Happy New Year everyone!
This year, MacSparky.com enters its ninth year of publication and, honestly, without this blog, I’d be a sad, sad little man. Here’s to a great 2015 for us all.
Chevron to Bring Apple Pay to the Pump
MacRumors reports Chevron is in the process of moving its Apple Pay terminals to the pumps so consumers can pay with their iPhone 6 (and in the not-so-distant future their Apple Watch) at the pump. For me, 2014, was the year of credit card fraud. I ended up with four replacement cards this years as a result of my card getting compromised (including Target and Home Depot). I’m tired of people mishandling my credit card information and while I’ll acknowledge I’m an edge case, I am now actively choosing vendors that will use Apple Pay and its one-time numbers. In short, it looks like I’ll be buying gas at Chevron.
Mac Power Users 232: Looking Back, Looking Forward
For this year-end episode of the Mac Power Users, Katie and I talk about some of our favorite apps, hardware, and technology of 2014 and look forward to 2015.
Sponsor: JustSend
This week MacSparky is sponsored by JustSend. It is easy open your iOS email client only to get sucked into the vortex of your inbox. JustSend gives you a simple way to send off email messages without ever seeing your inbox. The app is free through the month of January, starting today. There is zero setup. It works immediately with the built-in email accounts on your phone. A lot of people look at the new year as an opportunity to get rid of distractions and JustSend can help you along that path.
Happy Holidays! All Field Guides are On Sale
This holiday season I’ve put all of the MacSparky Field Guides on sale. If you’ve been waiting to buy any of the below titles (or you know someone getting a new iPad or Mac), now’s the time to strike. The sale runs up through the end of the year. Whenever I stop to think about the success of this blog, the podcast, and the Field Guides, I realize I’m probably the luckiest guy in the world. Happy Holidays everybody.
* Paperless, usually $10, is $5.
* Email, usually $10, is $5.
* Presentations, usually $10, is $5.
* Markdown, usually $10, is $4.
* 60 Mac Tips, usually $7, is $4.
Creating Flow with OmniFocus 2
Kourosh Dini has a second edition of his OmniFocus book out. It’s 110,000 words taking you from beginner to expert in OmniFocus, all told in Kourosh’s patient voice. If you’ve got some time over the holidays, this would be a good read.
MPU 231: Jason Snell Goes Indie
After many years working at IDG, Jason Snell has gone indie. He has some great new workflows. This week, Jason joined us to talk about how he gets work done.
Sponsor: Dropzone
This week MacSparky is again sponsored by Dropzone, the Mac menubar app that makes opening and sorting files wicked easy. Simply drag a file onto the Dropzone menubar icon and a menu slides down with several landing targets. For example, I’ve got a folder I use as a clearing house for work related documents. Using Dropzone, I just drag the file up to the icon and drop them on the folder’s link. Drop zone, then moves the file to that location lickity-split. I’ve also set up an application opening action so when I drag a PDF on PDFpen, it opens the file in the application. If you just need to hold a file temporarily, use the Drop Bar.
Dropzone is a great little utility that you’ll find yourself using all day. You can get it now in the App Store and learn more at the website. Thanks Dropzone for supporting MacSparky.com.
Removing Photo Metadata with Metapho
With the holidays coming up you may be taking photos for posting to Facebook, Twitter, and other social media outlets. If you want to make certain those photos don’t contain location data before putting them on the Internet, you’ll need an app to scrub the metadata out. I’ve been using Metapho for this purpose. The app is easy enough to use. Select an existing photo and push the big red button to remove the metadata. The app is free but the metadata removal tool is currently a $2 in-app purchase.
Pixelmator and InShort Updates
Two Mac apps that I like got gesture-based updates.
First, InShort for Mac received a Yosemite-friendly update with several interface tweaks, including the ability to scale diagrams on a touchpad. The app also has the ability to keep a catalog of locations and mark in which of them the process will be executed or the resource is located, is introduced.
Similarly, Pixelmator also now supports pinch to zoom gestures and the ability to scale objects. Pixelmator is, by the way, an excellent resource for fiddling with holiday photos. Here is a Pixelmator-modified image of some holiday decorations my kids and I made this year. Don’t look in Blitzen’s eyes too long.
