APPLEVIEWS » applications

Find Your Stuff With A Nifty Little Blast App

Tina Brunner — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 15:45:08 +0000

Do you ever have lots of documents that you open at any given day and find that you need to re-open that document at a later time and become frustrated when you can’t remember where the document went and what you named it? I know that I occasionally have that problem. That is, until I found this nifty little application that sits in my menu bar ready to help me out.
Blast (by Apparent Software) is an inexpensive Mac OS X app that helps you stay on top of your recently opened documents, images, movies, music, folders, and applications.

When using Blast, you will see a HUD like window with sections on the top for All files, Documents, Images, Movies, Audio, Folders and Applications. This is how Blast filters your data. You can always change these filters to whatever you want to keep track of by clicking the cog wheel icon on the top right hand side of the window. On the left hand side, you will see your Applications and Documents folders. If you decide you don’t want these folders, you simply drag them off the window. You can also drag items to the left side of the window from your filtered list, sort of like creating a favorites area.

The settings for Blast allow you to change which types of recent files (created/modified or opened files), decide if you want to show folders or applications in the list, change your menu bar icon or set up a different keyboard shortcut to open blast.

Overall, Blast is simple to use and does the job. It has a lot of potential and helps make working on your Mac a little easier. I like that you can change things and make it work for you. Give it a spin by going to http://www.apparentsoft.com/blast. The pricing is fair: Personal is $9.95 and Family is for $19.95. You can’t beat the price. I use Blast practically every day and find it easy to set up and use. If you use or have used Blast, share your experience by leaving a comment and sharing the wealth with our fellow readers. Don’t forget to share this with others!

Your Docks New Best Friend

Tina Brunner — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 21:33:56 +0000

The other day, I was searching for links to include in my weekly Links of Interest (which I haven’t submitted in quite some time now. I happened to come across a nifty little tool that is surprisingly only $7.99! You can download a free trial of this app, (which is for Mac OS X Snow Leopard only) and use it for as long as you want, with the occasional nag screen to purchase. So, without further adieu, this nifty little app is called DockView. Here is some more info about the app:

DockView extends the dock and makes it aware of any windows you have open. Whenever you point your mouse over an app icon, thumbnail images of the windows are displayed.

DockView helps you visualize any windows you have open and easily find what you are looking for. It can also display a thumbnail preview when clicking the Command+Tab application switcher.

Here are some other features listed from the Kapeli site:

* Live previews. The previews refresh constantly so that users can keep an eye on windows without activating them
* Activate windows. Users can click anywhere on a preview to activate the corresponding window
* Close windows. DockView provides a very convenient way of closing windows
* Control iTunes. The image previews for iTunes show Play, Pause and Skip buttons so that users can keep iTunes minimized and still control it
* Customizable. The previews can be any size users want
* No hacks. DockView doesn’t modify the Dock or any system file

Here are shots of the preferences:

Kapeli is a one-man software project ran by Bogdan Popescu, a Software Engineering student at Birmingham University. Kapeli has a simple goal: to solve some of the most common problems users encounter on Mac OS X. He offers a few other useful apps but I haven’t checked them out yet. To download DockView and read more about it, go to this link: http://kapeli.com/dockview/

I now use DockView all the time and it makes it SO much easier to get my work done. Give it a try and let me know what you think or if you use DockView and would like to share your experience, please leave a comment and share the wealth with our fellow readers. Oh, and don’t forget to share this article with others.

20 Photo Apps To Help You Create Great Photos

Tina Brunner — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 00:55:32 +0000

You’ve got a really cool camera and take pictures as often as you can. Now all you need to do is find an app to help you make them better. There are plenty of tools available to use for editing your images. This list contains applications to purchase and a few that are free. Click on the links for more information and trial downloads.

iPhoto ’09 *

Part of iLife ’09 (bundled on Mac)
iPhoto makes managing your photos as easy as taking them. It helps you organize your photos so you can find them fast. Edit them so they look their best. And share them with your friends and family. http://www.apple.com/ilife/iphoto/

Aperture 3 *

The fun begins even before you finish importing your photos. Double-click thumbnails in the Import window to view images, play videos, and hear audio files before they’re fully imported. If you’re on a deadline, you can begin adjusting an image even if it’s still being copied from your memory card to your Mac.
While the files are importing, Aperture 3 grabs data like shutter speed, aperture, lens, and focus points and starts sorting it right away. You can even add your own keywords and automatically apply an adjustment preset on import.
For extra flexibility, Aperture lets you store your images wherever and however you like — directly in Aperture 3, on external drives, or in their original folders. Choose to import RAW and JPEG images together or as separate images so you can work with them individually. And Aperture 3 can automatically back up your master images to a second drive during import. http://www.apple.com/aperture/features/

Adobe Photoshop CS5 *

Adobe® Photoshop® CS5 software redefines digital imaging with a strong focus on photography; breakthrough capabilities for superior image selections, image retouching, and realistic painting; and a wide range of workflow and performance enhancements. http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/compare/

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 *

Adobe® Photoshop® Lightroom® 3 software helps you bring out the best in your photographs, whether you’re perfecting one image, searching for ten, processing hundreds, or organizing thousands. Create incredible images that move your audience. Experiment fearlessly with state-of-the-art nondestructive editing tools. Easily manage all your images. And showcase your work in elegant print layouts, slide shows, and web galleries, as well as on popular photo-sharing sites. All from within one fast, intuitive application. http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshoplightroom/

Adobe Illustrator CS5 *

Create distinctive vector artwork for any project. Used by design professionals worldwide, Adobe® Illustrator® CS5 software provides precision and power with sophisticated drawing tools, expressive natural brushes, a host of time-savers, and integration with Adobe CS Live online services.* CS Live services are complimentary for a limited time. http://www.adobe.com/products/illustrator/

PhotoShop Elements 8

Adobe® Photoshop® Elements 8 is the leading photo-editing software for Mac, combining power and simplicity so you can easily go beyond the basics to tell great stories with your photos. Make your photos look extraordinary, share your life stories in creative ways, and easily manage all your photos. Works great with iPhoto! http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshopelmac/

Painter 11

Corel® Painter™ 11 is the ultimate digital art studio for anyone ready to expand their definition of creativity. Working with the most advanced digital painting and natural media tools available, you can create the art you’ve always envisioned. http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite/us/en/Product/1166553885783#tabview=tab0

INKSCAPE (FREE)

An Open Source vector graphics editor, with capabilities similar to Illustrator, CorelDraw, or Xara X, using the W3C standard Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format. Inkscape supports many advanced SVG features (markers, clones, alpha blending, etc.) and great care is taken in designing a streamlined interface. It is very easy to edit nodes, perform complex path operations, trace bitmaps and much more. We also aim to maintain a thriving user and developer community by using open, community-oriented development. http://inkscape.org/index.php?lang=en

Sketch 1.0

The most important part of any drawing application is arguably the drawing area, so we’ve just made Sketch contain one big and infinitely large view with no palettes to be seen. That doesn’t mean we’ve compromised on the tools though. http://www.bohemiancoding.com/sketch

Pixelmator 1.6

Pixelmator, the beautifully designed, easy-to-use, fast and powerful image editor for Mac OS X has everything you need to create, edit and enhance your images. http://www.pixelmator.com/

Acorn 2.5

Everyone needs to edit images at some point, but not everyone has the time to learn super pricey wizbang image editing programs. This is why we created Acorn. Add text and shapes to your digital pictures. Combine images together to create your own. Work with layers to touch up your favorites or make something new from scratch. Do all this and more with Acorn. http://flyingmeat.com/acorn/

Picturesque

Picturesque is a simple app with a simple goal: to make images more beautiful. Whether you are in web or print, your images can benefit from a touch of Picturesque magic. http://www.acqualia.com/picturesque/

GIMP (FREE)

GIMP on OS X is a project, which provides pre-build and easy to install application bundles of The GIMP for Mac OS X. http://gimp.lisanet.de/Website/Download.html

ArtRage 3

With ArtRage you can paint with oils and watercolors, sketch with pencils, spray stickers over your canvas, and much more. Stencils and rulers let you create precise shapes or smooth curves freehand. Tracing and Reference images let you load photos to recreate either by eye or by letting ArtRage select colors for you as you paint. For professional users, ArtRage offers Layers and Layer Groups, Layer Blend Modes compatible with the PSD file format, plugin Filter suport and more. http://www.artrage.com/

BibblePro 5.1.1

Bibble 5 is an ambitious project to revolutionize Digital Photographic Workflow. Expanding on Bibble 4′s speed and power, Bibble 5 is designed to unite unparalleled photographic editing capability and blazing speed in a sleek, modern interface. Bibble 5 offers Complete Selective editing – apply essentially any image adjustment to the whole image, or just a portion of the image – Asset Management that is fast and flexible, and an intuitive design that’s easy to learn, and is up to 88 times as fast as other similar applications. http://bibblelabs.com/

ImageLobe 4

ImageLobe allows you to very easily apply complex effects to your image files. Simply drag an image onto the ImageLobe window and select the effect you wish to apply. Over 40 image effect types are available, many of them highly configurable. Then drag the image back out to save it. It’s as simple as that. Try it out. All the features of ImageLobe can be tried in demo mode. Purchasing a license for $20 will allow you to use the application with large image files. http://www.js8media.com/imagelobe/index.html

Picasa 3.8 (FREE)*

Picasa is free photo editing software from Google that makes your pictures look great. Sharing your best photos with friends and family is as easy as pressing a button! http://picasa.google.com/mac/

DSLR Assistant

DSLR Assistant is a camera control software which allows to operate a Canon EOS digital camera from a Mac computer remotely using USB or Firewire cable.
It offers a comprehensive set of features that allows to control practically all camera parameters, key settings and shooting functions remotely.
DSLR Assistant automates the process of downloading and saving pictures on the computer. Images taken remotely can be saved directly to the Mac hard drive; there is no need for concern about changing the camera’s CompactFlash memory card during remote shooting. In addition images are automatically organized, so you will need no time to find images you want.
Any photographer is able to improve workflow efficiency using our camera remote control software product. DSLR Assistant is very user friendly and easy to use. http://www.kaasoft.com/

iStudio Publisher

iStudio Publisher, the new page layout and design application for Mac OS X has arrived. Produce professional looking magazines, brochures, adverts, reports, newsletters, greetings cards and many other types of publications without having to learn overcomplicated design applications. iStudio Publisher has a simple and intuitive user interface that has everything in easy reach allowing you to spend more time on your design work, and less trying to find those elusive features. http://www.istudiopublisher.com/index.php/home/home

Compositor

Compositor has a very full feature set. You can make images from scratch, or enhance your images in subtle ways, or remake them into wildly colored masterpieces with ease. http://www.artlythere.com/Compositor.html

This concludes the list. The items listed with an (*) are applications that I use most frequently. Some of these apps are a bit pricey and some of the free apps can do what you may need. If you use any apps that you think is awesome and not on the list, leave a comment and share the wealth with our fellow readers. Enjoy your new love for creative photography!

Effective Apps To WOW Your Mac Desktop

Tina Brunner — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 00:29:09 +0000

There are a few tools that you can use to customize your desktop. Most of the apps in this list are free or free to try. They are fairly easy to use right away and you can find resources on the Internet to make them even better. This list contains apps that are most frequently used by users who customize their desktops. The list includes a link to the site and a brief description.

Adium

http://adium.im/

Adium is an instant messaging application for Mac OS X that can connect to AIM, MSN, Jabber, Yahoo, and more. You can even find custom themes to use with Adium. (FREE)
Here are two sites to find xtras for Adium:
http://www.adiumxtras.com/
http://www.deviantart.com/#order=9&q=adium

Bowtie

http://bowtieapp.com/

Bowtie is an application that allows you to control iTunes with customizable shortcuts, it submits your songs to Last.fm with support for Loving and Banning, and sports a very simple, yet powerful, html5 + css + javascript based theming system. You can find themes for Bowtie in a variety of places on the Internet. (FREE)
Here are three sites to find themes for bowtie:
http://www.jackrebel.com/category/bowtie-themes/
http://www.iconpaper.org/bowtie-en/
http://www.deviantart.com/#order=9&q=bowtie+theme

CandyBar

http://iconfactory.com/software/candybar

CandyBar is easy to use and gives you a safe way to customize icons found on your system and application toolbars. You can also customize your apps, folders, clipping icons, locations and more. (Free to try/$12.95 to purchase.)

DragThing

http://www.dragthing.com/

Use DragThing to keep all your documents, folders, and applications a single click away. It is highly flexible, allows multiple docks, each customized to suit your exact needs.
It stores frequently used clippings such as text and pictures, and lets you easily paste them into other applications with just a click. (Free to try/$29.00 single user. Other prices available for multiple users.)

Img2Icns

http://www.img2icnsapp.com/

Img2icns is an application to create icons from images or images from icons, keeping them organized for future use. Creating an icon is as simple as dropping one or more images into Img2icns and choosing an export format. (Free Version and $12.90 for Pro)

Magnifique

(site down)

Magnifique allows you to browse beautifully crafted themes and apply them to your system with ease. The site is currently down. I have found a download at http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/30497/magnifique . I do not recall if it comes preinstalled with themes, if not, you would have to download from sites like deviantART or other locales. (FREE)

GeekTool

http://projects.tynsoe.org/en/geektool/

GeekTool is a PrefPane for Mac OS 10.5. It allows you to display different kinds of information on your desktop, provided by 3 default modes:
File mode is used to monitor your MacOS X activity with /var/log/system.log, or any file that you want to follow.
Shell mode is used to launch custom scripts or commands.
Image mode helps you monitor bandwith usage, CPU loads, memory availability of your server, via tools like MRTG, Cacti, or RRD. (FREE)

NerdTool

http://mutablecode.com/apps/nerdtool

NerdTool is a GeekTool like application that displays shell output and more directly on your desktop. Unlike GeekTool, it is run like normal applications.
Nerdtool allows you to display many things directly on top of your desktop; weather reports, headline news, and system vitals are just a few uses. Nerdtool is capable of displaying shell outputs with ANSI escaped formatting, but can also manipulate the final output’s colors, size, and font. If more intricacy is desired, Nerdtool is also capable of displaying images, HTML documents, and other higher forms of media. (FREE)

Overflow

http://stuntsoftware.com/overflow/

Overflow is an application designed to quickly launch applications, open documents, or access folders while reducing the number of items needed in your Dock.
Any item you see in the Finder can be added to the Overflow interface, making it accessible through a few simple mouse clicks or keystrokes. You still have quick access, but now that item is tucked away in Overflow instead of cluttering up your Dock.
The interface is resizable, and fully customizable. Create separate categories for your applications, work files, games, or anything else you want to be able to access quickly. (Free to try/$14.95 to purchase.)

DateLine

http://machinecodex.com/dateline/index.php

DateLine is a small app that displays a linear calendar on your desktop in a transparent window. It provides easy access to iCal by double clicking on a day. The background and text colors are customizable with support for transparency. (Free/Unlock features for $4.95 donationware.)

Rainlendar

http://www.rainlendar.net/cms/index.php

Rainlendar is a feature rich calendar application that is easy to use and doesn’t take much space on your desktop. The application is platform independent so you can run it on all major operating systems: Windows, Linux and Mac OS X.
The appearance can be customized with skins and you can even mix different skins together. Many of these skins can be found on http://www.customize.org/rainlendar or find skins at deviantART. (Rainlendar Lite is Free/$13.49 Pro.)

SuperDocker

(site down)

SuperDocker is a free utility that gives you the opportunity to customize some aspects of your system. For example, you can customize your Dock, your Dashboard, and even the Safari progress bar. And because the appearance customization is useless for some people, SuperDocker also brings up the ability to activate some hidden features. SuperDocker site is down but I found a site that has a download: http://mac.softpedia.com/progDownload/SuperDocker-Download-30474.html (tested and it worked). (FREE)
Here are a few links to download docks:
http://www.deviantart.com/#order=9&q=mac+docks
http://www.leoparddocks.com/Browse_Leopard_Docks_Designs.php
http://www.dockulicious.com/docks/
http://www.jackrebel.com/category/mac-dock/

Secrets

http://secrets.blacktree.com/

Secrets provides handy checkboxes to turn terminal commands on and off, and doubles as a menu of secret settings. A “Top Secrets” entry shows a list of popular options, but many more options for various applications can be selected from the application sidebar.
Clicking on any of the listed features will show you a short description of what it does in the bottom of the window; click on the More Info button for a detailed description. (FREE)

Wallpaper Clocks

http://www.vladstudio.com/wallpaperclock/

Wallpaper Clocks is a desktop wallpaper that refreshes every minute to keep your time and date precise on the desktop. They have many to choose from and you can register to download the better wallpapers. (FREE and the plans are Lifetime for $29.99, 3 Months for $9.99 and 12 months for $19.99)

Yahoo Widgets

http://widgets.yahoo.com/

Yahoo Widgets are sort of like the Dashboard widgets. You can choose from more than 4,000 widgets from the Yahoo widgets site and place them wherever you want on your desktop. (FREE)

Check out the list of sites that consists of fonts, backgrounds and wallpapers, icons, clip art, stock photos, vector images and more in ‘Fantastic Resources For Desktop Customization.’ If you have a useful app you’d like to share, leave a comment with a link. Don’t forget, if you like this article, share it with others.

Top 10 Calendar Apps For Mac

Tina Brunner — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 23:19:08 +0000

I have used several applications to keep a Calendar of my daily events. I started out with iCal, which came with my Mac. It is still sufficient but I decided to try other calendars over the years. This list is a compilation of the top 10 calendars I have used the most. I am currently using BusyCal because it has uses the same interface as iCal but has extra features. I am also using MenuCalendarClock, which sits in my menu bar and syncs with my iCal. Continue reading for my top 10 favorites.

ICAL (FREE AS PART OF MAC SYSTEM)

http://www.apple.com/macosx/what-is-macosx/mail-ical-address-book.html

iCal is already pre-installed on your Mac and ready to use out of the box. It has many useful features.

View: there are three different ways to view your calendars in iCal: Day, Week, and month.
Multiple Calendars: You can use several ‘Calendars’ to represent different areas of your life. Don’t forget to color code your calendars so that they don’t become confusing when viewing them all at once.
Sync: with your MobileMe account or to your iPhone through iTunes.
Adding Events: double click on a day you want to add an event and type your event information.
Notifications: set up a notification for either the time of your event or for a certain time period. A pop up will display a screen with details of your event at the time you set the notification. You can also have notifications sent to you by email. These are also known as alarms.
Address Book: is integrated into iCal so that you can send invitations to people from your address book by email and they can respond back to you regarding your invitation.
To Do: allows you to enter items that you need to do but don’t have a set day or time to do it. Click the ‘push pin’ icon in the lower right hand corner and it will display a list of your current To Do items. To add a new item, just right click and select ‘New To Do.’

BUSYCAL (FREE trial/$49 One User or $79 Family Pack)

http://www.busymac.com/

BusyCal uses the same iCal interface, making it simple to use. There are many other features that make BusyCal very unique. Some of the features you will find in BusyCal are:
Syncing with Bonjour: use Bonjour to sync calendars with others on your local area network.
Syncing with Google Calendar: sync your calendar with your Google Calendar to access from any computer, anywhere, anytime.
Syncing with iPhone: sync calendars with your iPhone through iTunes or MobileMe.
Multi-User: your calendar can be shared and edited with full read-write access and the changes made are synced instantly.
Recurring To Do’s: create repeating To Do’s that display in the calendar view and carry-forward until completed.
List View: customize a list view to sort events by date, event type, calendar, etc.
Live Weather: view live weather forecasts along with sunrise/sunset times, and moon phases right from your calendar.
Sticky Notes: add virtual sticky notes in your calendar and share or sync them with others in your network.
Rich Text: style the events in your calendar with customizable fonts, sizes, styles and colors.

MICROSOFT ENTOURAGE (Part of Microsoft Office:Mac 2008)

http://www.microsoft.com/mac/products/Office2008/default.mspx

Entourage is part of the Microsoft Office:Mac 2008 package. The calendar is part of the email, address book, and project management included in Entourage. It is a decent Calendar application but does not sync with iCal or with Google Calendar.
Views: Day, Work Week, Week, and Month views. The default view shows one work week.
Custom Calendar Views: You can filter the settings to create a custom calendar view.
Mini Calendar: see a quick view of the current and upcoming months by clicking on the arrow on the bottom left-hand side of screen.
To Do List: you can view and manage To Do items here.
Color Coding: you can color code events by category or event.

MOZILLA LIGHTNING (THUNDERBIRD) FREE

http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/lightning/

Lightning is part of an add-on for Mozilla Thunderbirds email client.
Views: include day, week, multi-week, month, and task views.
Tasks: you can add or edit tasks by clicking the task button or just click on the ‘Click to Add a New Task in the Task window (if open). If the Task window isn’t open, click on the ‘Today Pane’ button in the status bar.
Add-Ons: since Thunderbird is a part of Mozilla, and Lightning itself is an add-on for Thunderbird, you can also add other add-ons for use with Lightning.

PREMINDER (FREE during BETA may become Shareware)

http://www.hairyhighlandcow.net/software/PreMinderMain.html

This is a different type of calendar app which uses multiple windows instead of one window. It takes a bit of getting used to, but has many features that would be nice if it were incorporated into iCal like the scrolling views and spans. Since it is currently free, I’d hate to see it go to Shareware status. Also, there is no syncing with Google Calendar.
Views: You can switch between weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, yearly and multi-week views in the calendar window.
Reminders: a reminder for one day is able to show text in different fonts, colors, and sizes. You can even display small images.
iCal Import/Export: Save your calendar to a file in iCal, then import it to PreMinder (you can also import any standard vCalendar file type).
Import Birthdays: Birthdays stored in your Mac OS X address book can be imported directly into PreMinder and create an alarm for them. PreMinder also will calculate people’s ages for you if necessary.
Click and Type: click on a day that you want to add an event and just start typing (you will see the type in the large central field in the Reminders window.
Spans: create multi-day events with a simple drag and drop. Adjust the days by dragging the edges or move around the Calendar window.
Repeating Events: you can define events that repeat over a period of time or indefinitely.
Scrolling View: scroll through the months of the year and show the end of one month at the start of another in your month view. There are also month indicators in the scrollbar to show you where you are and where to scroll to.
Fast Time Travel: jump to any point in time with buttons that let you glide between months or years. Use the scrolling slider at the top of the Calendar to go to any month of the year and push the slider to the edge to scroll into the next year. To return back to today, click on the Target button.

MENUCALENDARCLOCK (menubar calendar) FREE/$19.00

http://www.objectpark.net/mcc.html

This is a very handy application that sits in your menu bar. It has some really cool features, especially adding an event without having to open iCal. They offer a free version which has limited capabilities.
Font: the font, style, and color along with where to display the MenuCalendarClock icon are in the Preferences.
Navigation: navigate between months using left/right arrow keys.
To Do: click on the button that has lines in it next to the ‘X’ to view your To Do items in iCal.
Add New Event: click Control+N and it opens a panel to enter new event information which will then be placed in iCal.
Add New To Do: click Control+K which opens a window to enter a new to do item which is also placed in iCal.
Search: if you want to do a search, click Command+F and it will add a spotlight search bar in the display. Type in your query and it will display the information if available.
Hover: when you hover over the menu bar icon, it will display upcoming events.
NOTE: you will probably want to disable your OS X time/date display through the Date & Time pane in your System Preferences.

GOOGLE CALENDAR (online) FREE

http://www.google.com/calendar/

Out of all the online calendars, I like Google Calendar the most. Especially since I am able to sync with my BusyCal (or iCal) calendars. Not to mention that I use GreaseMonkey and Stylish user scripts to tweak the interface to my liking.
Views: Google Calendar offers Day, Week, Month, 7 Days, and Agenda views.
Create Event: click on the Create Event in upper left-hand corner of the screen. Fill in all the information and Save.
Quick Add: use for quick event entry.
Scrolling: to view other months, scroll up or down to desired month.
Colors: change the colors of the different calendars set up.
Add Other Public Calendars: by going to settings, Browse Interesting Calendars at the bottom of the settings. The next window will display a list of available calendars you can subscribe to.
Tasks: are located on the right side of the screen. If it is not open, click on Tasks from the left hand of the screen and it will open on the right of the main calendar view.
Drag and Drop: move events that you have changed to a different date by dragging and dropping into the new date.
Import/Export: from Settings, then Calendars, you can import/export your Google Calendar.

YAHOO! CALENDAR (online) FREE

http://calendar.yahoo.com/

Yahoo! Calendar is fairly decent but doesn’t have as many features as Google Calendar. It has a bland appearance to me, but others swear by Yahoo! Calendar. So it is all in the preference of the user.
Views: offered in Yahoo! Calendar are Day, Week, Month, Year, Event Lists, and Tasks.
Add Event: click Add Event in upper left-hand corner of screen. Fill in the information in the next window and hit Save or Save and Add Another button.
Add Task: located in upper left-hand corner next to Add Event. Fill in your information and hit Save or Save and Add Another button.
Search: events from the search bar located under Tasks on the left hand of your screen.
Photos: can be added above the mini calendar for inspiration.
Import/Export: to Palm Desktop or Outlook. No syncing with Google Calendar or iCal.
Sharing: with friends or anyone, event sharing private, shown as busy, or public or by sending your URL of your calendar with friends by their Yahoo! ID.
Print: your calendar by clicking on the Printable View in the upper right-hand side of your screen.

WINDOWS LIVE CALENDAR (online) FREE

(Works with hotmail or live account – Part of MSN.com)

Fairly decent calendar. Again, I think it could use more though. Also, I am unable to share between my iCal calendars.
Views: offered are Day, Week, Month, Agenda, and To-do List.
Add Event: by clicking on the New button above the calendar, then select ‘Event’ and fill in your information in the pop up window.
Add To-do: by clicking on the New button above the calendar, select ‘To Do’ and fill in your information in the pop up window.
Birthday: added by clicking on the New button above the calendar, select ‘Birthday’ and fill in your information in the pop up window.
New Calendar: by clicking on the New button above the calendar, select ‘Calendar’ and fill in your desired information in the next window provided.
Import/Subscribe: to another calendar by clicking on the Subscribe button above the calendar and fill out the information on the next screen.
Sharing: by clicking on the Sharing button above the calendar and either selecting ‘don’t share this calendar (private)’ or ‘share this calendar.’
Print: by clicking on the printer icon above the calendar.

30 BOXES (online) FREE

http://30boxes.com/

This is a cool online calendar which has some cool features added in. I like that it allows you to share your calendar with Buddies and the ability to incorporate social networking. Add this to the Google Calendar and it would be awesome.
View: 30 boxes in view which can be changed to 4, 5, 6, or 8 weeks. You would still see 4 weeks on the screen but you would scroll down to see the other 4 weeks. You can also change views by clicking on the View button in the left hand side of screen and scroll down to View and select either Day, Week, Agenda, Webtop, or Map.
To Do: Click the check box in the upper left hand corner of the screen and start typing out your to do list. It will then show a number in the top right corner of the icon indicating how many to do items you have in the list.
Messages: There is a little box next to the check mark which indicates if you have any messages waiting.
Buddies: you can add buddies to share your calendar with and this icon will display if any of your buddies have made any updates.
Facebook: icon allows you to update your information with your facebook account.
Find: button gives you a search bar to find people.
Share: gives you a multitude of ways to share your 30 boxes with others.
Overall, this online application has lots of cool features. I of course still use BusyCal the most out of all the items listed.

As you can see, there are many calendar applications to choose from. These of course are the ones that I have used more frequently over the years. They share some common features and others have features that would be great with iCal. I especially like the Google Calendar syncing, the scrolling through the month views, the span views, birthdays from your address book, use of sticky notes, syncing between Mac and a few others. If you have a calendar application that you use that isn’t on the list, feel free to leave a comment and share the wealth with our fellow readers.

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Viewing RSS Feeds With Time

Tina Brunner — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 10:30:22 +0000

Times is the latest newsreader that I fiddled with. It is different than the usual mail styled RSS readers. Times uses an interface to try to give the reader a newspaper reading experience. The only drawback is that you would have to carefully choose which feed subscriptions to place on each ‘page.’ This makes it a little bit of work for someone who would like a reader to automatically add feeds imported. But hey, this makes it ‘your’ personal feed reader with your own personalization. I currently have nine pages on my ‘personal newspaper.’

Lets dive in to see how to set up Times.

USING TIMES PAGES

Your chosen feed subscriptions are displayed on ‘Pages.’ Each page has three panels to drag your chosen subscription to and you can have multiple feeds in each section except for the top section. Resize your sections and move feeds around by dragging the separator line. You can add or remove pages when your interests change.

To add a page, click on File

To remove a page, select the page you want to remove, click on Page

To rename a page, select the page you want to rename, then double click its title and rename the page (or go to Page

To reorder pages, click and hold down title of the page you want to reorder and drag it to where you want it to appear.

ADDING FEEDS

After you have created your own personal pages, start adding feeds by opening the feed drawer (click the pencil icon in the top-right corner). Find the feed you want to add and drag it from the feed drawer to any area on the page chosen.

To add a new feed, select ‘New Feed’ from the menu bar and either enter a feed URL directly or a site URL and Times will try to find your feed.
You can also add feeds from the Feed Drawer by clicking on the ‘+’ sign in the upper left-hand corner.

Times also allows importing of feeds from either Mail, Safari, NetNewsWire, or OPML.

To export feeds, click File

FEED DRAWER

When you add a feed, it will appear in the feed drawer. Here is where you can search for certain feeds, add feeds to pages by dragging to your desired page, and editing the feeds. To access the Feed Drawer, click on the pencil icon in the upper right-hand corner of your Times reader.

VIEWING FEEDS

Once you have added your desired feed subscriptions and added them to your pages from the Feed Drawer, content will be displayed on your pages. NOTE: The more feeds you add to an area, the less articles for that subscription will be displayed. You can always hit the ‘Show More’ button at the end of the section.
If you decide that you no longer want a certain feed in a section, you can remove the feed by clicking the pencil icon and then clicking the ‘X’ button on the left hand corner of the subscription area. NOTE: The feed will still be in your feed drawer. This only removes it from the page.
You can use your arrow keys on your keyboard to toggle through your different pages. (It would be nice if this feature was available to toggle through the feeds within the pages, maybe in a future update.)

If you have a feed that doesn’t contain lots of text, Times will try to download the full story from that feed’s website.

While in an article, to return to the main page, just hit the ‘enter’ key (or click on the page).

USING THE SHELF

Let’s say you find an article that you really want to read, but don’t have the time to read it. Other RSS readers use a ‘Star’ or ‘Flag’ system for saving articles to read later. Times uses a cool wood-grained shelf that you can drag and drop an article to for later reading. This is a really cool feature that is similar to the Mac dock stacks.

You can access the shelf by either clicking on the shelf button on the upper right-hand corner or by hitting the space bar.

There are four available spaces on the shelf for articles to be placed. Once the four spaces are taken, then the shelf will start creating a stack. You can also create your own stacks by dragging similar items on top of one another and rearrange your articles. To expand the stack (if a stack has been created), hover your mouse over the location of the stack. To read an article from your shelf, just click on the desired article.

To add an article to your Shelf, just start dragging the desired article and the Shelf will appear. Continue dragging until it is on the Shelf. You could also click your space bar and it will stay open until you hit the space bar again. There is also a shelf icon next to an article that you may be reading. To add an article to your Shelf from within an article, just click on the icon next to the article name and it will turn an blue color. When you close out of the article, your Shelf count will change. The latest article will automatically be in the first column of your Shelf.

To remove an article from your Shelf, manually drag the article from the Shelf and you will here the ‘poof’ sound similar to removing an application from your dock. If you are reading an article that exists in the shelf and you decide you no longer want to keep it in the shelf, just click the shelf icon next to the article title.

SOCIAL NETWORKS AND EMAIL

You can share an article with a friend through Facebook, Digg and Delicious. While reading the article, click on File An easier way is to choose the article from the page the article is on, right-click on the article title and you will be given the same sharing options.

To use Twitter to tweet about an interesting article, from the page the article you want to tweet about is on (it takes a little more steps from within the article), right-click on the article title and select Post to Twitter… which then opens a pop up window with the information to tweet (if you haven’t set up your Twitter information in the preferences, the pop up will display a window for you to enter your Twitter username and password). Times includes an URL shortening for use with Twitter.

To email an article of interest, from the main page the article is on, right-click and choose Mail This Article from the menu bar. Your default mail application will open with the information you want to send.

Times also offers the ability to drag an article to another application. I dragged an article to OmniFocus and it pasted the article link. All you do is just drag and drop (wait until you see the ‘+’ sign to know that it is working).

TIME PREFERENCES

General Tab: Read articles inline in times or open in Firefox, how to open Firefox, the article interface (slide or page curl), how often to clear shelf items, and the option to automatically check for new versions.

RSS Tab is where you set how often to check for new articles, how to handle the new articles, etc.

Sharing Tab is where you enter your Twitter, Facebook, Delicious, and Digg username and password along with adding other sharing options.

Times is definitely different from the other newsreaders out there. There are some things that I think would make this much better, and maybe will be added in future releases. I’d like to see better use of the social networking without having to go to an external browser. It unfortunately doesn’t sync with Google Reader. Also, it had crashed on me a couple of times during the trial run, so I am not sure if I would want to fork out the $30.00 without seeing a few tweaks in its future releases. I still prefer using NetNewsWire, as it has not crashed on me and gathers all my feeds perfectly to date, along with syncing with my iPhone and Google Reader. Overall, Times is still new and it is definitely a different experience. It took me a little while to get it to work to my liking. Give it a try and see if it suits your needs. You can click on the icon at the end of the article to be directed to the Times web site for more information and the free trial download. If you have used Times and would like to share your thoughts, feel free to leave a comment and share the wealth with our fellow readers.

Gruml Your Feeds

Tina Brunner — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 07:00:15 +0000

I had previously wrote about the top three RSS newsreaders for Mac. Gruml is another full featured reader that is on the top of RSS readers available for Mac. It is still in Beta phase and seems to be continually updated. Let’s dive in and see what Gruml has to offer.

The Interface

The interface is similar to Mail. The left panel contains the list of subscribed RSS feeds, the right panel contains the feed article title with a little summary of the feed, depending on the feed, some will show more of what you would see in their actual web site. If you have a feed that you would like to read more about (usually the feeds that display only a summary), hit your return key and it will open the article in the built-in browser. Unread news are bold and in the left panel, there will be small icons with numbers next to the folders for unread items. Gruml supports Growl notifications as well.

Layout

Gruml offers two different layout styles.
The 3-column style has the feed subscription on the left, the feed item with summary in the middle, and the feed article on the right.
The Preview Below Article style has the feed subscription on the left, the feed headline with summary on the top-right, and the feed article on the bottom-right.
I prefer using the 3-column style as it is easier for me to read my feeds on a smaller screen.

Styles

Gruml gives you 7 styles to choose from.
Graphite which contains a blue feed title and smaller fonts.
Greyed (default) which has a shiny black feed title and a larger font.
Lucidr has an aqua on white feed title and lucida sans style font.
Simple Sans which has a black on white feed title and sans style font.
Simple Serif has black on white all caps feed title with sans style font.
Vanilla (which I use) has black on white feed title and smaller fonts.
Write Type which has black on white all caps feed title and courier style font.
It would be nice if there were a way to add your own styles (like in NetNewsWire), but currently, there is no option to do this.

Feed List (Left Panel)

Your Stuff
All Items, when selected, displays all of your feed items.
All unread, when selected, displays your unread feed items.
Starred Items, when selected, display your starred items.
Liked Items, display items you have marked ‘liked.’
Shared Items, display items you are sharing.
Notes display any notes associated with a shared item. To add a note to a feed item, click on the note icon with the ‘+’ sign and enter a note.
Comments display feeds that have comments.
People You Follow will display a list of feeds from people you follow.
Search is where the search results are displayed when searching from search bar in the toolbar.
Feeds
This is where the list of your feed subscriptions are displayed.
Folders
A list containing folders created either in Gruml or in your Google Reader account.
Tags
A list containing articles that have been tagged in Gruml or in your Google Reader account.
To add a new folder, just click on the + sign in the lower left-hand corner, which in turn opens a window for you to name the new folder. Click the arrow button in the window to add it to a certain folder if needed.
To remove a folder, click on the – sign in the lower left-hand corner to remove the selected folder you want to remove.

The Built-In Browser

Gruml has an integrated Safari style browser, which is very useful for reading feeds that only contain text summaries. It is also useful when using the “Send Article To…” option.

Google Reader Sync and Integration

Gruml syncs any changes you do with Google Reader promptly. This includes syncing of starred items, shared, items, favorites, etc.

Adding Feeds

In preferences from the menu bar, you can enter your Google information that you want to sync with. You can also manually enter a new feed by clicking on Feed

To rename a feed, select the feed to rename and either right-click and select Rename Subscription or click on Feed

To rename a folder, select the folder to rename and either right-click and select Rename Folder or click on Feed

Send Article To…

This is a nice feature of Gruml. It allows you to share your feed with a variety of social networks and blogging platforms.

As to date, you can share your information with Twitter (using the included URL shortener included in Gruml), Facebook, and Myspace.

If you want to save an article for later reading, you can add the item to your Instapaper or ReadItLater.

To send the article to a blogging platform, your options are tumblr or posterous.

The bookmarking platforms for sharing are delicious, digg, reddit, and stumbleupon.

To ping the information, you can use ping.fm. You can also email or print a selected article.
To use the Send Article To…, right-click from your selected article and choose the service you want to use from the Send Article To menu. If you customize your toolbar, you can add your preferred services to the toolbar as well. Or, use the keyboard shortcuts: Delicious (Shift+E), Digg (Shift+D), Facebook (Shift+F), Instapaper (Shift+I), MySpace (Shift+M), ping.fm (Shift+G), Posterous (Shift+P), ReadItLater (Shift+L), Reddit (Shift+R), StumbleUpon (Shift+U), Tumblr (Shift+B), and Twitter (Shift+T).

Preferences

There are a few preferences offered in Gruml.
General Tab is where you would enter your Google account information.
Social Accounts Tab only allows the input for your Twitter, Instapaper, and ReadItLater account information. It also gives you options for URL shortening (is.gd, bit.ly, tr.im, cli.gs, u.nu, and .tk).
Appearance Tab allows you to change the fonts for the article list and sidebar.
Advanced Tab is where you would change the menu bar and icon, URL handling, Update/notification, feed behavior, and caching behavior.

Menu Bar Notification

Gruml offers a menu bar icon which will display the number of unread articles. Not only that, when you click on the icon, it displays a HUD interface displaying the articles that are available with the name of the article item and the title. If you double-click on an item, the article will open within Gruml’s integrated browser.

Blogging Options

If you find an article that you would like to integrate into your own blog. Click on Article Once you click on the application you have, Gruml opens your application and integrates the feed item into your blogging panel.

I have noticed a few quirks in the program. It crashed on me one time and it is a little sluggish at times. It is however quick to refresh, sometimes too quick for my liking. When I unstarred, unshared, or unliked an item, there was no visual cue the change had taken place, the feed still showed in my list, so this would be a nice item to fix. Maybe showing the toolbar item change color or something of that nature. Also, there were times when an article or item list that I have marked all as read would still be shown in the list, even after checking the Mark All As Read in the menu. It would be nice to see Gruml integrate with apps like Things, OmniFocus, or Evernote. Also, Gruml lacks the AppleScript dictionary. Another important item missing in Gruml is some form of Help. When you click on the Help menu bar item, it displays “Help isn’t available for Gruml.” Hopefully, in the future, this will be integrated for people who need help with Gruml.

Gruml, however is still in Beta phase and is constantly updating. I still like the overall feel of Gruml, and will continue using it as a backup to my preferred NetNewsWire. I’d like to see how Gruml will be in a few months after more updates. To give Gruml a try, click the icon at the end of this article to be directed to their web site. If you use Gruml or have used it and would like to share your experience with other readers, please leave a comment and share the wealth with us.

The Vienna RSS Reader

Tina Brunner — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 18:45:43 +0000

Vienna is another RSS feed reader that I’ve seen many people using. It is fairly simple, but does not sync with Google Reader. I personally use Vienna (version 2.5.0.2500.1507) for news only. I only want to read the news once a day so I easily set it up to check for new feeds every six hours. This way, I am not bogged with feeds and I can read them when I have the time, which is usually in the morning with my coffee. So here is some information about Vienna.

Vienna is a free open source news reader. It is simple, clutter free and has a clean user interface. You’ll see your feeds on the left and feed items on the right. If you are using the condensed layout (pictured above), hitting the return key opens the actual web site of the feed in Vienna’s built in browser.

Smart folders and folder groups is a nice feature of Vienna. Smart folders are similar to the iTunes smart folders allowing you to tweak folders the way you want. You do this from File To create a Group Folder, go to File

So, how do you retrieve your Google Reader feed items? All you do when in Google Reader: is go to Manage Subscriptions, then to Import/Export and once you’re in the Import/Export screen, click on “Export your subscriptions as an OPML file,” and hit Save File. Once you’ve done that, go back to Vienna and click File

Want to personalize Vienna? You can download Styles or learn how to create them from the Vienna web forums. There are also a few Styles already preloaded. Just click on View