Provides: Word processing
Developer: Hog Bay Software
Minimum Requirements: Mac OS X
Cost: $24.95 (30 day free trial available)
Availability: Now

Word processing was the original “killer app” of the personal computer. For those of you over the age of twenty, be glad you never knew a world where you had to type important documents (term papers, etc.) and making a mistake meant retyping the whole page (Liquid Paper being akin to spray painting over a dent in your car and convincing yourself no one would notice.

Still, just because computers made editing simpler doesn’t mean that writing comes any easier. In fact with wireless networking and the rise of social media, it’s become harder as there are more distractions to pull you away from the page. “I think I’ll just pop over to Wikipedia to check out this topic. Wonder if there’s any e-mail. Oh, hey I just got an @reply on Twitter.” It’s easy to lose your focus.

WriteRoom is a simple word processor: so simple, in fact, that all you can do is write because it takes over your entire screen, with your text floating in the middle of it. Other applications are hidden in the background. WriteRoom features two modes: plain and rich text. In the latter you can bold, underline and italicize, as well as set color and fonts. But I prefer the default plain text interface; it’s totally Spartan and truly gives you no distraction, no mental offramps from getting your words down quickly and efficiently. Other viewing options include seeing invisible characters (like spaces and paragraph marks), and wrapping your words per page (which adds a border if page count is part of your goal). Dropping your cursor to the bottom of the screen gives you a word count. You can also configure the text and background color, the scale, and the font itself to whatever size is more comfortable for you.

Once you’re done writing, you exit the fullscreen mode by hitting Escape or Command+Enter. Your document is presented in a more conventional SimpleText-like window where you could copy it into another word processor for final formatting (like, say, Final Draft for Screenwriting).

As a word processor, WriteRoom doesn’t offer anything that you can’t get for free—but as soon as I tell my friends who are or want to be professional writers about how it takes over the whole screen and helps lock out distractions, their eyes light up. Is that worth $24.95? You’ll answer that yourself with either a puzzled look or a “God, yes!” For me, it was very much the latter.

WriteRoom may be based around a gimmick, but it’s a really good one. Someone once said “A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.” I can’t remember who it was exactly.*  Maybe I’ll just pop over to Google to find out. Oh, hey, look a whole website of quotes about writing. I think I’ll just spend a few minutes here before I really buckle down and finish these projects that need my attention. Oh, hey, a friend of mine just popped up on Facebook…

*Thomas Mann

Full Story » | Written by Bill Stiteler for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Gruml has been around for a while now, but its first beta was extremely glitchy; too much to make it a very interesting and useful application. However, more recent beta releases have made Gruml a much more stable application. To be specific, an impressive RSS reader that relies on Google Reader for functionality.

Many of you are probably familiar with NetNewsWire—an application I use on both my Mac and iPhone quite often—which has made the switch to syncing with Google Reader back in July. As Gruml advances with new features similar to that of NetNewsWire, it, along with other RSS readers that sync with Google Reader, will have some good competition.

One thing that Gruml is lacking, though, is the AppleScript dictionary, which is quite important in an RSS reader (although that may be implemented in future versions of the app). The keyboard navigation, although quite decent, is also not as good as that within Google Reader’s web interface, which can be navigated entirely with only a keyboard. One cool Gruml feature is the “Send Article to” menu, which uses 12 services, including Delicious, Twitter, Facebok, Ping.fm and Posterous. Other Google Reader features, such as note-taking and starring, are all very well implemented in Gruml, and sync perfectly with the service.

Gruml’s UI has come a long way since the first beta, and the app even allows you to switch between a 2-column or 3-column view. The ability to add feeds is very well done and simplifies the process a lot more than other RSS reader apps. Still, some techinical glitches and bugs remain even in the latest version of Gruml (for example, marking all articles as “read” doesn’t provide any visual feedback), but it is still a very promising Google Reader desktop app for Mac OS X.

As a free download, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t try Gruml.

Full Story » | Written by Patrick Lutz for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

In late August / early September, Appletell ran a giveaway in cooperation with the good folks at Storyist for two free copies of their recently released Storyist 2 novel/screenwriting software. To enter, contestants simply had to tell us the title of the work they’d write with the software, and the staff at the Storyist would choose the two they felt were teh best. The submissions are in, and the winners have been selected.

Congratulations to the authors of the soon to be titled works The Fantastification of Gordon James and The Good Doctor Guillotin. Each author will receive a downloadable copy of Storyist 2 directly from the developer.

Storyist 2 is a powerful story development tool for novelists and screenwriters. With an intuitive interface that puts you in control, Storyist provides:

• A word processor with a page layout view and support for headers, footers, and style sheets so you can produce submission-ready manuscripts and scripts.
• A storyboard with customizable story sheets so you can track your plot, characters, and settings.
• A project manager with fast, project-wide search capabilities so you can keep your writing organized and accessible.

A full list of features—along with system requirements—can be found at the Storyist website.

Be sure to check back with Appletell throughout September for the announcement of more giveaways.

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Today is the last day we’ll be accepting entries in our Storyist 2 giveaway. Two entrants will be awarded free registration numbers for the download version of this last iteration of the popular novel/screenwriting software. If you’ve ever had a great idea for a novel or movie but didn’t know how to go about getting it started, Storyist 2 is perfect for helping you to organize, format, and complete your project.

If you haven’t yet entered, hurry up; the contest ends August 20th at midnight. Head on over to the entry page for details on the program, as well as instructions on how to enter.

Read [Appletell giveaway: Two copies of Storyist 2 novel/screenwriting software ] Product [Storyist 2]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Looks like Snow Leopard is an alpha male, at least when it comes to the RTF document format. If you use a word processor that saves to RTF by default, you’ll notice quite quickly that Snow Leopard is going to take control of all of your files, forcing them to open in TextEdit. In other words, double clicking your Nisus Writer documents or any file tagged .rtf is going to launch TextEdit, not the program you used to create the file. Thankfully, there is a workaround, and chances are you already know how to do it.

In fact, I’ll let the good folks at Nisus explain what’s going on, and how to fix it. The following is from their Nisus Newsletter, released earlier this morning:

The native file format in both Nisus Writer Express and Pro is RTF (rich text format). This format is shared by many other applications, including TextEdit and Apple Mail. It has been this way since the inception of OS X. We chose this format because it is supported by just about any word processor out there. Prior to Snow Leopard, files that were created in Nisus Writer Express or Pro would always reopen in the originating application.

However, Apple has changed this behavior in 10.6. All RTF files, regardless of where they were created, will open in a single application. By default the Finder is configured to use TextEdit… However, this behavior can be changed in a few easy steps.

In the Finder, single click a Nisus Writer RTF file.  Choose the menu File > Get Info.  Under “Open with” choose Nisus Writer.  Click the “Change All” button. All RTF files will now be opened by Nisus Writer.

Of course, you’ll want to change that to your word processor of choice, but I don’t see why it’s not Nisus Writer already.

Via [Nisus Newsletter]

Products [Snow Leopard] and [Nisus Writer Pro]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Are you one of those people who complain every year because you’re tired of movie remakes and sequels and Hollywood just isn’t putting out anything good anymore? Well, there are two things you can do about it. First, look beyond Entertainment Tonight for your movie options. Second, write your own movie. No sure how to do that? We’ve got some free software to help you get started. To win a copy of Storyist 2, you just need to give us your movie/novel title.

[Update: Because we got this contest started a little late, we’re going to let it run another week. This means you’ve got seven more days to score yourself a free copy of Storyist 2. All other rules and regulations still apply.]

About Storyist 2

But first things first. Storyist 2 is a powerful story development tool for novelists and screenwriters. With an intuitive interface that puts you in control, Storyist provides:

• A word processor with a page layout view and support for headers, footers, and style sheets so you can produce submission-ready manuscripts and scripts.
• A storyboard with customizable story sheets so you can track your plot, characters, and settings.
• A project manager with fast, project-wide search capabilities so you can keep your writing organized and accessible.

A full list of features—along with system requirements—can be found at the Storyist website.

How to Win

To enter to win one of two free copies of Storyist 2, you just need to do three things. First, read the Dabbledoo LLC giveaway rules. Second, make sure you’re registered with Appletell. If you’re already registered, make sure you’re signed in. And third, give us a great, original title for a movie or book. Just the title. We don’t need a synopsis or character outline or any of that junk, we just want an attention grabbing title. Be creative, but keep it clean. Kids see movies, too, you know.

Entries will be accepted until Sunday, August 30th, at which point a panel of judges at Storyist will select their two favorite titles. Those two entrants will then be rewarded with license codes for a full download version of Storyist 2. Good luck, and be sure to remember to thank us when you’re accepting your Academy Award for best screenplay.

Product [Storyist 2]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

It’s been a slow summer since the launch of iPhone OS 3.0, so this edition of the Appletellcast looks outside of Apple towards Google, where Bill explains why Google Chrome will not have as big an impact as we first thought. Also, Kirk laments the loss of the Genius Bar’s usefulness, both commentators discuss some helpful apps, and a Storyist 2 competition is announced. Winning is the easy part, figuring out how requires a listen.

But as always, it’s good to be prepared when entering a discussing with Kirk and Bill. Here are this week’s topics:

• Google Chrome
• The Genius Bar
• Tr.im
• iTalk
• Storyist 2

If you enjoy the Appletellcast, be sure to subscribe so you can have iTunes do all of the download work for you. Those you haven’t yet subscribed can download the podcast directly.

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Provides: Auto-fill/placement of frequently used text strings and images.
Format: Download
Developer: SmileOnMyMac, LLC
Minimum System Requirements: Mac OS X v10.4
Processor Compatibility: Universal
Price: $29.95
Availability: Now
Version Reviewed: 2.6.2
Demo: 3.6MB .dmg

I really need to start trusting the kids these days. When fellow Appletell writer Gaecke told me at Macworld Expo 2009 to check out SmileOnMyMac’s Text Expander because it’s, like, “... the greatest utility ever,” my thought was, “Yeah, well, this guy liked the new Star Wars movies.” After using TextExpander for a while now, I’ve determined that although Jake’s taste in science fiction leaves a bit to be desired, his opinion on Mac utilities is dead on. TextExpander is, like, the greatest utility ever.

It functions basically like your standard keystroke shortcuts in various software programs. You now how hitting Command+B will make your type bold? TextExpander does the same thing, only with much more power and compatibility. Also, it mainly focuses on content, not formatting…although you can certainly use it to format, too. For instance, my main use for TextExpander is within my Appletell templates. See the software spec formatting above? Before TextExpander, I would find an old review from which to copy that content, paste it into a new document, delete the outdated info and add the relevant info. Not ideal. I eventually switched to a text snippet, which I would just drag into the new document. Better, but I still had to hunt it down in my Appletell resources folder. Now, I just type “aRevSoft” and it appears. That’s it. Doesn’t matter if I’m in BBEdit or Safari or what have you. It’s the same with the rating formatting at the bottom of this review. All of that appears by typing “aRate5.”

You can see a pattern, right? This is because to use TextExpander to its best capabilities, you need to remember your codes. I use the lower case “a” to represent Appletell (and because I’m not likely to start a normal word with a lowercase “a” followed by a capitalized second letter). From there, you can figure it out.

There are a couple of ways to get your content into the TextExpander database. The “te” menu bar icon allows you to automatically create a snippet from your clipboard or highlighted text. Selecting either automatically opens the TextExpander System Preferences panel, and displays your selection in the content area. Simply assign a label to it, then, more importantly, the abbreviation. You need to choose carefully here, as it should be something you wouldn’t normally type without needing your snippet, but that is easy to remember when you want it.

If you forget, though, no worries. You can always just select your snippet from the menu bar icon if you can’t recall the abbreviation:

Being able to automatically insert long strings of text and code—and even images and PDFs—would be enough for me to completely recommend this app. Anyone working on anything with set formats will immediately benefit from TextExpander. But it doesn’t stop there. If you like having the ability to autofill web forms but aren’t satisfied with the security of web browser autofills, you can keep that info in TextExpander. You can also have it automatically correct your most common spelling mistakes and typos. Add “udpate” to the snippet library so it’s replaced by “update,” and you’re all set. And if you don’t have time to add every possible common spelling mistake, don’t worry about it; SmileOnMyMac offers a library of such snippet files ready to download.

Before I close, there are a few other features I want to point out. First, TextExpander can automatically insert the correct date and time. On our daily Macintosh/iPhone software update roundup, for example, I just type in “aRoundup” to pull in the headline, along with “%B %e, %Y.” That code becomes “June 22, 2009,” with the appropriate info, of course.

Second, your snippets can be synched up via MobileMe. Whether I’m working at the office or at home, I know all of my formatting snippets are always available to me. If you don’t have MobileMe (or don’t want to pay for that second TextExpander license), you can simply save your snippets to a file, then import them into your other computer’s TextExpander system prefs.

And finally, you can control in which programs TextExpander works. The default is “all applications,” and that’ll be fine for most users. If, however, you don’t want TextExpander’s functionality in certain programs, you can set it to work in “all applications, except…” or “only these applications…” which you control with check boxes.

There’s more that TextExpander can do, but that’s enough for here. If I haven’t already sold you on this wonderful utility, then find someone who will, because anyone who does a good degree of writing and coding on the Mac needs TextExpander. That’s right…needs. The developers are so sure of this, they even offer a 90 day money back guarantee. If you still don’t believe me or the folks at SmileOnMyMac, ask Jake Gaecke. But don’t ask him about the Star Wars movies. I don’t want his opinion there to taint your view of his credibility.

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Provides: Full suite of video/photo/image/web content creation and management
Format: DVD
Developer: Adobe
Minimum System Requirements: Varies by product/package (see Adobe’s website for individual details)
Processor Compatibility: Universal
Price: Varies by product/package (see Adobe’s website for all suite and individual software normal and upgrade prices)
Availability: Now

This is the update Macromedia users have been dreading since Adobe bought out the company a few years ago. This is when what we’ve known and loved about the Macromedia UI and methodology has been tossed out the window and replaced with Adobe’s own way of doing things. There is good and bad to this. Good, in that the Macromedia products—Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Flash—are now much more tightly integrated with their Adobe stepbrothers. The products share more of the same tools and commands, and generally get along a lot better. Bad, in that Adobe’s way isn’t always the best way, and they’ve overcomplicated quite a few features for the sake of unity.

CS4 is a huge update (hence our delay in getting up coverage…we’ve got day jobs, you know). If you’re going to pick up the Master Collection, you’re looking at nearly 20 updated programs rolled out at once in a single package. And these are big, big programs. That Adobe is able to maintain a schedule of significant updates about every 18 months indicates two things to me: that they’ve got an incredible staff of programmers, and that maybe some of these features were pushed out a bit too soon.

One way to address this is to abandon older technology, making it easier to program and troubleshoot. Although most apps in CS4 can work on systems dating all the way back to the G4, you still need to have Mac OS X v10.4.11 running on it. In addition, many of the programs (especially the video apps such as After Effects and Premiere Pro) rely heavily on OpenGL, meaning that certain functions will not be available to you or that you won’t be able to run the programs at all. For a complete breakdown of what app needs what to run, visit Adobe’s website.

Of course, you don’t need them all. The CS4 products are sold in numerous suites, each tailored to a specific use. Adobe has done a good job of fairly placing the apps into these suites; you likely won’t need to pay for apps you don’t need in order to get what you want in a specific suite.

Now, which package you go for should be fairly obvious, based on your needs. Because of they way they’re priced, if you purchase more than two or three individual apps, you’re likely going to save money by buying into a suite. And although the initial purchase is pretty steep, Adobe continues to be quite fair with their upgrade prices.

Once you’ve purchased and installed your update, the first thing you’ll notice is that the CS4 apps push further into the OWL (Object Widget Library) interface. Adobe has undertaken the task of unifying all the apps (both their original and the acquired Macromedia programs) across the suite, on both the Mac and the PC. Likely, your first reaction will be one of confusion. The interface is dark gray and heavy. Tool icons are clean, but lifeless. Adobe has apparently used OWL 2 to make the the Mac and PC versions not only work the same way, but look the same way. I’ve spoken to many users from both camps, and almost straight across the board, PC users like the new look, while Mac users hate it. Whether that means the Mac GUI is just that much better than the PC’s or that PC users are just more flexible, I’ll leave up to you.

We’ll address most of these issues in the individual reviews, but I do need to mention that there are some significant advantages to the OWL 2 GUI. First, although most of the apps now default to a tabbed interface for multiple documents (think tabbed browsing on Safari), you can shut this off so that each document stands on its own. In fact, through menu options and keystrokes, you can pretty much get the UI to behave however you want. I found the Application Frame, for example (in which your document and tools all sit in a single, resizable frame, as pictured above), too restricting when working on my 24” iMac. But when using my Unibody MacBook, it made it much easier to keep control of the limited space afforded to me. Likewise, simple keystrokes can minimize the tool panels, or hide them completely. Love or hate the new UI, it is designed to give you quick access to the tools you need, hide the tools you don’t, and show you as much of your canvas as possible at all points.

Don’t think for a second, however, that these updates are strictly about streamlining your workflow. Most of the apps have powerful new features and a host of small tweaks that add up to big improvements. Obviously, I can’t go into them all here. In fact, the CS4 updates are so large that we’re not going to handle them here at all, or even just at Appletell. Instead, we’re working in conjunction with our friends at Applelinks to bring you individual reviews of each app in the suites. To get to the individual app reviews, just click on the links below. It’s kind of pointless to rate the CS4 updates as a whole, because each package would deserve its own rating based on the apps included and the value they offer. So, below, we link to the individual reviews of the apps that comprise the suite. Click through to the Applelinks or Appletell reviews for the individual apps to learn more.

CS4 Design Suite (for print and web work):

Standard - $1,399 new, $499 upgrade

• InDesign
• Illustrator
• Acrobat 9 Pro
• Photoshop Standard

Premium - $1,799 new, $599 upgrade

• InDesign
• Illustrator
• Acrobat 9 Pro
• Photoshop Extended
• Dreamweaver
• Flash
• Fireworks

CS4 Web Suite (for web work):

Standard - $999 new, $399 upgrade

• Dreamweaver
• Flash Professional
• Fireworks

Premium - $1,699 new, $599 upgrade

• Dreamweaver
• Flash Professional
• Fireworks
• Photoshop Extended
• Illustrator
• Soundbooth
• Acrobat 9 Pro

CS4 Production Premium (for video work):

$1,699 new, $599 upgrade

• After Effects
• Premiere Pro
• Photoshop Extended
• Illustrator
• Flash Professional
• Soundbooth
• OnLocation
• Encore

CS4 Master Collection:

$2,499 new, $899 upgrade

• InDesign
• Illustrator
• Acrobat 9 Pro
• Photoshop Extended
• Dreamweaver
• Contribute
• Flash Professional
• Fireworks
• After Effects
• Premiere Pro
• Soundbooth
• OnLocation
• Encore

No matter which program you buy into, it’ll also offer Bridge, Device Central and Adobe Media Player. Version Cue comes in all packages save for Production Premium, in which it’s replaced by Dynamic Link.

It really is worth it to look at these apps individually, not as a whole. Most are absolutely worth the upgrade, a couple will only appeal to select users, and at least one should just be entirely dropped from the lineup. But overall, this is a solid lineup of amazing tools that bring some great new features, even if they are muddied up in a new user interface that will take some getting used to.

Once we’re done with all the pieces, we’ll assign ratings to each package. Until then, check back with us weekly as work our way through the powerful behemoth that is Adobe Creative Suite 4.

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Provides: Script/novel writing, formatting and management
Format: Download/CD
Developer: Storyist Software, LLC
Minimum System Requirements: Mac OS X v10.4.4
Processor Compatibility: Universal
Price: $59.00 (download), $69.00 (download + CD)
Availability: Out now
Version Reviewed: 1.5.2

I’m beyond the point of having to explain why anyone writing a screen or stage play would want software specifically for that task. You can no more use Word to write a movie script than you can use PowerPoint to develop a website.

So, the question becomes which script writing program to use. There’s no shortage of options available, from the high end (but more expensive) Final Draft and Movie Outline to any number of free, browser-based or open source programs. A newer entry is Storyist, which falls towards the middle in price and functionality, but manages to place itself closer to top thanks to a couple nice features that other script writing programs lack.

Rocky IV-mat

Of course, Storyist gives you the most basic functionality that all script writing programs do: formatting. It’s built so you can worry about writing and not about formatting, yet is oddly lacking in this area. You’re given only four options: blank, hero adventure (!), novel and screenplay. There are sample manuscripts to help you get started, but these options really pale to the competition, which usually offers screenplay templates for individual studios, templates for specific shows, etc. You can create your own or just make edits to the templates provided, but that defeats the purpose of a program such as this. At the least, I’d expect templates for stage plays, the formatting of which is quite different from screen plays.

I’m pleased, however, but the inclusion of novel formatting. This doesn’t mean it’s simply built for one but can be used for the other; rather, the program was actively developed to function with both, offering a complete set of tools no matter on what style of project you’re currently working. Not even kingpin Final Draft offers that. I’ve never minded working in separate programs for each, mainly because the only alternative has been to create styles and such in Word, and that’s just not at all worth the time, hassle and money (you can buy three separate programs for novel, script and general writing, and still have it cost less than a single copy of Word). Storyist, however, has helped me see the benefit of keeping novel and script writing within one program.

First, it’s one program with one set of tools to learn (with certain variables between formats, of course). Everything will instantly seem more familiar. Second, should you decide to adapt your novel for the screen, or vice-versa, everything is right there, ready to go. Your characters, plot elements, markers, outline…they’re all set. Storyist doesn’t offer any sort of automatic conversion, however, as I imagine there are far too many variables there to streamline that process. What they should do to compensate is allow you to export the plot, characters, settings and such from one manuscript style to the other.

Organizing your Notes On a Scandal

The reason I ask for this is that Storyist excels in keeping all of your notes and information organized for you. Pretty much everything you’d need to access throughout the process of writing (chapters/scenes, plot elements, characters, settings, etc.) are stored in a panel on the left hand side of the page. You can set up certain elements ahead of time, helping you to get organized before the night becomes “dark and stormy,” as it were. My method of writing is a little more organic, however. When starting on a new novel or play, I’ll tear through as much of the beginning as possible, then look back to see if the idea is as good on paper as in my head, and whether it warrants further development. If so, this is where I would take the time in Storyist to add in all my notes and organize my ideas on what’s to come.

Some of this is predictable behavior. Set up a character, and when you begin to type that character’s name in your work, Storyist will complete the name and link to his profile. In the profile, you can store photos and notes to help you stay accurate with description, motivation, behavior, etc. I found it helpful to store certain catch phrases he likes to use, interests, etc., that can be worked into normal conversation to make him seem more real. Having that info a click away was helpful, but having even more info two clicks away was better. Along with storing notes within Storyist, you can attach PDFs, web links, even movies. This is great if you’ve got a whole website of info on a certain topic that’s relevant to your story, but don’t want to bother with importing it all into your project.

You Can’t Take it With U.I.

The window panels for keeping track of all of this are easily opened/closed, and there is some freedom of movement. However, they can take up a lot of retail space. That’s fine on an iMac or larger display, but on my 13” MacBook, the actual space needed to write was compromised. In addition, the notecards used to store notes was almost illegible, the typeface was so small. This is partly due to the clever-clever approach Storyist uses; notes are on notecards, character photos are on Polaroids, and everything appears tacked onto a cork board. It’s fun, but not necessary, and just takes up space. A good way around this would be offer full-screen mode. This feature is promised for v2, along with numerous other enhancements such as collage view of your notes and characters, drag and drop importing, color-coded outline entries, and more.

Now or 28 Days Later

This begs the question on whether it’s worth it to pick up Storyist now or to wait for v2. Well, price isn’t an issue. Storyist is offering a free upgrade for anyone who purchased the program after September 1st, 2008. That’s quite generous. However, if the current version is missing features you’ll need but won’t see until v2’s release, you risk being turned off by the program for reasons that will soon be addressed. This issue is exacerbated by the lack of import/export capabilities. It currently supports only RTF, Word, HTML, text, Final Draft, Open Office and Word (.docx), the latter two of which work only on Leopard. There are some nice import tools to help, but the performance is spotty. And unless you use one of the apps supported (and of those, only final Draft makes sense for script writers), you’ll have to export your work from your program to RTF, then import the RTF into Storyist. As you can imagine, doing this will require plenty of reformatting.

Dark City (That has nothing to do with this section, I just really like that movie.)

It would be a shame if the limited import/export capabilities and the important features still in the works turn users away from the program, because Storyist is a strong entry in the manuscript formatting field. It’s young, and it certainly has room to grow, but it seems to be heading in the right direction. This makes it a logical program for new authors who need assistance with the writing process and how to keep it organized, but don’t necessarily need online, cross platform collaboration or formatting specific to Warner Brothers sitcoms just yet. The ability to use it for both screenplays and novels also makes it attractive to new authors who may not yet even be sure for what medium they want to write. Experienced writers likely won’t find enough in Storyist to compel them to switch from its more established competitors, but if you’ve grown tired with instability issues or that one missing feature the others just never seem to get right, keep Storyist on the radar of apps to consider when seeking a replacement.

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

This week’s show is a bit abbreviated, but still full of reviews, free apps, and who knows what else? We’re also giving away some iPhone cases with headphones from Dermis. But I’m sure you knew all of this already if you subscribed in iTunes to the Appletellcast. This would mean you just came here to check the show notes, which is also a good idea. Here they are.

• Appletell Reviews IPEVO TR-10i
• Appletell Reviews NeatReceipts for Mac
• Appletell giveaway: iPhone 3G skins and headphones from Dermis
• Free Apps Roundup for March 27th, 2009

If you subscribe to the Podcast, the new episode will be automatically delivered to your iTunes account. If you’re not subscribed and can’t see it in iTunes, you can instead download Appletellcast directly.

Full Story » | Written by Jake Gaecke for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Provides: Electronic document backup
Format: Box
Developer: NeatCo
Minimum System Requirements: 512MB RAM, Mac OS X v10.4.11, USB port
Processor Compatibility: Universal
Price: 229.95
Availability: Now
Version Reviewed: 2.0.4

Until the day when all transactions and receipts are electronic, you might want to consider a method other than physical files and folders for your receipts and important documents. That is exactly what NeatReceipts is for. It will scan your receipts, business cards and other important documents, making electronic copies. It will even extract data from these—such as names, numbers, addresses totals, etc. And best of all, you can recycle your receipts after they have been scanned in.

The NeatReceipts package contains the two things you really need: a scanner (though you can purchase the software separately if you have a supported scanner already) and the software, called NeatWorks. The scanner is very small and portable. It works by feeding paper over its sensor, which allows you to have a much smaller device than a regular bed-style scanner. You do sacrifice a bit of image quality for this, but you should know that this is for documents and the like, not high quality scannings. If this isn’t good enough for you, they have a much bigger scanner coming soon that auto feeds documents, perfect for book pirates (I’m kidding).

That said, it actually does a very good job scanning.  All you have to do is insert the paper that you want to scan (scanside down) into the scanner’s feeding slot.  It knows when there’s something there, so it will actually grab the paper.  Then just hit scan on the scanner, in the program, or with the shortcut keys.  It scans at about the same speed as a regular desktop scanner; nothing amazing, but it’s not slow, either.  Now, it will do its OCR (Optical Character Recognition) thing, and, a majority of the time, will populate most of the pertinent fields with accurate information.  It recognizes and records items such as name, company, phone numbers (sorted by type), email addresses, physical addresses, totals, taxes, tips etc.

[Side Note. You don’t actually have to scan a document to get it into NeatWorks. You can also import PDFs and images, or export from any other application from the print dialogue. Just click the Export to PDF drop down box in the bottom left and select one of the NeatWorks options.]

Now, you have a record of whatever it is that you scanned in. But before you toss that original, you’ll want to check a few things.  First, double click the record to open the inpector.  This is where you can edit the scanned image and correct any errors in information.  The image can be rotated by increments of 90 degrees, cropped, and/or converted to black and white (if you scanned it in with full color).  You can even hover your mouse over the image to see highlighted areas that correspond to recognized text.  You’ll notice that it doesn’t get every line of text, nor does it recognize everything 100% of the time.  I’d say it’s closer to 75% of the time, which is a good place to start.

Documents can be filed into Collections and Smart Collections.  Smart Collections are just like Smart Playlists in iTunes, while Collections are just folders.  It would probably be a good idea to develop a good sorting method with numerous folders.  Sadly, you can’t yet make collections inside of other collections, so they don’t function exactly like folders.  I’d really like to see this change, since it makes sense to sort all receipts by year and month.  To remedy this, you can edit a single Smart Collection for a specific month every time you want to look up that month.  It’s not the most elegant solution, but it works.

Documents can be exported into PDFs, CSVs or Quicken files very quickly.  This means you can track personal expenses with Quicken or make expense reports for a business trip easily with a PDF.

If the document you scanned is actually a business card, then you have one extra feature.  After you’ve finished cleaning up the record in NeatReceipts, you can drag it to a special folder on the sidebar called Address Book. I bet you can’t guess what this does.  Yup, it exports the data as an entry in your Address Book, complete with the image(s).  I wish there was a more automated process for doing this.  The reason I say this is because contacts are not automatically synced with the Address Book, which sometimes makes sense.  But there currently isn’t a way to update a field in NeatWorks and have those changes applied to the Address Book, nor the other way around.  I imagine this will be fixed in a later update to NeatWorks.

The only real features missing in NeatWorks are what I’m going to call next step features.  It already scans and keeps records of your documents phenomenally.  What the software needs is the next step.  You can tell they are already thinking about this since it has Address Book and export features built in.  I’d like to see not only my previous syncing idea, but more features related to budgeting.  If you’re going to scan all of your receipts into this, then why not have them sorted and totaled by month?  It doesn’t have to be the most sophisticated piece of budgeting software, but basic functionality would be awesome.

You probably can’t go completely paperless with your life just yet, but NeatReceipts can at least help. It’s a great product for keeping digital records of all documents, both physical and digital. The software could use some updates, but it’s far from crippled. It does exactly what it’s supposed to: keep records of your documents. The improvements I’d like to see deal with the next step (what you do with those records?), and I have faith they won’t leave their users hanging.  They have a PC version as well, which has more features than the Mac version, so don’t be surprised if the Mac version continues to see updates.

Full Story » | Written by Jake Gaecke for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

As I am writing this, the MacHeist 3 Bundle is about to be revealed. Last year, many were disappointed with the MacHeist bundle, as it had many apps that had been seen in the previous year, and no really spectacular app. This year, that was acknowledged, and a much better bundle has been promised.

Right off the bat, Eventbox is free just for showing up at the live unveiling. It will likely be added to your loot even if you didn’t tune in, but that’s another maybe. At a $12, it’s already a $12 savings. Great way to begin the night.

After a bit of a late start (what’s 10 minutes among friends?), Lisa, Veronica, and Chris chatted for a bit, went totally dark for an antagonizing minute, then introduced the first app: iSale. Not terribly impressive, as if you don’t use eBay, it’s useless. But it’s the first app, and I have a feeling we’re only going up from here. iSale is a $40 value.

Next up? The Apple Design Award winning Picturesque. Picturesque is an image-enhancer. You can get those Apple-style perspective/reflection images, put shadows, strokes, and more. Great for desktop publishing, it’s a much easier way than Photoshop, worth $35. It’s getting excited!

Now they announce that the first 25,000 buyers of the Bundle will get Big Bang Board Games for free. For those who didn’t get it free with their Mac, this is a great extra, and worth $25.

Sous Chef is the next app in the list. Though of no use if you don’t cook, it’s a great, and very pretty way to keep your recipes organized and share them with friends. Sous Chef is a $30 value.

Now we get a game! World of Goo is a physics based puzzle and construction game in which you drag live globs of Goo to build bridges and towers and other things to get them to safety. It actually looks really cool. This is one I’m excited about. Plus, it’s valued at $20.

And now, PhoneView. PhoneView provides desktop access to the content on your iPhone, a disk mode to store files on your iPhone or iPod touch, and much more than probably should be included in iTunes. It’s priced at $20 as well.

Next up is LittleSnapper, a brilliant screenshot app, much like Skitch, that has integration to their own web service, FTP, Flickr, etc. If you’ve ever wanted to scribble on your desktop, now you can. (It has more useful uses as well.) A great app, which would normally cost $39.

Acorn is the next app on the agenda. It’s another image editor, so it’s questionable given how Picturesque is already part of the bundle. To be fair, Acorn is more about touching up a photo, whereas Picturesque is about stylizing them. Still, a bit of a stretch. It costs $50 normally.

Still no huge apps at this point, but the next app is Kinemac, a $300 app. That’s exciting in and of itself. Kinemac is a 3D real-time animation and presentation software, with the simplicity of a 2D tool. It’s like Motion, but not confusing as all-get-out. The only problem with Kinemac? I have a feeling it’ll drive up the bundle price. Once again, it retails for $300. Wow.

Now we’re getting to the unlocks. These are the apps that are part of the bundle only after a certain amount of bundles are purchased. After $100,000 is raised for charity, Wiretap Studio will be unlocked. Wiretap can record any combination of audio feeds together at once. It’s pretty cool, but definitely not an exciting app. It retails for $70.

Three more apps to go now, and the next app is available as an unlock (the required charity level wasn’t mentioned.) It’s BoinxTV, a fantastic app that turns any recent Mac into a live TV studio, allowing you to add lower thirds, cut between cameras, and much much more all live. It retails for $199 normally. Now that is exciting.

The Hit List is the next app, part of the “Mega Unlock” where two apps are unlocked at a certain charity level. The Hit List is a GTD app to organize tasks in your life. With a simple and easy to use design, it might just be the To-Do app I’ve never been able to find. We’ll see. The Hit list retails for $50.

The other half of the “Mega Unlock” is Espresso, a web development app that combines editing, real-time previewing, and publishing in one window. It has a sleek UI and intuitive interface, and it retails for $60.

All together, these apps cost about $900, according to Chris Pirillo’s math. Chris asks us how much we’d expect to pay? $500? $250? No? $100? Still high? $50. Okay. $50. That’s it, right? What? Lower?! What’s a good price then? $39!

That’s right. $900 worth of software, including Live TV software, 3D animation software, and much more. For $39. Plus, if you’ve been doing all the heists, you have an $8.00 bundle discount. That means, for $31, you can have $900 worth of software. My writing skills are going out the window as I scramble to add money to my PayPal account.

Check out and buy the bundle at MacHeist.com!

Full Story » | Written by Adam Fisher-Cox for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Apple currently ships a ton of full-fledged programs with Mac OS X. Safari, Mail, iChat, Address Book, and iCal are all great examples. As the operating system paradigm shifts, though, I think Apple could be the one to pull these apps all together into one really useful application that many people would rarely ever leave.

First, let’s talk about why this won’t work well on OS X as is. It mostly has to do with the Dock, and Dock badges for notification. Currently, you can tell you have new Mail because the Mail icon gets a badge. You can tell there’s a new chat message because iChat shows a badge. If all these apps were rolled into one, how would you know which functionality was asking for your attention? As OS X moves in the direction OS X touch has already taken, where the line between operating system and application is much more blurred, a notifications bar, housing small icons much like the menu bar, would be a great place for these notifications to show up.

The reason I even considered this idea is because Apple has a keen focus on keeping apps integrated. Promotional materials frequently reference the “seamless integration” of applications. But even then there are flaws, because they are separate applications, after all. Having all the functionalities as one application means they really do all work together as one. This type of application is one place where I could see Safari’s tabbed title bar working. The large tabs would be for the different functionalities, and within, there would be smaller tabs a la Safari 3 for different mail messages, websites, chats, etc. Safari would be the main focus, with iChat in a sidebar. Mail would be largely the same as it is currently, but mailing links and videos, etc would all be right there. A new section would be an RSS reader, replacing the oddly duplicate RSS readers that both Mail and Safari currently sport. All the different “programs” would be built smartly so as to be always on, but never seen if they aren’t needed (and also not wasting resources.)

At first glance, this seems like a rather unnecessary step, but it really does make sense. As computer users, we spend most of our time on the internet. To have email, instant messaging, RSS feeds, etc. all in the scope of one application means that there won’t be the clutter and confusion of switching between a whole bunch of separate applications; it will all be available in the same window. Done right, it could be a great productivity enhancer, and I think Apple would be the company to do it right.

Would this work for you? Why or why not? Sound off in the comments below!

Full Story » | Written by Adam Fisher-Cox for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Do you have a great idea for a movie, but don’t know how to turn it into a screenplay that makes any sense? Well, that’s never stopped those fellows who make the Saw movies, and now it doesn’t need to stop you, either, thanks to Mariner’s Contour screenplay structure software.

Contour is a proven story development system that streamlines the process of turning your movie ideas from first glimmer to full outline. Using the Contour story development system created by Emmy Award-nominated Jeffrey Alan Schechter, you will learn how to use the same character-based structure that nearly all the blockbuster movies use to create solid stories that hold together from Fade In to Fade Out.

No idea who Jeffrey Alan Schechter is? Me neither, but I looked him up in IMDB and saw that he wrote Care Bears: Journey to Joke-a-Lot...sooooooo, he must be really good for anyone to take him seriously with that on his resume, right?

Plus, Mariner has a history of releasing fantastic software for writers, including the Mariner Writer word processor, Montage screenwriting program (with which Contour will integrate after a forthcoming update is released), and StoryMill novel writing program. They’ve also recently launched the WritersPub social network site to build a community of writers around their software. Mariner is one of those rare companies who actually seem to take interest in what their customers are doing with their software, and Contour covers yet another part of the writing process.

Some of Contour’s features include:

• Flesh out a main character and codify their motivations and behaviors.
• Quickly recognize archetypes which protagonists journey through in all the top movies.
• Go from concept to bulletproof outline in less time than ever before.
• Learn a flexible yet exact plot point and beat structure that works for all genres.
• Seamlessly transfer a concept into popular screenplay writing software such as Montage.
• Develop a compelling logline.

Now, if they could just release “Guaranteed Agent Finder,” we’d be all set.

Product [Contour]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Provides: Speech to text conversion
Format: DVD with Headset
Developer: MacSpeech
Minimum System Requirements: Mac OS Xv 10.5.2 or greater (or 10.4.11) and certified noise-cancelling microphone
Processor Compatibility: Intel
Price: $199
Availability: Now
Version Reviewed: 1.2.1

Talking to inanimate objects has become more accepted in the past years, mostly thanks to Bluetooth headsets. But you can take it a step further by talking directly to your computer! MacSpeech Dictate is the premier dictation software to turn your spoken words into typed text without ever needing to touch a keyboard.

It’s really quite amazing the accuracy that MacSpeech Dictate has when translating your spoken words into typed text. In only three short training sessions, you’ll have your speech accurately recorded as keyed text. And when I say accurate, I mean really accurate; like, I wrote this 95% of this article using MacSpeech Dictate (the other 5% was me adding minor details like this). The software is very intelligent, so you won’t find yourself correcting it very often. And it knows all about the rules for words like “its” and “there,” meaning there’s a small chance it might actually be smarter than you, but I wouldn’t get all grumpy about it. Someday, the robots will rise and take over; it’s best you start to come to terms with that now.

After you install MacSpeech Dictate, you’ll be required to perform some vocal training so that the software can become accustomed to your voice. Basically, all you have to do is read the text that is displayed in the window. I found this process very easy; in fact, I was actually a little sad that there are only three training sessions.  You can further train the software, but it’s not necessary except for certain specific words.  After these three training sessions, the software will be spot on.  And you can set up as many profiles as you like; one for the morning, one for the afternoon, even one for your god-awful Batman voice…you get the picture.

Many of you might be saying to yourselves, “Why do I need dictation software?” Truthfully, you might not. Dictation is sort of a thing of the past.  We are not used to speaking to people who then write down our words in this day and age, especially if you’re a teacher.  We’ve become quite accustomed to others completely ignoring us and our ideas, so we type out our own thoughts. Still, though, speaking to a computer and having it type your words is actually faster than typing for a large portion of computer users. You’d be surprised how fast you can speak to a MacSpeech Dictate and have it translated in the text.

The only problem is that you have to be quite good at speaking exactly what it is that you want to go onto paper. I often found myself blankly staring at the computer screen, running the words I wanted to type through my head over and over. I didn’t want to get it wrong and then be required to fix it. This isn’t a problem with the software, I’m just used to using the difference between my typing and thinking speeds to my advantage. Dictation definitely takes some getting used to, but I think, in the end, it’s worth it. Here’s a tip, speak your sentences in small chunks, that way if you make a mistake you can fix it before it ruins the whole sentence.

MacSpeech Dictate is very good for recording your thoughts all at once. You can just kick back and speak to the computer in comfort, without the need to sit there rapidly hitting keys to keep up with your thoughts. But one thing it’s not so good for is editing.  While there are tools for editing mistakes that pop up while you’re speaking to MacSpeech Dictate, it’s not the ideal solution for editing an entire document.  It’s much faster to use a mouse and keyboard to select or rearrange text or fix things that are far away from the insertion point.  You’ll actually want to keep your hands off of the mouse and keyboard while you’re speaking to MacSpeech Dictate.  You might be tempted to click somewhere else in the document, which might confuse the software.  Part of its built in intelligence relies on knowing what was last typed.  It does not update itself based on where you click, something to keep in mind.

But dictation is not the only thing that MacSpeech Dictate can be used for.  It has a few more tricks in its bag. You can use the software in command mode to verbally access keyboard shortcuts or run AppleScripts. This could be used to augment what you already do inside an application such as Photoshop.  I personally don’t think that the command mode is fast enough to be able to be used in this manner, but I’m glad the technology is available, and I’m sure I’ll find a use for at some point.  It could be that I’m just not accustomed to it, and it also could be that the software is just not fast enough yet.

The only other annoyances I have with MacSpeech Dictate relate to the hardware. You are required to use a headset, since the software depends on having a microphone very close to your mouth. They ensure that this is the case by requiring you to have a USB microphone.  You cannot use a microphone that is simply plugged into the microphone port on your computer.  You are also restricted from using a Bluetooth headset, since the sound quality is apparently not up to dictation standards.  I really wish that there was a hidden option to at least try this out.  I’d really like to find out for myself just how badly a Bluetooth headset performs.  I also don’t enjoy the included headset all that much, but you have choices when you buy, so pick wisely!

If you think you could benefit from having all of your thoughts typed into a document for you simply by speaking, then this is definitely the product for you. Like I said before, this software is incredibly accurate, and it’s even intelligent enough to know the difference between certain words based on context. The software is expensive, but it performs as advertised, so you know exactly what you’re buying into.  As far as I know, this is your only option for dictation software on the Mac, but that’s not a problem because it is, in a word, amazing.

Update.  MacSpeech Dictate was updated just as I was uploading my review to version 1.3.  So it only gets better from here.

Full Story » | Written by Jake Gaecke for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Fresh is a brand new application for OS X that is essentially a file management tool. What it does is take every file that you have interacted with, and shows it in a list. If you edit a Word file, download a file, save an e-mail attachment, take a screenshot, etc., it will show up, newest first, in Fresh’s top green “Recently Created” panel. In everyday computer use, this isn’t much help. But when you’re working on a project, it can be a huge time saver. All of your recently used files will show up in the Fresh window. If they apply to your project, you can drag them down to the “Cooler,” a second window that contains files you choose.

The huge advantage to Fresh over using the Finder is that it is extremely out of the way. When not the main application, Fresh shows a small translucent black tab on the side of your screen that you can drag things to. I decided to drag this down and into the corner of my screen, so now, when I click in the bottom right hand corner of my screen, up pops Fresh. If I’m working on a website, I can have Fresh pop up with all the screenshots, PSDs, HTML files, and CSS files I’ve recently used, plus anything else I’ve put into the cooler. As soon as I choose a file, Fresh is gone, out of my way.

I think I like the description Fresh’s developers give most: “The ‘Cooler’ on the bottom is a like a shelf where you can put things for storage. [... It is] sort of like your desktop—with two important distinctions. One is that the files listed in the cooler can be anywhere on your computer. The other is that this cooler features an ‘autoclean’ function—it automatically throws out items that overflow. This means that you don’t have to worry about cluttering up the cooler with too many items.”

Fresh’s last big feature is the ability to tag files and search through by tag, though the search feature only searches tags, and not file titles. There’s really only one other thing I don’t like about Fresh; it runs with an icon in the dock, something I feel an application like this shouldn’t do. I would prefer options for a menu bar item or nothing at all.

A file organizer that I don’t have to maintain, that doesn’t get in my way, and that has all the files I need without any setup. I’m sold! Fresh costs $9 USD, but is currently (as of Thursday, Feb. 19th) available for free when you do the latest nanoMission on MacHeist.

Product [Fresh]

Full Story » | Written by Adam Fisher-Cox for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Although Spaces was a hyped feature of Mac OS X Leopard, it seems to lack functionality and reliability. Thankfully, an app named Hyperspaces is available to cover some of those missing features. What’s unique about Hyperspaces is that it does not replace Spaces, it simply adds functionality and improves usability. Long wanted features are now a click away, such as custom backgrounds for each individual space, a thumbnail space switcher, and text prompts alerting what space is being used, with custom names for different Spaces as an option. If text isn’t your thing, colors can also be defined for each space, giving a graphical notification of what space is being used. Keyboard triggers are available for nearly every and any action, from adding spaces to switching spaces and showing the space switcher.

Hyperspaces requires Mac OS X 10.5.4 and a PowerPC or Intel Mac, and recommends a nice amount of VRAM. A demo is available, and the license runs a low $12.95.

Product [Hyperspaces] Via [The Mac Observer]

Full Story » | Written by Alec Feld for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Things is a very easy-to-use task management tool that helps us approach the GTD (Getting Things Done) philosophy proposed by David Allen. The concept is very simple, and the application is neat, clean and powerful.

The idea behind this article is not to explain or detail every single feature of the application, but instead, to share my personal experience using it and giving one more try to the art of organizing every activity I’m in charge of.

What is GTD

I think one of the really important things you need to know is a little bit about GTD is and what it stands for. This is not a simple To Do application, and you won’t be able to take full advantage of the software if you don’t bother getting a little background first on the ideas behind Things for Mac.

If you start putting down some tasks with no general sense of where they go or how you should organize them, it’s very likely you will end up doing some unnecessary work or sub-utilizing the software.  If I could give you some advice on how to do it, I’ll say:

1. googling GTD
2. watching the Things screencast
3. organize your ideas, tasks and activities according to that new info (hint: concepts over priorities now).

This will be one of those time investments that really pays off at the end. Believe me, I did it the other way and I paid the price.

Features

Of all the features you get in Things, there are a few I find pretty special. Even if they could be perceived as regular features for some, to me they’ve been the key in making this application an indispensable tool of my day.

The Focus area is very important. Here, you realize that Cultured Code knows exactly which is the difference between a regular To Do app and a full-featured GTD app. Each category of this area has a specific function, meant to help you organize tasks according to their nature or final goal.

Being able to understand the difference between Projects and Areas is another key factor in the road to the correct use of Things. Projects are meant to be finished; you have to mark as a project any group of activities which belong to a main concept that will end in time.  You can use this category to group the tasks for your thesis, a paper you need to prepare and introduce next week, etc.

Areas is meant to be used for those activities on which you’re constantly working, like writing new articles for Appletell, updating your blog, or making your company succeed.  Every activity in your life will end eventually, but the ones you have in your agenda with a clear due date should be placed in Projects, the long lasting ones with no end in sight should be considered for the Areas section.

Even though we have a lot more features in Things, my favorite overall is the Quick Entry option. Quick Entry allows you to use Things throughout your system without even knowing it’s open and running. No matter which application you’re using at the moment, if you remember something you have to turn into a Things entry, the only thing you need to do is press the configurable key combination to invoke a translucid window that will allow you to quickly set up a new entry and record a note, set the tags, due date and the destination of this new To Do (Collect, Focus, Projects, Areas, etc).

Make Things a Habit

The last advice I have for those of you considering giving this a try is to keep in mind that you need to constantly go over your data inside Things. You have to review your tasks, check their status, refresh everything you have pending and add every new task that will need attention in the future. As David Allan suggests, if you have a task that will take you around two minutes to complete, don’t bother setting it up in the application, just go and do it already. You will consume the same time setting that in the software as it’d take you to finish it.

Getting your life organized is possible with the support of great applications like Things for Mac, but even though you get to know all its features and some hints to make it work efficiently, you’ll need to take it as a part of your life in order to succeed with it. Make the use of Things a habit; take the advice from those of us who already know most of the mistakes and start organizing your activities now. 

There’s no better day than today to change the way you do your Things.

Product [Things for Mac]

Full Story » | Written by Juan Gonzalez for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Say what!?  You haven’t heard of Growl?  And you call yourself a Mac user.  Don’t worry, I’ve got the why and how on Growl.  Before you know it, you’ll have the feature that Apple left out running on your machine.

So what is Growl?  Growl is a centralized notification system for OS X.  It allows your computer to alert you when certain events take place.  I know this doesn’t sound all that exciting, but it’s extremely useful.

Use spaces a lot?  Maybe you have iTunes running in its own space while you browse the net in another.  That’s fantastic, but what happens when the song changes and you can’t name that song in 3 seconds?  Well, normally, you’d have to switch to iTunes to find out.  Lame.  How about status changes in your Buddy List?  Are you seriously going to try and watch everyone like a hawk all day long, waiting to swoop in on your friends and talk them to death?  Doubtful.  How about when you get a new message in an IM window, or your downloads/uploads finish?  How are you supposed to know all of this stuff without being a peeping tom?

Growl can solve all of these problems and more.  In fact, Growl may prove so useful that you soon won’t know how you lived without it.

There are four main reasons to use Growl, as outlined on their site:

• Control - you get to choose which applications get the priviledge to notify you
• Ease of Use - in true Apple fashion, it just works.
• Consistency - the style of your notifications is determined by a theme.  This brings consistency to all of your apps across your system.
• Powerful - you have more options that just notifications, like spoken or emailed messages.

To install Growl, just download the package from their site (link below), mount the image and double click the installer.  After you’re done installing, go to System Preferences, Other and Growl.  Make sure you check “Launch Growl at Login” and then pick a display style (my fav is Music Video).

Applications that already support Growl include: Adium, Firefox, Cyberduck, Transmission, Dropbox, Skype, Twitterific, and so many more.  If your favorite app isn’t on the list, there is still hope.  There are plugins, scripts and apps that can help applications that aren’t supported, such as iTunes and Mail.  There are plugins for Mail and Safari included with Growl, so you’ll want to install those.

One of the best applications that you can download to help out Growl is OmniGrowl.  It adds support for things like iTunes, iCal events, Weather, RSS feeds and so much more.  If you like Growl, then you’ll like OmniGrowl.  It’s shareware, with a suggested donation of $10, but you can use it for free.

Basically, Growl allows your system to notify you of events without taking you away from what you’re doing.  So you can keep browsing or working on your paper, but still be aware of Twitter, or your buddies on IM, or whatever else.  Then, when you have more time, you can investigate all of that stuff later.

It’s really a mystery to me why Apple hasn’t already bought out Growl and incorporated it into OS X by default.  I think of it as OS X’s missing feature.

Products [Growl, OmniGrowl]

Full Story » | Written by Jake Gaecke for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

I picture that guy in the Verizon commercial, sad because he has to take his Christmas lights down. Learning that Verizon is having a sale, it still feels like Christmas, and he happily plugs his lights back in. Only here, Verizon is Nisus, and Christmas is Macworld Expo, and the lights are…well, it all falls apart right there. But anyway, Nisus Software, Inc. has announced that from now until January 21, they are offering both Nisus Writer Express and Nisus Writer Pro at 15% off the regular price. The discount also works for upgrades, family packs, and even the Nisus Writer Pro printed manual.

Nisus Writer Express is an easy to use, lightweight word processor. Express features an elegant user interface and compatibility that has been universally praised by both users and press alike.

Nisus Writer Pro is a higher end word processor that has more features, more power, and is geared for the power user. Features such as Comments, Mail Merge, Table of Contents, Indexing, Bookmarks, Widow and Orphan control, Cross References, Full Screen, Line Numbering, and Text Wrap around images are included. An intuitive interface, powerful Find and Replace, a macro language, and a file format that can be read by just about anyone on any platform rounds out the feature set.

Now, I have four word processors on my computer. They’re the usual suspects, each with its own strengths and weaknesses, and I’ll freely admit that Nisus Writer Pro is the application I use most often for general word processing. It’s clean, it’s quick, and it’s easy to use. Even better, it produces very clean text that can easily be read by other apps, and it does a very good job of handling documents written in other word processors, provided they’re not layout heavy. You can see my review of Pro v1.0.3 at Applelinks.

Both Express and Pro are universal binaries, and require Mac OS 10.4 (Tiger) or later.

To take advantage of the 15% off sale, enter the coupon code “macworld2009” when purchasing the programs online. They will then see the discount reflected in the cart.

Product [Nisus Writer Express and Nisus Writer Pro]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Have you ever had that impulse on jumping to that new trend that everyone’s talking about, but you get yourself lost when you try to approach it?

It’s happened to me a few times since I began getting interested in technology and software applications in general.  Sometimes that new tool or device seems to be a great idea, and you think that you or your business could really benefit from it but, when you try to put your hands on it, it just becomes impossible for you to go from the idea to the fact.

Subversion is, in my opinion, one of the typical cases of this statement.  The idea behind it is great, the implementation is very good (no matter what Linus Torvalds says about it), and I don’t know a single person who, after I explain the idea behind the SVN, thinks that is not useful in his/her work environment. So, why doesn’t everyone use it? If it’s so great and so helpful improving control and productivity on projects, how is it that we don’t find subversion controlled projects everywhere?

The answer to me is really easy to point out. Making this thing work out is pretty difficult most of the time! I’ve written before about the strategy to follow when using SVN (from client or sever point of view) and other fine tools you could add to make yourself a nice work environment, but let’s face it, the tech work behind setting this environment is no trip to the beach.  So, many people get tired of trying and just give up more often than they succeed.

So, there’s no hope for those who would like to use subversion without wasting half the time of the project setting it up? Not so fast; there’s still hope.

Once in a while, a great group of dedicated professionals commit to a even greater idea so hard that they come out with that tool designed to make everyone’s life easier.  For the purpose of this article, that tool is Cornerstone, and that nice group of people behind the project is Zennaware.

Cornerstone is that wonderful, easy to use and flexible tool everyone (especially the ones who have dealt with tedious installation and setting processes) is waiting for, even when you’re not aware it’s actually being made.

Being deeply involved with subversion for a few years now, has made me an errant user of many Linux distributions (for server installations), Windows and Linux clients, and, since I’m a diehard Macintosh user, Mac SVN clients, as well.  This has been one of those enriching experiences that you would definitely give away if you had a Cornerstone-like tool from the beginning.  It was a necessity, not a choice, for sure.

Thanks to the work done with Cornerstone by the group at Zennaware, Mac users all around have the chance to use a world-class application meant to make interaction with subversion as easy as it should’ve been from the beginning.

Let’s start with the fact that this is not only a subversion client per se; what we have here is a fully equipped subversion tool—the only thing you’ll need to have in order to manage your projects with subversion from now on is a Mac.  This application brings a fully functional Subversion 1.4/1.5 installation, and every update of subversion will be included in the tool, so you won’t have to worry on updating SVN in your system as an isolated task.

If you prefer, you can use Cornerstone just as a client and keep your dedicated server architecture intact (as it is in my personal case), but that’s exactly my point here: if you prefer, if you want, if you like.  This is an important improvement on the “you have to” way of do things that’s been the rule since the beginning.

Another key factor in the process of building a good application for Mac users is making it Mac-like.  Cornerstone says “Mac Pride” in every click.  The incredible amount of detail reminds me that I’m working in a Mac all the time.  The application is fast, clean and sleek.  The help goes far away from just the application; it also includes subversion documentation and best practices, everything in the Apple Help Book format.

Writing about every nice feature would take another whole article. Rather, I invite you to go to the Zennaware website and see for yourself this wonderful tool and everything it’s capable of.

You’ll have a fully functional trial version for 14 days, and if you make the decision to buy it, you’ll have to pay a reasonable price of $69 for a single user.  You’ll also have a 5-user pack ($259) and a 10-user pack ($449), ideal for the enterprise environment.

Cornerstone is, without a doubt, a great and flexible application made to make our job easier when working with subversion.  You’ll have a nice working environment even if you’re on a laptop with its all-in-one UI mode optimized for use on small displays, or the multiple-window UI mode optimized for use on desktop systems with large (or even multiple) displays.

This is a serious candidate to end my search for subversion tools.

Product [Cornerstone]

Full Story » | Written by Juan Gonzalez for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

There is certainly no shortage of GTD apps in the OS X shareware world. Active developers, who respond well to community feedback, have proven to create healthy competition between apps. Just as Cultured Code released version 1.0 of their lauded app, Things, the Potion Factory has struck back with a free beta version of their own GTD app: The Hit List. The Hit List, at first glance, is similar to Things in its simplicity, as the novice can use it immediately.  There are, however, other advanced features, such as a tagging system that helps you organize tasks by category/topic.

What I like about The Hit List is that it is made to be used with the keyboard; a really nice option for those who enjoy using the keyboard rather than the mouse. Additionally, The Hit List organizes tasks into cards (much like the old hipster PDA) and folders, which can be tabbed, a great option. Overall, those who enjoy Things may want to give The Hit List a chance before they lay down the $50 needed for Things.

Finally, looking at the preferences, The Potion Factory says they are indeed planning on releasing an iPhone version of The Hit List, one that will sync with the desktop version.

A free public beta is available.

Product [The Hit List]

Full Story » | Written by Indraneel Purohit for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Mailplane, an application with a long history of private, public, alpha, and beta, has been upgraded to version 2.0 by Uncomplex. A free upgrade for users who purchased the initial version, Mailplane 2.0 includes many new features that help enhance the overall client experience. New shortcuts have been added to make managing emails quicker and more seamless. New, improved email notifications have been added to alert the user when a new email has arrived, ridding the need for Gmail Notifier. Multiple account support has been improved with an Account Drawer, allowing for seamless signing in and out of multiple accounts.

Even with all of this, there’s more. Full Gmail 2 support is included, with video chat support, color labels, and Quick Links. A free OmniFocus plug-in is included as well, for those who enjoy GTD. Simply select text, trigger OmniFocus’ clipping window, and then save! It’s that easy to turn an email into tasks.

Mailplane 2.0 provides a full Gmail client experience on OS X, and is available for $24.95. Current owners of previous versions can upgrade for free.

Product [Mailplane] Via [MacNN]

Full Story » | Written by Alec Feld for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Nisus Software has announced the release of Nisus Writer Pro 1.2. This latest version of their critically acclaimed (and my personal favorite) word processor adds a completely new file importer that improves file translations, especially for the .doc format. Additionally, export as Word file format (.doc) and the Open Document (.odt) format has been added. The Table of Contents feature also has a few new options: tab/backtab can be used to promote or demote TOC levels, and TOC entries can be rearranged by drag and drop within the navigator pane.

Other new features include automatically updating time stamps, Flesch and Kincaid reading ease scores, additional backup options, a Macroize menu, and editable document properties (author, company, copyright, etc.). There have also been additions to the Nisus Macro Language. A host of bug fixes and other enhancements have also been included.

Of these updates, I’m most curious to try out the new Word translations. In my review of Nisus Writer Pro v1.0.3 over at Applelinks, I wrote:

For (better or) worse, pretty much all word processors competing with Word have to support Word in order to make any sort of dent in the market. By default, Nisus Writer Pro saves files as RTFs, which Word can read. Nisus goes one better, however, by allowing you to save your files directly as Word docs. There will still be some discrepancies when opening your Nisus files in Word, depending upon the complexity of the layout, but they’re kept to a minimum. This problem is more apparent when opening Word docs in Nisus Writer Pro. Text documents with simple formatting are no problem, and I found that Nisus Writer Pro gave me cleaner, easier to format documents than even Apple’s Pages program. However, there’s pretty much no such thing as a simple Word document anymore, and Nisus did tend to choke to Word files with heavy graphics and “church secretary” layouts. I occasionally opened a graphic-heavy Word doc in Nisus only to have the graphics not show up at all.

Oh, but how’s this for irony? This new .docx format of Microsoft’s that not even Word can open? Nisus opens it just fine. We had a client send us a .docx PC file that my boss couldn’t open with Microsoft Word on his PC. I opened the document without trouble in Nisus Writer Pro, saved it to Word, and handed it off to my boss.

If this update addresses the issues with Word compatibility, I’ll update that review and post it here at Appletell.

In the meantime, the full list of features and fixes in Nisus Writer Pro 1.2 can be read at the Nisus Writer Pro release notes page. All of these new features add to an already rich feature set that includes an intuitive interface, multilingual text support, easy to use style system, non-contiguous selection, full screen mode, and a native file format (RTF) that almost any word processor can read.

Nisus Writer Pro 1.2 is available now for $79.00 ($45.00 upgrade). A three license Family Pack is also available for $99.00. Versions on CD are available for an additional $10.00 plus shipping. A printed manual is also available for $25.00 plus shipping.

This release is a free update to current license holders of Nisus Writer Pro.

Nisus Writer Pro 1.2 is a universal binary and requires Mac OS 10.4 (Tiger) or later. A 15 day demo is available.

Product [Nisus Writer Pro]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Hyperspaces is a new app that aims to add in some features to Apple’s Spaces that are in many other virtual desktop programs. It offers custom space names, different desktop backgrounds for different spaces, on-desktop labels, color tinting, and more. While it offers quite a few ways to differentiate spaces, it doesn’t quite seem worth the RAM space it takes up yet.

Personally, I would only use Hyperspaces for a little bit of spice in my Spaces experience. I find it pretty easy to stay oriented within four spaces. For others with upwards of six spaces, this could turn from UI-sparkle into a really useful app. The desktop labels are really customizable—from font, style, size, and color to position on screen. Unfortunately, when moving from a labeled space to an unlabeled one, it renders an animated exit for the label which is both distracting and choppy. I want the label to slide out along with the desktop, as if it was just a part of the desktop picture.

Hyperspaces also eats up quite a bit of RAM and really doesn’t blend in seamlessly, because it is a little slow and choppy. With luck, they will fix this with version 1.0.

You, yes you, can download the free public preview now.

Product [Hyperspaces]

Full Story » | Written by Adam Fisher-Cox for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

OpenOffice has released version 3 of its open-source alternative to the Microsoft Office suite of applications, which now includes a native version for Mac OS X.

The new OpenOffice 3 includes the following new features:

• ODF 1.2 Support
• Microsoft Office 2007 Import Filters
• Solver component which allows solving optimization problems
• Support for displaying custom error bars and regression equations
• Improved Crop Feature in Draw and Impress

The native Mac version of the productivity suite is only available for Macs with Intel processors. There are projects available for converting OpenOffice for PowerPC Macs, but an official version was not included in this release.

The OpenOffice web site is running quite slowly right now due to the overwhelming demand for the new 3.0 release, but you can skip directly to downloading the software by going here. For all Mac users, make sure the file you’re downloading includes MacOSXIntel_AQUA_install in the name, especially if you’re using an external mirror. OpenOffice 3 weighs in at 163MB, and is a great free and open source alternative to Microsoft’s proprietary Office suite of applications.

Read [Insanely Great Mac] Product [OpenOffice]

Full Story » | Written by Patrick Lutz for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Adobe Systems officially announced this morning the Creative Suite 4 product family. The CS4 programs will feature a new workflow and “hundreds of feature innovations,” including tighter integration with Flash technology across the entire product line. The updates will be seen across Adobe Creative Suite 4 Design editions, Creative Suite 4 Web editions, Creative Suite 4 Production Premium, Creative Suite 4 Master Collection, as well as 13 point products, 14 integrated technologies and seven services.

Some of the major applications receiving updates are Photoshop CS4, Photoshop CS4 Extended, InDesign CS4, Illustrator CS4, Flash CS4 Professional, Dreamweaver CS4, After Effects CS4, and Adobe Premiere Pro CS4.

From the release:

A simplified workflow in Adobe Creative Suite 4 enables users to design across media more efficiently by making it easier to complete common tasks and switch between mediums without leaving a project. InDesign CS4 includes a new Live Preflight tool that allows designers to catch production errors and a newly customizable Links panel to place files more efficiently. The revolutionary new Content-Aware Scaling tool in Photoshop CS4 and Photoshop CS4 Extended automatically recomposes an image as it is resized, preserving vital areas as it adapts to new dimensions. An expanded version of Dynamic Link in CS4 Production Premium enables users to move content between After Effects CS4, Adobe Premiere Pro CS4, Soundbooth® CS4, and Encore® CS4, so updates can be seen instantly without rendering.

Adobe is also focusing on the suites 3D features, providing the ability to paint, composite, and animate 3D models using familiar tools. In addition, Flash CS4 now features items such as the ability to apply tweens to objects instead of keyframes, as well as a new Bones to help create more realistic animations between linked objects.

Adobe Creative Suite 4 the products it comprises will be available in october 2008. The estimated street price for Adobe CS 4 Design Premium will be US$1,799, US$1,699 for CS4 Web Premium, US$1,699 for CS4 Production Premium, and US$2,499 for Adobe Creative Suite 4 Master Collection. Adobe plans to offer tiered upgrade pricing from previous versions, and, for a limited time, validly licensed customers of eligible versions of Adobe Creative Suite, Adobe Production Studio and Macromedia Studio will be able to upgrade to Creative Suite 4 for the CS3 upgrade price. To compare software/features of the different editions, visit the Adobe website.

Product [Adobe Creative Suite 4]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

DataViz a few years ago released a very promising product called Documents To Go. The main idea behind this application was to give mobile users the chance to manipulate Microsoft Office documents on a portable device.

It was the days when the Palm m100 just got out—when mobile devices without a color screen were still a normal thing to deal with—that I got to know this interesting product from DataViz.

I tried it back then, even through as many versions as I could install in my handheld, and it was great. It could never be a complete substitute to the desktop version for me, but it was a very powerful option for viewing and editing those Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents on the go.

Now DataViz has announced they’re working on a version of Documents To Go for the iPhone. They haven’t announced a released date yet, but you can visit their website and subscribe to receive e-mail updates in order to be one of the first to know the availability of the product.

I can’t wait to see how they manage to take advantage of the iPhone interface and capabilities to improve an already mature suite.

Product [Documents To Go]

Full Story » | Written by Juan Gonzalez for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

My relationship with Intuit is definitely a weird one.  It’s been on and off for years now, and while I can’t deny I’m not entirely satisfied with the treatment they gave Mac users in general, I still find myself falling back to their products. At least Quicken, with all its known faults, is one product I like.

I know there are other options, I just don’t feel interested in trying them out. Even though I think Intuit continuously drops the ball for us with some buggy features, delayed updates of applications, and Windows-based solutions as a priority, I can’t avoid feeling excited when I hear some new feature is out for the Mac community. That’s exactly what I’m bringing you today—a new service from Intuit, deployed for iPhone users, which I don’t completely like, but I’m glad it exists. It seems this relationship will continue the same for a while longer.

First, let’s review the good news. If you happen to be a satisfied user of QuickBooks, aand you’re also an iPhone user, this could be great news for you and your business. Intuit has released a new online service for QuickBooks users which they claim to be perfect for business owners on the go.

This new service will allow you to view read-only versions of:

• Balance Sheet and Profit/Loss reports
• Bank account and credit card balances
• Vendor, customer, and employee lists
• Accounts receivable and payable
• QuickBooks Online contact information, which works with your iPhone to make calls, create emails, and even look up addresses using Google Maps

It’s nice to have some iPhone application integration, and it could be really useful for mobile executives to have updated information of their business; after all, we know how important information is in the decision-making process these days.

Even when I could look the other way with the fact that you can’t actually edit your information and just appreciate that they’ve put these nice features for me to use, it’s really impossible for me to do that. Not only because they haven’t implemented them yet, but because, according to Intuit, they’re not even planning on doing it.

If you want to add another detail to the release of the online service, for now, QuickBooks Online requires a Windows-based computer running Internet Explorer to work properly. If you own a Mac, you’ll have to go to Boot Camp or a virtualization solution to run it.

So, it comes again; that familiar feeling that Intuit takes a good initiative and turns it into something to bother me. Not because I use QuickBooks (which I don’t) and I have an iPhone (which I also don’t), but because they like to show us what it could be, what they can do, and then not do it.

QuickBooks Online costs $9.95 per month. If you’re already an online user, you won’t have to pay anything extra. If you’re not, but you’re interested in testing this service, Intuit allows you to try it for free for 30 days.

As it has happened before, I hope Mac users get the word out and start demanding better options for this service, which I’d personally like to see extended to Quicken sometime. At least that I can run on my Mac.

And finally, after writing this article, I went to the Intuit website and signed up to be a beta tester of their new Quicken Financial Life for Mac! I’m so excited to start feeling disappointed again. They’ve promised me that it won’t be the case this time, and I can’t help myself in believing them, as usual. You’ll know my thoughts about it very soon.

Product [QuickBooks Online for iPhone]

Full Story » | Written by Juan Gonzalez for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Pageonce is an interesting service, that provides centralized access to different types of Internet accounts. The main idea behind this service is to allow customers to get into their e-mail account(s), social networks, shopping pages, and financial services, among others, from one single virtual door where everything is organized and easily accessible.

One of the many features of Pageonce is the possibility of getting alerts from all your associated services, such as flight changes, earned miles, financial status, pre-programmed payments, etc.

A few months ago, Pageonce added a new extension to its already useful service. iOnce 2.0 is the mobile experience of the master service from Pageonce, and they’ve developed it for the mobile phone of the moment: the iPhone. This new version improves security, and brings the centralized online management to a new level. 

When you think of having it all in one single administrative site, and your access platform is a traditional computer, services like the one Pageonce offers are optional, and could be seen by many as a matter of taste and preference. 

Maybe you are not attracted to the idea of paying for that kind of online service, since you don’t mind opening tabs in your browser or having multiple windows distributed across you computer’s screen. Maybe you have the same few passwords for everything, so remembering them isn’t a huge effort. But, when it comes to a mobile platform, that point of view could be dramatically changed.

When workspace and screen size are limited, any alternative to optimize your time and effort is appreciated.  Doing your usual tasks on a mobile device would not be as convenient as it is on the big screen. That’s when iOnce offers you an attractive solution, making it easy for you to navigate multiple pages through a single optimized space.

iOnce takes advantage of the great multi-touch user interface of the iPhone, making it easy for you to work with thousands of internet services, also receiving updates from all your accounts in one single view. iOnce is definitely an Internet tool with many features to offer iPhone users all over the World.

Product [iOnce] Related Info [iOnce Videos]

Full Story » | Written by Juan Gonzalez for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Lemke Software has announced the immediate availability of GraphicConverter 6.1.1, their image editing and conversion utility from way back. GraphicConverter is the ultimate tool for image editing, image browsing, metadata editing, slideshows, image conversion from more than 200 file formats, and much more. There was a time back in my layout/design days when Graphic Converter was necessary for survival. And although most image editing programs now accept a wider array of formats, GraphicConverter is as useful now as it was when it launched in the early 90s; perhaps even more so with it’s growing number of features.

Version 6.1.1 includes many bug fixes and little enhancements, and is a recommended update for all customers.

New Feature Highlights:

• Decoding of all images of mime attachments added (UB)
• Set label in operator added (UB)
• Sort by label and creation date option added to browser

Updated features:

• Drawing inside alpha channel added as option
• Calliper calibration supports shift for horizontal or vertical mode only
• Set rating does no longer rewrite the exif data
• Sort folders option added to catalog printing
• Saving icns saves the large 512x512 icons (UB)
• IPTC window in browser support unicode display (UB)

GraphicConverter supports German, English, French, Danish, Sweden, Italian, Spanish, Chinese (simplified), Chinese (traditional), Czech, Dutch, and Catalan languages.

Minimum Requirements:

• Mac OS 10.4.4 or later for the Universal Binary version
• Mac OS 10.1.5 or later for the X version
• Mac OS 8.6 - 9.2.2 for the Classic version
• 40 MB Hard Drive space

GraphicConverter 6.1.1 is a free update to registered users of GraphicConverter 6.0-6.1. New users may purchase the software for $34.95 USD directly from their website. A free trial version is available.

Product [GraphicConverter]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Geeksuit’s newest software creation, Client Folder Maker 2.0, is now available to the public with a $14.75 price tag for a one user license. This application “...is a simple to use, general purpose folder creation and management tool for the busy desktop publisher, prepress operator or web designer.” With a few simply clicks and some typing, you can have CFM set up a hierarchy of folders that are able to be recreated anywhere on your system, saving you a ton of time. Sounds easy to me.

The two main pieces of information needed to create this hierarchy are simply the client’s name and the job number. However, these variables can be changed to suite your style of working. Furthermore, any of the folders that are created by CFM can be altered, deleted, or moved, giving you tons of customization over your “folder tree.”

Since this app is a universal binary, it will run on any PPC or Intel based Macs that are running on Mac OS X 10.4 or higher. You can purchase the app or try it out with a 15 day trial.

Product [Client Folder Maker 2.0]

Full Story » | Written by Josh Holat for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Dare to Be Creative has recently announced their new product, ResizeMe, a batch image and photo editor for Mac OS X 10.4 and higher. ResizeMe can be used to flip, rotate, and scale thousands of photos at one time, and it supports all of the popular image formats (.pdf, .tif, .png, .jpg) while managing to protect the EXIF data.

There is a 10-day trial available for this 2.6MB application, and it will cost you $19.95 if you want to purchase it. It’s a universal binary, so it will work on both PPC and Intel based Macs.

This is the third tool from Dare to Be Creative that deals with batch images. Along with ResizeMe, they have Renamer4Mac, a batch file renamer, and Dragoman, a batch image and photo converter. If you have a large quantity of photos to which you need to perform a similar task in an efficient manner, it seems like Dare to Be Creative would be the place to go. If you have used or plan on using any of these applications, be sure to let us know how they are.

Product [ResizeMe]

Full Story » | Written by Josh Holat for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

DEVONtechnologies, LLC has opened the grace period for free upgrades to DEVONthink 2.0, and offers all editions of DEVONthink, as well as DEVONnote, for 25 percent off exclusively for two days. DEVONthink is designed to manage and keep in order all those disparate pieces of information so important to your work or studies. As you become more experienced with DEVONthink and its easy, intuitive interface you will quickly find more exciting ways of using your data.

Starting July 1st, 2008, everyone who buys licenses for DEVONthink Personal, Pro, Pro Office, or DEVONnote will be eligible for free upgrades to version 2.0 when it is released later this year. A regularly updated thread on the progress on version 2.0 can be found in the DEVONtechnologies user forum.

“With the opening of the grace period, we now welcome all new users with a free ticket for the upcoming version 2.0,” said Eric Böhnisch-Volkmann, president of DEVONtechnologies. “And for everyone who has been reluctant to jump on the DEVONthink bandwagon with version 2.0 on the horizon, we will add another incentive: On July 1st and 2nd, we will give 25 percent on all editions of DEVONthink as well as DEVONnote.”

All editions of DEVONthink require Mac OS X 10.4 or later and can be downloaded from DEVON Technologies website. They can be test-driven for free for 150 hours of non-continuous runtime before they need to be properly licensed.

Product [DEVONthink 2.0]

Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

AssistiveWare, purveyor of many accesability applications for Mac, has officially announced the release of KeyStrokes version 4.1.  KeyStrokes is an on-screen keyboard and word suggestion tool for those with disabilities with a need to use a computer. 

KeyStroke is a great tool for those who cannot use a real keyboard. With an integrated word-prediction tool and LayoutKitchen 2.1.1, users can customize their interfaces and type as fast as they can click. The program is not only attractive for the disabled, but possibly for graphic designers who don’t want to have to switch from a tablet to a real keyboard.

The update, now version 4.1, improves support for universal binary, along with better support for Spaces in Leopard.  It requires Mac OS X v10.4 or later, and carries an MSRP $299.  An upgrade from version 3 or earlier is $99, and the upgrade from v4 to v4.1 is free.  Everything is available on the AssistiveWare website.

Product [KeyStrokes]

Full Story » | Written by Mark Rowland for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

PublicSpace, makers of the popular applications MacBreakz, The Big Mean Folder Machine and A Better Finder Attributes, has officially announced version 7.9.9 of their application A Better Finder Rename. 

A Better Finder Rename is a tool for people who need to rename files of all different types en masse. Whether it’s a bunch of pictures from a vacation, some MP3s from a disc, whatever, it can be handled and renamed by A Better Finder Rename. The application provides users with a full Cocoa interface, detachable instant preview window, drag and drop installation, file renaming (no matter what the complexity), and Unicode support for international use.

The main feature in the update is the addition of support for UTF-16 ID3 tags in MP3 music files.

A Better Finder Rename requires Mac OS X v10.4 or later, Universal Binary support for PowerPC or Intel Architecture, and 5 MB of Hard Drive Space. A single user license is priced at $24.95, and Business and Enterprise licenses and forever-upgrade options are also available.

The only question is, why buy $25 worth of software when you have Automator?

Product [A Better Finder Rename]

Full Story » | Written by Mark Rowland for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Chris Paveglio, the mastermind behind such products as PDF Bee and ID Font Catalog, has officially announced version 3.3 of his popular InDesign Image Catalog. 

InDesign Image Catalog is a tool used by people who need a coherent list or contact sheet made from images of theirs. Users can quickly create their catalogs, along with the ability to quickly input other information such as name, file path, and placement scale. 

v3.3 includes faster viewing of images, along with fixes for issues when running the program with Mac OS X v10.5 Leopard. Many other new preference setting have been added, such as limiting the number of images on a page, removing file paths and names from the catalog, and whether or not to use a document title.

The application requires any version of Mac OS X 10.4 or 10.5, and supports either PowerPC or Intel Architecture. Adobe InDesign CS3 is also needed for operation. The update from versions 3.0, 3.1 or 3.2 is free, and new users can purchase v3.3 from Chris Paveglio’s website for USD $20.

Product [InDesign Image Catalog]

Full Story » | Written by Mark Rowland for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Slife labs, a company based out of Atlanta that makes activity intelligence and analytics software for individuals and groups alike, has officially released the newest version of their time tracking and management tool, Slife. Slife is a tool targeted at groups and is used for time management, and allows the user to create everything needed to make a goal.

New features in version 2.0 includes almost entirely redesigned code, simplified UI, privacy controls, time goals and activity management, and unique time tracking tools.

“Slife 2.0 brings the idea of activity and productivity management to a whole new level”, said Edison Thomaz, CEO of Slife Labs. “It is an automatic time tracking tool that makes it incredibly easy for designers, consultants or anyone else to monitor how much time they’ve spent on projects. Once you use Slife, you can’t go back to time sheets. Slife is time tracking for the 21st century”.

With the new version of Slife being well received so far, the application is billed as the best tool to help the user and their group to realize a goal. And to help users even more, Slife Labs also unveiled their new web client, Slife Teams which enables users to view and edit time sheets from anywhere that has an internet connection.

The application is free of charge, requires Leopard, and is available on the Slife Labs website.

Product [Slife v2.0]

Full Story » | Written by Mark Rowland for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Here’s another one of Limit Point Software’s Mac applications, this time called Mailings v1.9.37. From its name alone, you could immediately guess what this software offers up. Mailings is a rich and full-featured application you can use to do your batch e-mailing tasks for marketing, news announcements, product updates and other purposes. Using this software, you can send web pages or text documents—including their respective attachments—to multiple recipients.

As much as we want to give you a complete rundown of the features of Mailings 1.9.37, we’re afraid it might take us several pages to do it, so we’re just going to give you some of its features, and these include:

• simple, intuitive interface
• CSV or TSV import facility
• full address book support for groups and distribution list
• simulated send mode
• scheduled mails
• personalized greetings
• and much more

You can have this software up and running on your Mac (with at least Mac OS X v10.3.9) for $25. Like many other Limit Point Software products, Mailings is also part of a software bundle which allows you to download and install Mailings for a discounted price.

Product [Mailings]

Full Story » | Written by Arnold Zafra for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »