Mac Power Users Episode 68, Workflows with Rod Roddenberry is live. In addition to being a certified Apple geek, Rod is doing some amazing things with the Star Trek franchise that his father began. Get the episode over at 5by5. Also, don’t forget to subscribe in iTunes.
One of my favorite people in the Mac community is Jean MacDonald (Twitter), one of the owners of Smile, makers of my beloved TextExpander. The thing about Jean is that every time I spend any significant time with her, I learn some new thing about her that I never knew before, like that she is in a rock band, Ruby Calling, and on the board of directors for Rock ‘n’ Roll Camp for Girls. So Jean, shown us your home screen.
;)
What are some of your favorite apps?
Twelve apps are Apple’s default apps, but I use those apps all the time. Of the remaining eight third-party apps, here are a few of the ones I find most interesting:
GroceryIQ: I like it because it allows me to segment my shopping list by store. There are certain items I only buy at Trader Joe’s, versus New Seasons or Fred Meyer. A shopping list is important part of my process of getting things done. I need to have an easy way to get things off my mind and onto a list that I won’t forget.
WriteRoom: This is my default note-taking app. I like the simplicity of it, and that it has TextExpander support built-in.
Due: This lets me set alarms on an ad-hoc basis. It’s much easier than using the Clock or Calendar app.
Maybe the most interesting thing about my home screen is what’s NOT there: TextExpander. Obviously, I use TextExpander all the time. But on the iPhone and iPad, the OS does not let TextExpander function the way it does on the Mac. It’s still very useful, but more so in the apps that have added support for expanding TextExpander snippets. Osfoora for Twitter and WriteRoom both have TextExpander integration. TextExpander is on Screen 3, along with all the other apps that support it. It just doesn’t get opened very often, especially now that all my snippets are synced via Dropbox.
What is your favorite app?
Maps. When I got my first iPhone, I was heading out on a solo road trip from Portland to Northern California. I never anticipated how useful the Maps app would be, even before there was GPS in the phone. I love calculating how much time is left until I reach my destination. I was just in Chicago, and I used the Public Transit option to plan my trips around the city. I use the app to check traffic. And I use it just for fun, to go look at some exotic destination in satellite view, or to show someone my neighborhood in southeast Portland.
Which app is your guilty pleasure?
Cat Piano. I use it to mess with dogs.
What is the app you are still missing?
I want an app that can identify trees and flowers from a snapshot. Kind of like Shazam for plants.
How many times a day do you use your iPhone and iPad?
My iPhone is almost never more than a foot away from me. I use it too many times a day to count. I use the iPad two or three times a day, more if I’m traveling.
If you were in charge at Apple, what would you add or change?
I would let developers respond to App Store reviews. The system right now is so frustrating. Frequently, the gripes could be resolved with a quick response. I’d also like to encourage all your readers to take a few minutes to leave reviews for their favorite apps. It really does make a difference!
Thanks Jean.
I consider Instapaper a transformative technology. It changed, for the better, what and how I read. I have a collection of RSS feeds and twitter friends that throw interesting links at me every day. From all of those sources I quickly select bits and pieces for reading later, in Instapaper. Both my twitter client (Tweet Bot) and RSS reader (Reeder) make this painless. I’ve taken the time to create folders in my Instapaper accounts so whatever I’m feeling like reading, I just need to tap a button and my own self curated magazine appears.
I love Instapaper so much that when Instapaper announced a subscription plan of $1 per month (with no initial extra features or benefits), I jumped on it. I’m dependent on Instapaper and paying $1 a month to help keep the lights on was an easy call.
This investment however is starting to pay off. There are some third party Mac apps appearing that help supercharge your Instapaper account. Two I’ve been enjoying lately are Read Now and Readomator
I’ve wondered why Instapaper never created a native Mac OS X app. I suspect it probably has something to do with the insane number of iOS devices out there and the way Marco Arment lovingly sweats every detail. Regardless, someone else did create a Mac OS X Instapaper app, called Read Now. Read Now, $5, hooks into your Instapaper (or Read it Later account) and gives you an attractive alternative to the Web browser. (You need to have a paid Instapaper account for this to work.)
The overall spit and polish of Read Now reminds me of the refined minimalism of the Reeder RSS reader on the Mac. Read Now looks fantastic in full screen mode on my MacBook Air. While granted Instapaper has a clean enough web interface (shown below), I’d argue Read Now is visually the better experience.
Read Now has a few light and dark looks in addition to the paper view (pictured). You can also adjust the typography and font size. Read Now accommodates sharing to Bit.ly, Twitter, Pinboard, Delicious, and Evernote.
The general preferences give you the usual switches and buttons to control the interface and badge icons. One of the first things I did was turn off the badge icon. I’m weird that way.
;)
Where the app falls down a little bit for me is keyboard controls and gestures. There are only three assignable keyboard shortcuts, all of which relate to operating Read Now (such as “Open Read Now”).
;)
What I’d like is the ability to send articles to folders or the archive with keyboard shortcuts. This option doesn’t exist. Instead, you’ve got to click and drag. Ugg. (2011-01-05 Correction: Opt-A sends an article to the archive. There still is no way to keyboard save to folders.) Using Brett Terpstra’s Instapaper Beyond plugin on the Instapaper website, I can file articles with keyboard shortcuts. I’m hoping the developer sends some love to us keyboard jockeys with a future release. Likewise the gesture controls are a little nutty. With Lion you move between articles with 4 fingers while simultaneously holding down the Alt (Option) key.
While all of this results in slowing me down a bit, I’m sticking with Read Now. The ability to escape the browser and give Instapaper its own space on my Mac hooked me.
Readomator, $4, automates the process of turning Instapaper articles into spoken word tracks in iTunes. In fairness, setting up an Automator script to do this for you really isn’t that hard. Nevertheless, for $4, Readomator gets the job done and takes all of the work out of the process. Again, this requires a subscription Instapaper account.
;)
Once you punch in your Instapaper account name and password, Readomator presents your list of articles. By pressing the podcast button at the top of the screen, Readomator goes into your iTunes account and creates a podcast based on your currently selected folder. Inside that podcast you can “get” an article. Readomator then grabs the relevant article text, converts it to audio, and drops the audio podcast into your podcast feed. That is it. No more steps. The next time you sync up, the podcast loads and you can listen to your favorite Instapapered (is that a word?) article.
;)
The Readomator preferences lets you set the reading speed and voice. Mac OS X Lion added several good new voices. Currently, Serena reads my selected articles on my morning commute.
I’m really pleased to see these apps growing out of Instapaper and hope enterprising developers continue to make Instapaper awesome.
