sharing their location with you. It’s a little obscure but it works.

The Sparks family uses Find Friends all the time. With my kids off at events, jobs, and school, we often check up on each other. I like to think of it as a nerdy version of the Weasley family clock. We’re not creepy. Really.

The one piece of this I don’t understand though is why Apple hasn’t found a way to put Find Friends on the Mac. (It’s also not a part of iCloud.com.) I would guess this is an issue of engineering resources but now that we have Maps on the Mac, I hope Find Friends is not far behind.