Mac Power Users episode 152 is up. In it Katie and talk about hardware and software tools for getting back to school. Prepping for this show I was struck by how many great tools students have these days.
Home Screens – Shawn Blanc
I’ve read one book on my vacation, Shawn Blanc’s Delight is in the Details and it was an excellent choice. In addition to being an author, blogger, and all-around swell guy, Shawn (Website) (Twitter) loves his iPhone and agreed to share it here.
What are your most interesting home screen apps?
- VSCO Cam has become my favorite iPhone photo editing app. They’ve got quite a few filter presets, and several fine-tune-ability tweaks as well. When posting a cool photo to Instagram, I usually edit it first in VSCO Cam and then send it to Instagram.
- The new Safari is my favorite iOS 7 app. There are quite a few design changes and improvements that make it leaps and bounds easier and more enjoyable to use than its predecessor.
- Scratch is a great quick-capture app. I keep it in my Dock because it launches lickety-split with a blank text entry field. From there I can quickly jot down a fleeting note, a task, or whatever. And if I need to hang on to that note or do something with it, I can toss it from Scratch right into OmniFocus or Simplenote, or send it as an email or text message if I need to.
What is your favorite app?
I don’t know if I could pick a favorite. But…
If I had to pare my iPhone down to just one app, it’d probably be Simplenote. I share a lot of text between my iPhone, iPad and Mac. In the form of lists, ideas, notes, and articles-in-process. Right now those are split up into apps that do one thing well. So: OmniFocus for lists, Simplenote for ideas and notes, Byword (on Mac and iPhone) and Editorial on iPad for articles-in-process. But if I had to, I could consolidate those things into one app — Simplenote — and survive.
From a more personal context, Day One is also a favorite. Not only is the app itself well-designed and fun to use, but it’s become the place where I keep track of small and big life events.
Which app is your guilty pleasure?
Dots. A simple, whimsical game that seems so easy yet actually takes quite a bit of skill to excel in.
What is the app you are still missing?
A really great RSS reader that works tightly with Feed Wrangler.
When Google Reader shut down, I moved my RSS subscriptions over to Feed Wrangler. Reeder has long been my favorite RSS reading app, and though it works with Feed Wrangler, it doesn’t fully support all of its APIs (such as Feed Wrangler’s smart streams and filters). I’d love for Reeder to get tighter integration with Feed Wrangler, or else have another really great iPhone RSS app come along.
How many times a day do you use your iPhone?
Two less than the legal limit.
What is your favorite feature of the iPhone?
Hardware-wise, it’s still the Retina display. Though LTE speeds are very nice, and the day-long battery life is great, the screen is the “window” into the soul of the iPhone.
Anything Else You’d Like to Share?
San Dimas High School Football rules.
Thanks Shawn.
Mac OS X Automation
There is a little corner of the Internet that is quasi-secretly ran by Sal Saghoian (yes, that Sal Saghoian) with a ton of great OS X automation tools and resources, including the mother load of OS X services.
I thought the site had gone dormant for awhile but I was wrong. I noticed today a new online training section with some great, robot-voiced tutorials. This is definitely worth checking out.
Butterick’s Practical Typography
Mathew Butterick has been quietly fixing typography in the practice of law for years with his Typography for Lawyers website and accompanying book which, by the way, every lawyer should read once, pause, then read again.
Most recently Mathew has a new project, Practical Typography, which everyone should read. It doesn’t take long and includes great, useful typography tips such as:
“Avoid goofy fonts, monospaced fonts, and system fonts, especially times new roman and Arial.”
If you’ve wanted to clean up your own typography act but don’t want to spend a lot of time on the endeavor, check out Practical Typography. It will set you right.
MPU 151: iOS Photography with Jeff Carlson
MPU 151 is up. Jeff Carlson joins us to talk about the best workflows for iOS photography. This episode is loaded with tips. I’m writing this post while on vacation and am already using some of Jeff’s ideas. Don’t believe me? Here you go.
BusyCal Turns 2.5
Today marks the release of BusyCal 2.5. This update is huge if you are using Exchange or Office 365 in that it includes full calendar sync. It supports Exchange Calendars and Tasks, calendar sharing, and meeting scheduling (including viewing free/busy time).
So using BusyCal 2.5 you can now sync with iCloud, Google Calendar, and Exchange. BusyCal is a great replacement for the built in Apple Calendar app. It is actively developed by some really smart (and nice) folks so it gets a lot more love than Apple’s Calendar application (which is only updated with each new iOS release).
There have always been a lot of good reasons to use BusyCal and now Exchange sync means Exchange users can finally get in on the action. Learn more at BusyCal.com.
Home Screens – Author Michelle Muto
This week’s Home Screen features author Michelle Muto (Website) (Twitter). Michelle write urban fantasy and paranormal books. She’s also a geek and loves her iPhone. Okay Michelle, show us your home screen.
What are some of your favorite apps?
It’s one of the best places for me to jot down notes about story ideas & research. It’s also helpful when I need to remember room dimensions, vet or doctor records, and auto service records.
It syncs between the iPad and iPhones, scans items by barcode, keyboard, and voice, and does what we need it to do. It’s a favorite because it does the job needed for our weekly shopping.
I don’t know how anyone with a mobile device, computer, or tablet gets by without it.
It comes in handy during book signings. Easy to use.
We just bought a Harmony remote and it is dead simple. No more looking for various other remotes or trying to figure out how to use them.
Which app is your guilty pleasure?
Bejewled. I try not to play it much though.
How many times a day do you use your iPhone/iPad?
Dozens. At least. It’s sad. I have a 27″ iMac and at any given time, someone could walk into my office to see my iPhone on my desk, and the iPad propped up with something on it, too.
What is your favorite feature of the iPhone/iPad?
Siri – There are times when it is more conveinent to listen to or reply to emails and texts using Siri. It also looks up words for me, and is helpful when I need to research topics. I want Siri for the Mac.
If you were in charge at Apple, what would you add or change?
I’d make it easier for people to upgrade their iMacs and MacBook Pros. I’d create a way to run rules on sub folders within emails. Hazel for email! Oh, and Siri for the Mac.
Anything else you’d like to share?
I’m mad for a shortcut or a way to make things simple – as in grass roots simple. Everything you must have owns you, right?
That said, thanks for all the tips, tricks, and thought provoking topics both on your blog and Mac Power Users. I’m also addicted to your videos. Precise, short, fun.
Thanks Michelle.
Editorial, iPad Writing Re-Imagined
There has been a secret society of tech nerds using Editorial (Website) (iOS App Store Affiliate) for months now. The app is done and the Internet is having a nerd-gasm over its release. Speaking on behalf of the secret society, I’m here to say this enthusiasm is justified.
Until Editorial arrived, I felt like iPad text editors really didn’t have much room left for innovation. Boy, was I wrong. Editorial combines thoughtful Markdown integration with iOS scripting that will curl your geek toes. (Editorial’s developer, Ole Zorn, is the same guy that brought us Pythonista.) Editorial includes a bunch of pre-built scripts with useful functions like linking, versioning, statistics, and web searches. You can also roll your own by stacking pre-built blocks or writing your own. I’m not a Python programmer but I’m able to use the heck out of this.
This app is really powerful. In a lot of ways, Editorial is more powerful than anything I’m using on my Mac. I need to spend more time figuring out exactly how many of these shiny things I’ll put to use. This is going to be fun.
In the meantime, there are some very in-depth reviews from Federico Viticci at MacStories and Gabe Weatherhead at Macdrifter. (With Editorial, both Gabe and Federicco have published the first iOS app reviews I’ve ever seen with Tables of Contents.)
Is the Mac Power Users going to revisit iOS writing in light of the advance? Magic 8-Ball says “most likely”.
PDFConvert.Me – PDF Conversion Service
While I really enjoy working on my iPad, occasionally I run into roadblocks on it. One such roadblock is my desire to save an email as a PDF file. I’m not talking about a PDF attachment to an email file but the actual email itself. For instance, if I buy something on Amazon and I want to keep the receipt for future reference, Amazon sends me an email telling me about my purchase. I want to print that email to PDF and save it to a folder. This is really easy on the Mac. It is not so easy on the iPad or iPhone. There is no Print to PDF command on iOS. So I usually stick these types of emails in my Action Folder and deal with it when I’m sitting at my Mac later. However, the fact that I can’t deal with it on my iOS device does make me a little crazy. I bemoaned this on a recent episode of Mac Power Users and, of course, one of our clever listeners answered the call.
Brian Almeida has just released a Web service at PDFConvert.me that solves this problem. You can forward any email to the service and it will convert the email to PDF and reply to you with the newly minted PDF as an email attachment. Of course you are sending an email to a third party so this isn’t appropriate for confidential email but I could do this for my Amazon receipts all day long.
At this point, it’s a beta service and he’s trying to figure out the business model. Either way, I think there is a demand for the service and I’m already using it. If you’ve also wanted the ability to turn email into a PDF effortlessly from an iOS device, go check this out. Brian has also been adding features. For instance, if you send a Microsoft Word document to your magic PDFConvert.me email address, it’ll spit back a PDF of that file to you as well.
My Sony Dictation Recorder
I once mentioned on a MPU episode that I use a small digital recorder with Dragon Dictate. Since then I’ve had a lot people asking which recorder I use. It’s this one (Amazon Affiliate Link). I picked this up at an office supply store and didn’t do a lot of comparison shopping. There are a few things I really like about it though. The USB port folds into the device so I don’t need to find a cord when I want to download. The battery life is great and it is light in my pocket (plastic). It saves audio files to MP3, and my voice sounds great even when I record while walking down the street.
Why don’t I just record onto the iPhone? The physical buttons make a real difference for me. I start and stop between just about every sentence. I also can turn it on and record virtually anywhere without looking at it. As an example, I’ll often take a walk after eating my lunch and record into the Sony for later transcription. It’s also great for diary entries.