Category: Mac

CleanHaven from Holy Mackerel Software is a tool focused on one purpose; simplifying the task of cleaning and formatting text.  At first, it might seem that this need is confined to IT and data specialists, such as marketing professionals, working with lists. But there are times where occasional users would benefit from a tool that easily automates, say, formatting names and addresses in a contact list or removing duplicates.

Both the simplicity of use and the fact it is free make CleanHaven an ideal tool for this kind of use. CleanHaven has a powerful set of features available for managing text, and we’ll be taking a look at these in today’s review.

Getting Started

The CleanHaven download is provided as a zip file. After you’ve downloaded it and opened it with Archive Utility, you can drag CleanHaven to your Applications folder.

Each time you launch CleanHaven, the text input window defaults to showing some helpful ‘How to use CleanHaven’ information which includes some test data so you can see the effect of applying each of the clean up options. This is a really helpful way to gradually learn about what the app is capable of.

Design

Opening CleanHaven shows the text input window:

CleanHaven keeps a rigid separation between input and output views by launching a separate output window – the Results window – as soon as you perform a conversion operation:

This allows you to visually compare the input and output to see the effect your changes have had.

Functionality

The most direct way to start using CleanHaven is to paste into the input window the text you want to work with. It’s also possible to open and read in any text file.

Now you have the text you want to clean, you can pick which operation you want to perform on it. The Convert tab in the input window lets you choose a variety of options which you can either use individually, or combine together.

Conversion Options

The check box turns on a particular category, then you can select an action from a drop down list. For example in Case you can choose between Title Case, Sentence case, UPPERCASE, lowercase, RaNdOM cAsE and “curly quotes”.

There is similar degree of control in the way in which you can control order under Sort and the ways in which duplicate entries in your text can be treated.

The Remove option has a useful list of items you can choose to heve taken out of your text: excess returns, excess spaces, linefeeds, non-ASCII, non-letters, non-numbers, periods, punctuation, returns, spaces and tabs. It also allows you to convert bidirectionally between linefeeds and returns.

The Personal options are of particular interest as they include the ability to convert full names to first name/last name, format phone numbers and expand UK postcodes to show the city and county. Finally on this tab, Info can provide details on correct and incorrect spellings, frequency of words in your input text and other measurements.

Having chosen the options and attributes you want to apply, you then click the Clean button to see the outcome in the Results window. If the outcome is not what you needed, you can change your options back in the input window, click Clean again and the results wil be updated accordingly.

One you are satisfied with the results, you have the option of either adding them to the clipboard or, by clicking the Source button, passing them back as a new input to CleanHaven. Thus you can carry out a multiple stage clean up by applying one rule at a time and examining the interim results to check they meet your needs before progessing to the next stage.

As well as copying your results to the clipboard, CleanHaven lets you save them as a text file, an Excel file, or a tab or comma separated values (CSV) file.

Find And Replace

In addition to the primary text and format manipulation purpose of CleanHaven, it is possible to find and replace terms in your input text via the Replace tab. The special characters Carriage Return, Linefeed, Tab and Escape can be included in find and replace strings.

Table View

You can toggle between Text and Table views in the input and results screens. So far we’ve only shown Text view but if you have tabular data, you can switch to column view and apply your convert and replace actions either to all columns or only to one indivdual column. This is managed through a drop down choice in the Settings tab.

Rival Text Cleaners

There are products that compete with CleanHaven such as  CleanText ($29) which has a wide range of built in conversions and TextSoap ($39.95) which has plug ins for other popular applications and supports scripting. Although each will have its supporters, CleanHaven’s price advantage of costing you nothing makes it a good starting point for people needing to manipulate text and it may well be all you need.

Conclusion

CleanHaven, which is also available for Windows and Linux, is a very powerful tool for automating the laborious process of correcting or reformatting text to meet your needs. It has some drawbacks; the spelling features don’t cope well with punctuation, and the product shows its British origins with the sole inclusion of UK postcodes.

These are more than offset by a simple learning curve, a handy set of ‘how to‘ videos on the web site, and the value it offers. CleanHaven deserves a place within the toolbox of anyone who needs to maniplulate data on even an occasional basis.

The software industry is moving ahead at a rapid pace at the moment – particularly on the Mac. We’ve seen some brilliant new applications released this year, and a few classics updated with an impressive new feature set.

Before we forge ahead into a new year, likely dominated by the onset of the Mac App Store and everything that entails, I thought it would be fun to take a look back at the past twelve months to remind ourselves of what happened.

I’d be honoured if you’d join me in this review of Mac apps in 2010. You might just find some fantastic new software along the way!

Alfred + Powerpack

In the fairly competitive niche of Quicksilver-esque software, Alfred has really shot to popularity this year. A beautifully designed, versatile application, Alfred has quickly become one of my absolute favourite apps.

You can use it as a basic application launcher if you’d like, but the Alfred team recently launched their commercial “Powerpack” that adds a bunch more functionality. This includes iTunes integration, filesystem navigation, clipboard history, and an iTunes mini player – a pretty incredible deal for just under $20!

Transmit 4

Transmit has long been one of the dominant file transfer applications for the Mac, and it underwent a major improvement in the form of Transmit 4 this year. This brought an enormous series of new features, improved speed significantly, and introduced the new “Transmit Disk” functionality.

It’s rare that such as popular and well-designed application undergoes such a worthy upgrade, but Transmit 4 is absolutely worth every dollar of the upgrade price. Heartily recommended!

Knapsack

Knapsack is designed for organised travellers. People who need to keep track of frequent conference trips, or those who want a flexible and straight-forward way to construct and manipulate a complicated itinerary for their trip will find plenty to love about it.

Although this isn’t a new piece of software, it went through a major acquisition in 2010, and has been updated with some great new features.

Instapaper

Although Instapaper has been around for quite a bit longer than a year, and doesn’t have a Mac application specifically, I had to mention it here. Instapaper is one of my all-time favourite tools, and the developer, Marco Arment, took the decision to work on it full-time earlier this year.

If you regularly read in-depth articles and blog posts, Instapaper automatically saves them to your iPhone or iPad to come back to later – presented in a beautiful text-only format. It’s completely free to use, but I’d urge you to become a subscriber for $1/month and show your support to the developer.

Safari 5

Apple released Safari 5 in June this year, touting support for new HTML5 features (in an ongoing effort to demonstrate its supremacy over Flash). In addition to better standards support, Safari Reader was added, giving you a way to read articles in a clutter-free view.

The final major addition was Safari Extensions, and the associated Extensions Gallery, which gave developers a way to expand and enhance the functionality of Safari. I haven’t really used any of these personally – I prefer my browsing experience to be as simple as possible – but there are a few great additions available for those that like this type of thing.

Steam

The humble Mac platform is far from first choice for dedicated gamers, and has a reputation of being unsuitable for people who like to enjoy the latest graphically intensive releases. Although this is certainly still the case to a large degree, the release of Steam for Mac this year has set the process in motion for turning this stereotype around.

Various classic games are now available through Steam to run natively on your Mac. From Counter Strike to Football Manager, you’ll be surprised how competent your Mac now is as a gaming platform!

Office 2011

People have a love/hate relationship with Office for Mac. Some of our readers love to use it, and others would trade Microsoft Word for Pages any day. Office 2008 was widely regarded as a fairly poor release – it didn’t integrate all that well with OS X, and wasn’t a pleasant experience to use.

Microsoft has stepped up their game with the release of Office 2011. It brings a few new features, a completely re-worked application in the form of Outlook for Mac, and it’s a far more polished piece of software.

Arq

Arq is a fantastic backup utility that left beta right at the beginning of this year. It uses Amazon S3 for storage, backing up your critical files to the internet rather than a local drive. This is really secure, and a winning combination for many Mac users.

Although you’ll need to pay an ongoing fee for Amazon S3 storage, it’s a pretty great deal for most people, with the fee coming in at around $5/month for 50GB of storage. Definitely worth checking out if you’re looking for an off-site backup solution.

Soulver

Version 2.0 of Soulver was released this year, bringing plenty of great updates to this already unique calculation app. Simply put, Soulver helps you work things out. It’s quicker to use than a spreadsheet, and smarter and clearer than a traditional calculator.

Version 2.0 added a sleeker interface, support for conversions between currencies, time, distance etc, the ability to use stock information, and a whole range of other great features. Well worth upgrading to!

Kaleidoscope

Sporting one of my absolute favourite app icons of the year, Kaleidoscope is a tool that helps you compare files on your Mac. Be these text documents, images, or various other types of file, Kaleidoscope will quickly show you how the two files differ.

It’s really helpful for developers to compare versions of code and text, and for photographers, retouchers and designers who work with images regularly. A beautifully designed website and application, albeit with a fairly niche appeal.

Alarms

A fairly fascinating application, Alarms adds a bar to the top of your screen that shows a visual representation of your day. You can quickly drag items, files or text into Alarms, and schedule them to be worked on during a certain time of day.

It’s full of handy features – such as “snoozing” a to-do with a shake of your mouse – and can work well for reminding yourself of things throughout the day. It’s certainly no replacement for a dedicated task manager, but definitely worth taking a look at.

MarsEdit 3

Another app that underwent a fantastic update this year was MarsEdit. Version 3.0 shipped with support for “WYSIWYG” text editing, support for WordPress Pages and Custom Fields, improved syntax highlighting, integration with iPhoto, and plenty of other improvements.

If you regularly contribute to a blog, MarsEdit is definitely worth considering. It makes writing and drafting posts a really pleasant experience, and can be a major improvement over using your web-based blog administration area.

Sparrow

Although I’d hazard a guess that almost all our AppStorm readers use Gmail or Google Apps Mail, I know that many people don’t particularly enjoy using the Gmail web interface. I know I don’t! Apple’s Mail.app is a great application (and my mail client of choice), but for casual email users, Sparrow offers a nice alternative.

Released a few months ago, Sparrow sits in your menu bar and gives you a minimalist way to access Gmail. It supports threading, notifications, multiple accounts, and is actually a fairly powerful little app. If you’re a fan of the Tweetie interface, you’ll love Sparrow.

Firetask

Although Firetask has been available on the iPhone for quite some time, it only made the jump to OS X in August this year. It follows the classic “Getting Things Done” methodology for a task manager, and is a great option if you’re looking for a fairly powerful to-do manager.

Although it isn’t quite as feature-packed as an app like OmniFocus, it’s stylish, syncs with the iPhone version (Wi-Fi only for now, unfortunately), and works pretty darn well!

Postbox

This alternative Mail client has seen a flurry of updates over the year, and has recently become my email client of choice. It’s fast, lean, pretty, and an all-round pleasure to use. I don’t see myself going back to Mail.app in a hurry, and would strongly recommend Postbox if you’re undecided about desktop email.

I particularly like the ease of setup, and the quality of integration with Gmail – something that I always struggled to achieve perfection with in Apple’s mail client.

iLife ’11

Apple’s yearly iLife release cycle was enacted a couple of months ago in the form of iLife 11. This brought new versions of iPhone, iMovie and Garageband (while iWeb and iDVD were left somewhat out in the cold).

New features include widespread full-screen views (a pre-cursor to this becoming fairly ubiquitous in OS X Lion), hollywood-style movie trailers, and some funky groove matching for Garageband. It isn’t a “must have” upgrade, but it might be worthwhile if you’re hankering after one of the new features.

Fake

Released toward the end of the year, Fake is a new browser for Mac OS X that makes web automation simple. Think of it as “Automator for the web” – possibly something that doesn’t interest you at all, but a real life-saver for web designers and developers.

Fake is a very versatile tool that can work in any way you’d like it to. If you think the idea sounds interesting, I’d recommend downloading it and taking it for a spin. Anything that stands to save you a few minutes of time a day is a winner in my book!

Rocketbox

Do you ever sit looking at Mail’s search results, struggling to find what you’re looking for? No, me neither. But it seems that some people do. For them, Rocketbox will be a fascinating application. It’s more advanced than Mail’s search, with highlighted search previews, a sophisticated query language, and a blazing fast engine.

You can also intelligently search by person, and set up powerful filters that can sift through lots of email very quickly to find what you’re looking for.

Courier

Courier allows you to share files, images, photos, movies, and more with all your favourite online services – including Flickr and Facebook. It’s a beautiful application from Realmac Software, works with over 30 different services, and is packed with fun and interesting features.

Ever wondered where your files are going geographically when they’re uploaded? Courier attempts to show you this, in a fascinating metaphor of throwing files around the globe.

Cockpit

Launched in April, Cockpit is an interesting little app with a really gorgeous interface. It gives you a place to launch apps, control multiple aspects of popular software (iTunes, iPhoto, Safari etc), run scripts, and set up custom hotkeys to do all of these tasks.

It’s a tool for Mac geeks, undoubtedly, and it could be a really interesting app to try out if you’re a keyboard shortcut junkie (or just like faux aluminium interfaces).

Permute

If you find yourself occasionally needing to convert video, but are baffled by an array of applications, settings and frame rates, Permute is for you. It’s a one-window app that takes any media you throw at it, and quickly converts it to work on a particular device.

It really couldn’t be any simpler to use, but has plenty of power under the hood. A solid replacement for VisualHub, if you’re still mourning the loss of that handy little app…

Eon

Released right at the end of 2009, I think Eon qualifies to be included here. It’s a time tracking application that supports a huge range of different online (and Mac-based) invoicing apps—19 at the time of writing. It’s simple to use, automatically notices idle time, and lets you break your time down into projects.

If you use several different invoicing/client management applications and would like a central place from which to track your time, Eon is for you.

Billings Pro

Every time I ask Mac users about the software they use for managing clients, projects, and time tracking, one name always comes up. Billings.

The basic version of Billings is perfect for freelancers and small companies – but if you run a larger organisation, it’s definitely worth taking a look at Billings Pro. This advanced version offers powerful time tracking, synchronization between different computers, and the ability to review and approve invoices. It’s a powerful beast.

Watts

If you’re unsure about the best way to treat your MacBook battery to prolong its life, you need to take a look at Watts. Released this year, it offers a simple menu bar interface for walking you through a battery calibration process on a regular basis.

Along with an improved battery indicator, it can accurately time how long you should keep a full charge, and will tell you when you need to run your battery down to a low level to calibrate it. Fun and functional.

1Password 3

Receiving a major update this year was 1Password, now in its third major incarnation. I use and love this application every day—it’s a tool that you can’t live without after using it for a few weeks.

Version 3 brings plenty of new functionality, most notably improved synchronisation across all your devices. Whether you’re on your Mac, iPhone, iPad – or even Windows box – you’ll have all your passwords right at your fingertips.

Simplenote, Notational Velocity, and Nottingham

I’m bundling these apps together because they all essentially work with the same service – Simplenote. This, coupled with Notational Velocity on the Mac, has had a huge impact on the way I write this year. The seamless syncing across all your various devices is fantastic, and means that you can easily work on a document from anywhere, using any Apple device.

If you regularly write—whatever medium it’s for—you owe it to yourself to take a look at this combination of software.

Dropbox

It’s been around for much longer than a year, but I had to include Dropbox as one of my favourite applications of 2010. It’s simple, understated, and really changed the way I use my Mac and iOS devices.

Take a couple of minutes today to investigate a few methods for really making the most of this fantastic service, by reading a couple of articles we’ve posted on Web.AppStorm over the course of the year:

• The Ultimate Dropbox Toolkit & Guide
• 15 Awesome Dropbox Tips and Tricks
• 10 [More] Killer Dropbox Tips and Tricks

Reeder (Beta)

Last, but certainly not least, I wanted to mention the very recent release of the Reeder for Mac Beta. This has immediately become my RSS tool of choice for the desktop, and it’s a real pleasure to use. Though the beta is still missing certain pieces of functionality, it shows a great deal of promise already.

I think it’s a good example of bringing iOS to the Desktop, and I’m looking forward to seeing this trend develop and evolve over next year.

What’s Coming in 2011?

So, 2010 has been a great year for software. From fantastic updates such as Transmit 4, through to beautiful new apps like Courier, there’s a lot to reflect upon! But as the year draws to a close, what lies in store for 2011?

The first thing to look forward to—indeed, something that may arrive before the end of the year—is the Mac App Store. This seems set to change the landscape of Mac software development, and will no doubt lead to hundreds of interesting new software releases over the coming year. We’re going to have our work cut out!

In addition to the forthcoming store, we also have OS X Lion to look forward to—the next release of Apple’s operating system. So far, we know that this is going to bring a range of new iOS-like functionality, the “Mission Control” dashboard, and widespread full-screen support. Of course, Apple wouldn’t be Apple if it didn’t have a few surprises up it’s sleeve.

One thing I’m really hoping for is some form of improved “cloud” service from Apple. Dropbox is a fantastic tool, but I can’t help yearn for something that’s integrated directly into Apple’s own iPad and iPhone applications. By the end of 2011, I would love to kiss goodbye to the clunky file-synchronisation method currently employed by iTunes.

Last but not least, we’re expecting to see a new iPad release at some point next year—most likely around April—that will add a few new features. I’d expect these will include a camera (or two) to provide FaceTime support, along with the Retina Display used in the iPhone 4. Though not directly Mac-related, it’s certainly an announcement that I’m looking forward to with great anticipation!

The Best iOS and Web Apps of 2010

If you’re a fan of the iPhone, iPad, or web apps (and let’s face it, who isn’t?), you may also like to take a look at the companion posts published across the AppStorm network. These include some seriously amazing software, and it’s a good way to quickly see what you might have missed over the course of the year.

Take a look at:

• The Best Web Apps of 2010
• The Best iPhone and iPad Apps of 2010

Thank you so much for reading AppStorm in 2010. We’re really excited about everything that 2011 has in store, and I hope you’ll take a minute to subscribe to the site if you haven’t already!

It’s a big day at AppStorm HQ today, as we’ve launched an exclusive preview of two new sites that are due to kick off in the New Year. I hope you’ll join me in welcoming both Android.AppStorm and Windows.AppStorm to our growing family of sites!

As a die-hard Mac user, I know what you’re thinking… Windows and Android? Well allow me a minute to explain our thinking. After all, even the most dedicated Mac user has a reason to boot into Windows from time to time, and it’s difficult to ignore the storming success of Android in recent months!

Windows.AppStorm

With Windows 7 restoring some lost Windows pride, it’s time PC users had a place to find awesome apps from both small indie developers and the big powerhouses. Plus I’ve been hearing really good things about the new Windows Mobile, so you can expect to get a dose of non-desktop apps too! To kick things off we have:

90+ Incredibly Useful Windows 7 Apps & Tips

If you’re interested in checking out what’s available on the other platform, be sure to take a look! Perfectly happy with your Mac? Don’t worry – we won’t be inundating you with Windows content here at Mac.AppStorm and you can stay in your beautifully designed Mac bubble!

Android.AppStorm

Lately Android has been appearing on all sorts of devices. With a few different app stores and so many incredible developers making apps for Google’s open source platform, you need a trusted place to get the low down on Android Apps. So head over and check out the new site!

I know plenty of Mac users who love their Android phones, so hopefully this one will be useful for quite a few of our readers. Our first bumper post takes the form of:

100+ Absolutely Essential Android Apps & Tips

The New AppStorm Homepage

Last, but not least, we have a brand new AppStorm homepage over at AppStorm.net. This offers a central place to find out about all the different AppStorm sites, and we’ll be expanding and improving this over the coming months.

Thanks for Reading!

Thanks again for taking the time to read our sites every day. I hope you enjoy the teaser posts we’ve launched today, and I’m really looking forward to getting into full swing with both sites in 2011.

Feel free to let us know your thoughts in the comments, along with any suggestions for content you’d like to see on the new sites!

In the world of to-do lists, the golden standard comes from David Allen’s book, Getting Things Done. Inside he details how to manage all of your tasks, sort them out, and accomplish them in a timely fashion. The book is so popular that it’s had multiple printings, and has become the benchmark for other organisation systems.

OmniFocus is designed to take the David Allen GTD system and make it easy to use on your Mac. The software implements the methodology to its core, making it simple to input, prioritise, and review tasks (and much more!) But OmniFocus is more than just a GTD manager—it’s a way to truly organize your life on your Mac, iPhone, and iPad.

GTD 101

Although the basic GTD system isn’t incredibly complicated, it does take a while to get used to. We could spend a good amount of time getting into it (after all, there is a book dedicated to the subject), but instead, check out the flowchart below from OmniFocus’ website. It does a good job of showing the process step by step.

Every task has a context as well. These should be places where you do the task at hand. If you have to make a phone call, then the context could be “Phone.” If it was an e-mail to send, it could be “E-Mail” or “Online,” depending on your personal preference. These contexts are critical to proper organization, because this way if you’re looking for a task to do, you can go to the context and select what actions you can perform.

At first, the GTD methodology may seem complicated, but in practice, it’s quite simple. Just give it a few days, and you’ll be fine.

How OmniFocus Works with GTD

When first starting the system, you want to do a “mind dump”, emptying out all of your ideas and tasks into OmniFocus. When doing so, you want to do it quickly, and just put it into the Inbox for sorting later. OmniFocus makes it super easy to do this, giving you two options for entering things into the system.

First, you can use the program directly, just by clicking on the “Add Action” button. Alternatively, there’s also a quick input method which can be done via keyboard shortcut. Just enter in the task, and if you have time, you can also enter in the Project it needs to go under and the Context. You can also add a date if this needs to be done at a later time.

Once your mind dump is complete, go back through the Inbox in OmniFocus and start sorting out your tasks. Create Projects for tasks that may need multiple steps, making every part of the process an individual task. Then start building your contexts, making it as varied as you like, depending on your preferences. Once again, if you need to assign a due date to a task, you can do so, and you can also flag them if they’re more important than others.

Viewing Your Tasks

Once everything is in the system, now you can see all of your tasks in a variety of different methods. Sort them by project, context, or flagged, just depending on your preference. One of the more important views, is “Due”. This will show you what tasks you have due next by date, or due by priority. If that wasn’t enough, you can also sort your tasks even further by clicking on the View option and narrowing down your choices by specific criteria.

If you have a lot of tasks to do, sometimes it can be difficult to narrow down specifically what you need to work on next. Fortunately, OmniFocus has a feature named – you guessed it – Focus, which opens up a new window dedicated to either one specific context or project. This can be really handy when you don’t want to be distracted by all of the things you’ve got to do, and just want to get one project completed.

Going the Extra Mile

Now the key to this system is being able to enter tasks as quickly and easily as possible. At some point during the day, you’re going to walk away from your computer, and you may have occasion to enter a task with your computer miles away.

To help with that problem, OmniFocus has an iPhone and iPad version, both of which sync with each other seamlessly.

OmniFocus gives you multiple options for syncing as well. If you have a MobileMe account, you can set all of your devices to sync to a folder on your iDisk. You can also use Bonjour or a USB key, depending on whether you’re trying to sync multiple computers or multiple devices. But even better, you can also share your settings by e-mail or Wi-Fi, which makes setting up everything as simple as possible.

The Alternatives

We would be remiss if we didn’t mention any of the dozens of different options out there for working in the GTD system, all of varying prices. One popular option is Things, which also has iPad and iPhone versions (but still no over-the-air syncing ability available to OmniFocus users). There’s also Firetask (which we recently reviewed), along with the seemingly forever-beta The Hit List . So why choose OmniFocus over these options?

OmniFocus is both powerful and simple at the same time. You can have tasks nested within tasks if necessary, making it easy to organize your system similar to a file hierarchy. But it’s also basic enough to just get the job done, and do the bare minimum.

It’s all about flexibility and ease of use. And if your GTD system isn’t easy to use, then you won’t use it. OmniFocus is by far and away the most faithful representation of this methodology in software format.

In Conclusion

I’ve tried dozens of different GTD programs over the years, including Things, which was my favorite until I gave OmniFocus a try. Between the interoperability and syncing options, and the ability to drill down tasks, I can organize projects to my heart’s content. It’s everything I want in a GTD program, without being so complex that you need an engineering degree to figure it out.

It’s not the cheapest option, nor is it the simplest. But it is the best, and for me, it’s the only method I have for getting things done.

Would you like some further reading, and an even more in-depth look at everything that OmniFocus can do? Check out Shawn Blanc’s piece entitled A Sledgehammer Called OmniFocus. It’s a great read!

With Macworld 2011 slowly approaching, I thought it would be interesting to ask whether any of our readers have attended this conference previously (or are planning on going next year).

If you’re unaware of what Macworld is, essentially it’s a four day event that covers everything to do with the Mac. It includes user sessions focusing on teaching, an Expo floor for software exhibitors, various conference programmes, and generally lots of Mac-geekery! It’s based in San Francisco, running from the 26th-29th January.

Although Apple used to attend this event, the company pulled out prior to last year’s event. It seems that the 2010 conference was still a major success, despite their absence, and Macworld will be running once again next month.

The AppStorm team is going to be in attendance in January (a first for all of us!), and we’re really looking forward to meeting a few of you there. Let us know if you’ll be going in the comments!

If you, like me, regularly use multiple applications at once, then you will know how switching between them frequently can take up precious time. Sure, it’s a lot easier to do it on a Mac than on Windows, with Exposé or Cmd + Tab, but sometimes, you need something even faster. Even worse is when you have multiple windows of the same application open, and need to get from one to another.

This is where applications like DockView and HyperDock come into play. They make it easy to switch from application to application, and from window to window, very quickly. As indicated by the names, both of these are apps that add extra functionality to your dock. When you scroll over an icon in your dock, they will quickly show you all the windows open for that application, making switching easy.

So if you’re interested in getting an app like this, which should you get – HyperDock or DockView? This article aims to put both apps through their paces, head to head!

Price

Pricing is always a nice and easy place to start, and in this case, the winner is quite obvious.

DockView costs $7.99, which is a decent enough price considering how much time you will save. It also has a free trial, which you can use for as long as you want with no loss of functionality. However, a window will pop-up several times every day telling you to buy the app if you do with the demo. Also, the word “Demo” is subtly slipped into the Dock preview windows, so if you like your Mac to look perfect, then that might put you off the trial version.

HyperDock, on the other hand, costs a grand total of $0. You just can’t argue with prices like that! That said, it is in Beta, so when they reach version 1.0 (it’s currently on 0.9.12.1), it could become a paid application.

DV: 7/10
HD: 9/10
Winner: HyperDock

Installation

In both cases, this is a very straightforward procedure. Both are quick and easy to download. HyperDock, at 7.5MB, is a little bigger than DockView (3.9MB), but if you have a vaguely decent internet connection, neither should trouble you too much.

It is worth noting, though, that both apps only work on Snow Leopard, so if you try to install it on anything other than that, you will have some difficulty.

You install DockView the way that you would install most apps – simply drag the app icon into the Applications shortcut in the DMG window. For HyperDock, it’s also very easy, although you may not be as used to this process as normal app installations, because HyperDock is a preference pane.

Nevertheless, all you have to do is click the icon in the DMG, and confirm the installation of the pane in System Preferences. Very easy, but because you are probably more used to installing apps than preference panes, and the fact that it is a smaller file size, means that DockView has to win this section.

DV: 9/10
HD: 8/10
Winner: DockView

Interface

Both of these apps look beautiful, although there isn’t an awful lot to analyse, due to their minimalism and lack of an interface, as such. Both designs integrate effortlessly into the dock, and look as if they are a built-in feature of Snow Leopard.

You shouldn’t have any reason to change their designs, but if you want to do so, both make it easy. With DockView, you can change most things about it; the preview size, distance from Dock, and even the preview window colour. In HyperDock, you can change all of the same features, except for the colour.

While I appreciate that the ability to change the colour in DockView is good for people wanting to customise everything about the app, it does in fact mean that it won’t always fit with the OS X design. There are a few other elements in DockView that don’t look quite right, such as the controls on the iTunes preview.

HyperDock, on the other hand, gets everything spot on, design-wise, which, when you are trying to make your app feel like a part of OS X, is essential.

DV: 7/10
HD: 10/10
Winner: HyperDock

Features

This is a tough category to call, as both are full of features, but both have features that the other would benefit from. However, to start with, here’s a list of features common to both:

• Close windows from the Dock
• Control iTunes from the Dock
• View iCal events in Dock
• Keyboard Shortcuts

As for those features exclusive to DockView, one of the best selling points is further functionality for other applications in the dock. For example, you can check your mail in Mail.app from your Dock, and play/pause files in both Quicktime and VLC Player. You can also activate badges which show you how many windows you have open in each application. However, this does not work properly if you use Dock Magnification.

Another of DockView’s big features which (surprisingly) HyperDock does not support is window previews when using Cmd + Tab. This is an excellent feature, and for many, could well be the feature that clinches the deal.

HyperDock, on the other hand, has Window Management, which allows you to move and resize windows using keyboard shortcuts, so that don’t have to move your mouse up to the  title bar/resize icon. I absolutely love this feature, and it can gradually save you even more time. Hyperdock also integrates with Spaces, which, if you Spaces, can be very useful.

As I said, this category is very hard to call, but I think that because of the Cmd + Tab feature, DockView has to win, if only by the smallest of margins.

DV: 8.5/10
HD: 8.4/10
Winner: DockView

Conclusion

Basing this on the winners of each category, then the apps are equal (two category wins each), and it’s true, these apps, despite having many different features, are difficult to separate.

However, the whole purpose of this article is to find a winner, so we must go the average scores, where we find that DockView has an impressive score of 7.9/10, but HyperDock wins this with 8.9/10.

Although HyperDock is the winner, both apps are absolutely fantastic, and I would thoroughly recommend either of them to anyone. If you’re looking for some great design and window resizing features, HyperDock is the one for you. If you need the Cmd+Tab window previews, and don’t mind paying a bit more for it, then go with DockView. For now, however, I’ll be sticking with HyperDock.

One Final Thought: OS X Lion

By now, if you have any interest in Mac whatsoever, you will have heard about Mac OS X 10.7 Lion. If not, check out our article about the announcement.

One of the features that Apple showcased in their preview of Lion was Mission Control, combining Exposé, Spaces, Dashboard and full-screen apps. With a single gesture, you can quickly access all of your windows, easily.

So what does this mean for apps such as HyperDock and DockView? Will these be yet further casualties of Apple’s domination? Or will Mission Control open up a whole new area for potential optimisation?

As both HyperDock and DockView are Snow Leopard only, they almost certainly won’t work with Lion, so after Lion is released in Summer 2011, you may have to wait for a new version of these apps, if they come at all. Perhaps that’s another reason to go with HyperDock – If you’re only going to be using DockView for the next 7 or 8 months, is it worth paying extra?

We haven’t seen enough of Lion to really tell, but it’s certainly worth considering when making your decision.

This week, we’re proud to have RapidWeaver 5 as the Mac.AppStorm sponsor. Released just a few days ago, RapidWeaver 5 is a worthy upgrade to an already stellar piece of web design software for the Mac.

Whether you’re just starting out with web design, or you’re a seasoned professional, RapidWeaver has a versatile set of tools that can really help with the visual process of website design. You don’t need to write a single line of code, but you can if you want to.

RapidWeaver comes bundled with an array of stunning designs, and a versatile publishing system. In a few clicks you can have your content uploaded to MobileMe, or any other SFTP or FTP server.

Version 5 introduces the new RapidWeaver add-ons, better handling of site resources, a new site map plugin, and 6 brand new themes. A completely free trial is available if you’d like to download RapidWeaver and give it a try.

We also have an exclusive competition for AppStorm readers, and we’re giving away five licenses for this brand new version. All you need to do is leave a comment on this post, letting us know what type of website you’d like to create with RapidWeaver!

The competition closes at midnight on Friday, and we’ll randomly select the winners shortly afterwards. Good luck, and be sure to give RapidWeaver a try in the meantime.

We’re all busy people. Probably busier than we would like. There’s a lot going on, coming at us from all different directions. We have multiple projects and tasks going on at the same time, and sooner or later, there will come a time when you’ll need to find a solid method to keep everything in order.

Luckily for us, there’s an abundance of task management theory and methodology available—and also a lot of associated software software to choose from. Dejumble is one such task manager, and we’ll be taking it for a spin today.

Design and Function

First worth mentioning is that Dejumble is a Menu Bar app. This is slight step away from tradition for this type of app, but it makes a welcome change. It seems to remind you that managing tasks is an aside to the real work you’re meant to be doing in dedicated windows.

I have to say, I wasn’t blown away by the design of this software. It certainly isn’t bad, and the visual design and layout does make sense, but the move away from traditional interface elements feels slightly unusual. For the most part, though, the design feels pretty well thought out.

The search bar is at the top and is an important piece of the software. It’s definitely easy to find and quick to use. Searching is contextual based upon your current position in the app. If you are viewing a certain project, the search will cover that project only.

The core parts of Dejumble are tabs directly below the search bar. The tabs are labeled Inbox, Projects, and Search. These are not customizable. You’ll spend a majority of your time on the Projects tab. This is where all of the actual project and task management happens.

The Search tab shows all of the tasks for every project. When used in conjunction with the search bar at the top you are able to search through all projects and tasks at once rather than on a project by project basis.

Below the tabs is the Smart Bar. We’ll get into this in more detail shortly, but basically this is a way to quickly filter your tasks.

Projects and Tasks

Dejumble uses the common project and task structure for the core organization method. Projects are created with tasks and sub tasks created within those projects. There is quite a bit of functionality in this area so I’ll just run through some of the capabilities.

While on the Projects tab you’ll see your projects as tabs along the left hand side of the application window. The active project will display as a lighter color and you’ll see all of the tasks associated with that project to the right in the main application window.

You’ll see indicators of tasks due today or overdue tasks on the project tab. The tasks are listed displaying their title and due date (if there is one) with a place to “check off” a task. The task will gray out when it is completed (checked).

At the bottom of the main application window are the functions to add, edit, and delete the tasks. They work exactly as their names would suggest.

Here is where Dejumble starts to really stand out. As you’d expect, when you create a task you must assign it to a project. On top of this, there are also some other less obvious things you can add to the task title help you better organize the tasks. I say “less obvious” because it did take a little research to figure out some of this functionality.

You are able to tag each task with one or multiple tags. You simply add a hash (#) sign in front of a tag (#home). These tags are very handy and can be used as essentially live filters. Click on a tag and all of the tasks with that tag will be shown.

You can also prioritize each task by including a ! followed by a number (1-9). So if you wanted to make something a 5 priority you’d include !5 in the title. The priorities will display in different colors. Green for the lower, yellow for the middle and red for the high priority. These can also be clicked on to use as filters in the same way as the tags.

Notes can also be added to any task. This works as you would expect—include whatever text you’d like as a note and you’ll see a small paper icon next to the task title. Sub tasks can be created within the notes section by using the dash (-) followed by the sub task text and then a blank line.

All of these functions are great, but they are a little tricky to figure out at first. I’m undecided on whether I like accomplishing these items in this manner, or if it would make more sense for it to be more obvious (i.e. choose a priority from a list, or a separate function to add sub tasks, etc.)

In the long run, the current keyboard-centric method is quicker in the end (after the user has become familiar with the app). There is something of a learning curve with this more advanced functionality and that may turn some less savvy users away.

Smart Bar

The Smart Bar is an interesting feature that adds a level of quick organization or, more accurately, filtering. Dejumble comes with a few default Smart Groups. You’ll see one for All, Today and Important. These are basically stored searches or filters that can be quickly activated from the Smart Bar.

They are created and edited in the Dejumble Preferences.

The Smart Bar also houses a button to open a new task form.

Syncronizing

One of the big features of Dejumble is that it can be paired with an iPhone application, or with other computers with Dejumble installed.

There is also an option to sync a project with iCal. This is very simple, and once implemented, a particular project’s tasks will then show up as To Do items within iCal. You can check tasks off within iCal and it will sync back with Dejumble, but it doesn’t appear like you can add any tasks or projects via iCal.

Pricing

Dejumble is still in beta so, as of now, is a free download. There is an option right now to pre-order for $20.00 which they say is almost half off what the regular price will be ($39.00). The companion iPhone app is $4.99.

The price of $20.00 seems about right to me, but I’d say that $39.00 seems steep. Especially with the additional iPhone app cost. There are some free—or much cheaper and still very capable—task managers available, so I think they’d struggle to justifying that cost.

Conclusion

Overall, I’ll say that I think Dejumble is a good task manager. I’m not going to say “great”, primarily due to the moderate learning curve. I’m a bit of a geek and can usually figure out new software relatively quickly, but Dejumble had me stumbling around at first. I think that could turn a lot of people off from the get go.

On the other hand, once you figure out how everything works, the advanced organizing features can be really powerful. I expect they would only become more helpful the more projects and tasks you have to search through. I think the developers made a bit of a trade-off when designing. They certainly could have made it more intuitive to use those features, but it would make the usage a bit more sluggish. In a perfect world both methods would be available.

The syncing ability between the desktop application and the iPhone application is a great feature. It is becoming an expected feature of task management software. The iCal syncing, while nice, isn’t necessarily a huge selling point.

If you’re in the market for a task manager I’d say Dejumble is certainly worth checking out. Just make sure you spend a little time getting to know the advanced features so you can really use it to its full potential.

Slowly but surely, awareness about backing up computer data is on the rise. Much of this attention toward backup comes from the recent crop of cloud based storage solutions. The problem with these online storage options is the unavailability of options to backup data over your own network or external drive. There’s also the time it takes to download data from remote servers when you need to restore.

Twin bridges that gap. Nowadays—especially if you’re a freelancer—there is a very high probability of having a web server for running your own website/blog, so why pay an additional monthly subscription for storage?

And in the case of small and medium businesses, there’s likely to be a network storage device or a bunch of RAID servers to use for your backup.

After the break, let us take look how Twin can help us back up data efficiently within our existing storage infrastructure.

Installation

Twin has a simple one-click installation process, and the installer is lightweight too (less than 10 MB). Immediately after launching the app, you will be taken to the licensing screen. Here you can enter the license key you have purchased to unlock all features or choose to continue to use the app unlicensed. Twin will cost you a cool $130, but you are promised that all future upgrades will be free for life.

If you go down the unlicensed route, the app will come with a limited feature set. You will be able to perform a single backup of 250 MB in size every 15 days. Also you will be allowed to restore only one file at a time during this period. It is surprising that they do not offer a time bound full trial of the app like other Mac apps. Without a full trial version, am not sure how users will be able to check if the features like continuous backup work seamlessly.

Setting Up a Backup

After passing the licensing screen, we are shown options to create a backup or to take care of existing backups. I decided to go ahead by creating a new backup of the files from my hard disk.

Navigate through the file system to select the folder(s) to backup. It goes without saying that any sub folders and files inside folders also get backed up. At the same time, if you want to exclude a file(s) from inside these folders from getting backed up, it can be done after this initial selection.

Twin offers you the option to rename the backup to avoid any confusion or to follow a naming system you have in place for all the backups.

If you are backing up sensitive data, say financial documents or medical records, Twin helps you encrypt them at this stage. You are saved from the hassle of going through the process of encryption with a separate app even before planning a backup. The encryption process requires you to enter a password and as Twin recommends, the longer and complicated the password is, stronger the encryption will be.

For those curious tech savvy types, Twin uses AES 256 algorithm. It’s worth noting that if you forget the password, the backup cannot be decrypted.

Twin has an interesting feature that lets you set a maximum file size limit for the backup files. If the files from the folder are smaller than the maximum limit, they will be grouped together and if the files are bigger they will be split.

This feature would come in handy if you have a batch upload schedule or a bandwidth bottleneck. Being a long time Windows user, I have in the past used a couple of third party backup apps but none of them had this feature. So, that’s a +1 from me.

Next up is the backup location. Twin offers all options available across the board. Files can be backed up locally, over the network, or to popular cloud destinations like Amazon S3 and Apple iDisk. I chose to use my webserver to backup files and entered the FTP login information along with the directory path.

After a quick verification, I was displayed the file structure on the webserver to make sure the files are at the right folder.

Dashboard

Once you have input all the relevant data, you will be taken to the dashboard that displays information pertaining to the backup plan you have just created. After a quick review of the setup and adjusting the bandwidth limit from the Preferences section, you can initiate the backup.

As soon as the backup begins, you will see the progress bar at the top of your screen and the Twin icon on the status bar will start rotating. You can pause or abort the process anytime. Twin uses bzip2 compression to reduce the size of the files and it skips already compressed files (JPEG images, Zip archives etc.) to save time.

Events are logged extensively in the Events tab complete with date, duration and status of the backup job.

Twin has a great scheduling system to automate your backup process. Either you can choose the time & date, specify intervals, or initiate a backup upon launch. You also can make the app skip the backup process with specific set of instructions – based on power source, IP address, network location etc.

Final Thoughts

I found Twin to be a brilliant swiss-army backup solution, with its ability to support storage options across the spectrum. It covers all the backup options under the sun and is extremely simple to use.

The only drawback worth mentioning is a fairly steep price tag. Unlimited cloud backup is available at less than $50 a year and lot of external hard disks come with a bundled backup app.

However, if you add up the cloud backup subscriptions over a period of two years and if you already have access to abundant network storage or a webserver, Twin will fit perfectly in the backup equation. Do give it a try!

Ever wanted to turn your Mac into a security camera, to snap a few pictures of what’s going on in your home when you’re away? Or how about a timelapse recorder? Periscope is a very clever application from Freeverse which utilizes your Mac’s built in camera and mic to automatically detect when to take the right photos.

Alongside some very cool motion detection, Periscope also has the ability to save and even upload the photos to a whole bunch of different places immediately after snapping them. Read on to find out more.

Overview

Periscope makes use of the Mac’s in-built iSight camera (or an external one if attached) to automatically take pictures. It’s packed with a good range of features which serve the application well. The interface of Periscope is split into three main sections; Capture, Share, and Review which are self-explanatory in basic function but I will look into the features of each below…

The over-arching “Off Air”/”On Air” button at the top dictates whether the application looks for triggers to take the pictures or not.

Capture

First up, the Capture tab lets you set up when the camera should take pictures, and what should trigger them. The main (and definitely the most fun to test) way in which Periscope works is by sensing movement, such as that burglar creeping around your home – or your cat.

You can specify Periscope to watch the entire camera, or only the areas you’ve selected. The latter can come in handy if you have trees swaying outside a window, so that Periscope will ignore any motion there.

The other options for triggers are when the microphone hears a noise over a certain volume, or when the Apple Remote button is pressed. There’s also a Timer, which rather than going off at set time, takes a photo every so many seconds, minutes, or hours (to a maximum of 2 billion days!).

This allows you to create some interesting time lapses… and also far less interesting ones such as your long, tiring day at work!

Share

The Share tab is really important. While you might not want the world to see the photos your computer has captured, this could be a great way to give you remote evidence of the person who’s stolen your Mac. If you use Periscope as a security app, then those photos of the burglar aren’t going to be much good on your Mac when it’s nowhere to be seen…

Periscope gives you the option to send these images via email, save them to a local folder, iPhoto, or upload to .Mac or an FTP server. It’s a sign of slight application neglect when it still references .Mac rather than MobileMe, but don’t let that stop you giving it a try.

With the growing popularity of Dropbox, possibly the best solution is to have new images sent instantly to a “local folder”, to which you would assign your Dropbox folder. This way, the photos will be synced straight away with the Dropbox server for you to look up later for an increased chance of catching the thief.

This tab also lets you add a timestamp to every photograph, as well as image overlays and text if need be.

I would like to note that the email feature doesn’t work for me at all, though I’m not sure why that is. It doesn’t sound as though email is the best way to share photos to yourself if you use Periscope for security though because it will sometimes wait up to 5 minutes before sending all captured photographs at once, by which time the thief has no doubt packed up your computer and left.

Review

It’s a given that the Review tab is for having a look at the pictures taken, but it also boasts a few nifty features. The image browser on the left feels a bit clumsy and seems to jump around erratically – a grid layout to show more than two images at a time would be ideal.

Underneath the the photo are a few extra buttons which enable you to copy an image to the clipboard, the desktop, or upload to your Flickr account. The best feature here is “Movie” which exports the captured photographs and turns them into a time-lapse QuickTime film, letting you choose the playback speed.

Preferences

In the Periscope Preferences you can set which camera you’d like to use, and turn off the give-away ‘camera snap’ sound it makes every time it takes a photo.

The ‘Video’ section of the Preferences has a very welcome feature; the ability to color correct the image from the camera. This lets you really bring out the color in the images, but also allows you to stretch the brightness/contrast to record more detail in dark rooms. Plus, if you drag the Hue slider all the way to the right you turn into the Incredible Hulk, which is always fun.

Conclusion

Despite a few quirks, Periscope is an overall great application for monitoring and recording activity when you’re away, and if the worst happens, may increase your chances of catching a burglar. It’s also a very easy to use application for creating time lapses with a MacBook, but of course the camera quality isn’t going to be stunning unless you use an external camera.

Priced at $24.95, it could be a worthy investment or a fun tool to have depending on your needs. Download Periscope and let us know if you’ll be using it in the comments.

There are plenty of other applications that exist in this niche, as well. Do you use any of those as security protection for your Mac?

When Steve Jobs gave a preview of the new version of OS X, he talked at length about the idea of bringing what they’d learned through iOS “Back to the Mac”. Unsurprisingly, sweating the details of one of the best mobile interfaces in the industry has given Apple a great deal of insight and experience that can be applied to OS X.

This concept excites some people, and disturbs others. Although I love my iPad, do I want the same experience on the desktop? Or is this platform still better suited for more intricate, complex interface design?

Although iPhoto ’11 started to hint at how this transition may play out, it still felt very much like a traditional desktop app. I couldn’t really see how bringing iOS interface elements and functionality to the desktop would lead to an overall better experience.

Until this week.

Having spent two days using the Reeder for Mac beta, I’m completely blown away by how well—when executed to perfection—this amalgamation of iOS and OS X can work.

Show Me

If you are yet to take Reeder for Mac for a spin, here’s a quick one-minute screencast showing the interface in action:

This is the Future

When opening Reeder for the first time, you’ll feel like you’ve just launched an iPad app on your Mac. The resemblance is uncanny, right down to the use of iOS interface controls for swapping between different view modes. Everything animates with a fluidity rarely found on desktop apps, and Reeder just oozes a style that’s hard to pin down.

By way of a quick overview, Reeder is a desktop client for Google Reader. It’s been available on the iPhone and iPad for some time, and definitely holds the title of “best Google Reader” client in my book. The care and attention to detail invested into Reeder are unparalleled elsewhere.

My Favourite Software Feature of 2010

It’s late in the year, but this fantastic feature of Reeder for Mac immediately takes the top spot:

When you’re reading an article in text mode, Reeder pre-loads the original web page completely behind the scenes. If you decide you want to see the original version, click the article headline, and the original web page slides in with absolutely no loading time. This is insanely clever, and it makes the application feel lightning quick.

Edit, Cut, Refine

The process of cutting something down to the bare essentials is an art. Whether that’s in writing, photography, video, or software design—it makes no difference. The beauty of the iPad is that it forces the developer to consider the bare minimum that the user needs to be exposed to.

Screen space is at a minimum, and there’s no convenient Menu Bar into which every miscellaneous setting and option can be recklessly thrown. Each element, control, and piece of information needs to justify an existence in the application interface.

This is the way that software design should be, and it’s this process of refining and editing that makes many of my favourite iPad applications such a joy to use. So often on the desktop I find myself not using 75% of an app’s functionality, but still being burdened by these unnecessary menu icons, preferences and buttons. This hardly ever happens on the iPad, and I use almost every app to its full potential.

Just for a moment, let’s take a look at this difference personified. This is the screen that loads when I fire up Reeder for Mac:

Simple, understated, and with very little visual “commentary”. Yet I’m confident that I know what everything does, and how everything will respond when I click it.

Here’s how a competing app, NetNewsWire, looks:

Although these two apps have almost identical functionality (with the exception of not being able to managing your feeds in Reeder), there’s no comparison in terms of interface complexity. In Reeder, I’m shown only what I need to see at any given time. In NetNewsWire, I’m shown everything, all the time.

Seth explains perfectly why this is such a huge problem:

Once you overload the user, you train them not to pay attention. More clutter isn’t free. In fact, more clutter is a permanent shift, a desensitization to all the information, not just the last bit…

…More is not always better. In fact, more is almost never better.

No Need for Gestures

One of the main stumbling blocks with porting iOS application to the desktop is the difference in user interaction. Actions such as swiping and pinching often simply can’t be replicated on the desktop, at least not with any enjoyment (if you’ve ever tried the iPhone Simulator app, you’ll know why).

This is one of the reasons why I think it’s unlikely we’ll ever see iPhone or iPad applications reside in the OS X Dashboard. They aren’t designed for the desktop, and would be wholly unpleasant to use.

But Reeder manages to solve this problem in an interesting way, while retaining the feel you’ve come to love on iOS. Click up and down your feed categories on the left, and you’ll see the item list swipe left and right, just as if you were swiping on the iPad.

Click the headline of an item you’re reading, and the feed listing will smoothly hide itself to accommodate additional room for the in-app browser.

No actual “gestures” required—everything works perfectly with a single mouse click—but you still feel as through you’re swiping your way around an iOS interface.

Colour Me Impressed

Despite my initial skepticism over whether iOS could really come “Back to the Mac” in any meaningful way, Reeder’s interface and functionality has put me firmly back in my place. I’m happy to accept that this is certainly the way forward, and I can’t wait to see what Apple has in store for OS X Lion. Just the thought of a re-worked Mail app using Reeder’s interface styling makes me smile…

The constraints enforced by this new paradigm of interface design will persuade developers to take a more refined and carefully planned approach to software development. When this happens, everyone wins.

If this is the future of Mac software, 2011 can’t come fast enough.

Let’s be honest, there has been a flurry of activity in the task manager/list space over the last couple years. For better or worse, there seems to be an endless stream of such apps making their way to the market. Some are very complicated and almost do too much, while others are incredibly simple and cover just the basics.

Hub List is a very new piece of software that has just made an entry into this cramped space, falling very much into the latter category of a super-simple task manager. A “super early adopter beta” version has been released recently.

Beta versions—let alone “super early adopter” beta versions—can be pretty buggy, but I’ve been playing around with the software for a few days, so read on to get my first take!

Design

The first thing that you will notice is that it is very basic. As I’m assuming was planned, it is reminiscent of jotting down a to do list in a paper notebook. Overall, the design has a nice feel to it.

There aren’t too many buttons and spaces to convolute the experience, and it is very clear how Hub List works from the time you first open it. It is designed in such a way that it feels at home with other Mac software.

Layout & Functionality

The layout is remarkably simple. It all happens on one screen with a couple buttons. That is it. The left hand side is where you can organize your task lists. Lists can be organized into folders, and folders can be organized within sub folders.

Folders and task lists can be dragged around to organize them differently. This is a very useful feature to keep you organized and feels like a natural interaction with the application.

One minor gripe I have is that it appears that the only way to create new task lists or folders is by using control-click (or right-click) to bring up a menu. Personally, I’m a control-click kind of person so it doesn’t bother me too much, but a couple of simple “add task” and “add folder” buttons would be a welcome addition for the majority of users.

The right side of the application is where the task lists actually display. As I mentioned earlier, it looks like the lists are displayed on a piece of notebook paper. Double-clicking on a new line will let you add a task, and you can also press the enter key to accomplish this. Double clicking on an existing task will edit it.

The tasks show up with a check box next to them. If a task is completed (checked) it will dim slightly. You can also uncheck tasks as needed as well. It is possible to delete tasks (or lists or folders) by either using a control-click option, the delete key on your keyboard, or using the Hub List menu.

Task order is also easily adjustable by dragging them into the order you would like. If you drag and drop one task on another you can create a sub-task—a nice little touch to help organize a bit better. It is also possible to drag and drop tasks to other lists in your navigation panel. Again, another nice touch that can help you make some quick adjustments.

There are two views for displaying task lists. They can be toggled with two corresponding buttons at the top of the application. The default is the “sheet of paper” view and the other is more of a “notecard” type view. Arrows on either side of the card will allow you to flip between tasks.

It does seem that there is quite a bit of empty space in this notecard view, and I expect that the developers will add more functionality to this before the final version ships.

Conclusion

This is a minimalist task manager (at least it is right now). Hub List is very simple and basic and, depending on your school of thought when it comes to task management, this could be a perfect tool. It really strips away all the frills.

This is just a flat out desktop application at this point, something that will be an immediate interest-killer for many readers. I know a lot of task managers do work in the cloud, and many also have companion iPhone or iPad applications as well. Hub List is also a single person task management system—there are no collaborative features available at this point.

Hub List is still in “super early adopter beta” phase so I’m sure that plenty more tuning and adjusting will be done in the coming months. Truthfully, I haven’t come across any “bugs” as such when using it, and to be honest, I’m not sure I’d add a great deal more functionality. If the goal is to create a super-basic, easy to use Mac task editor, they have achieved this goal pretty well. For the most part it has all of the core features a task manager should have, and interactions with the application seem very natural.

The choice made for an application of this type relies heavily on your task management methodology. If you’re exploring applications in this area, I’d say you should keep your eye on Hub List. Native mobile editions are coming for iPhone and Android by year-end (supposedly), so we’ll soon see how their syncing system works.

Don’t let the beta version scare you away from taking it for a spin either! From what I’ve experienced it runs quite smoothly, and I look forward to seeing the final product.

We’ve collected the top five reviews, roundups and how-to articles from across the AppStorm network in November. Whether you’re interested in Mac, iPhone, or Web apps, there’s bound to be something you didn’t spot over the course of the month. Now would be a good time to explore a part of the AppStorm Network you’ve never seen before!

Thanks for reading AppStorm, and I hope you have a great month in December. We have some fantastic news in store for you over the coming weeks, so stay tuned to find out more… If you don’t already follow the general @appstorm Twitter account, I’d recommend doing so!

Best of iPhone.AppStorm

Best of Web.AppStorm

Best of Mac.AppStorm

Share Your Ideas

Is there something in particular you’d like to see on the site next month? We’d absolutely love to hear your suggestions for articles, topics and giveaways. Just let us know in the comments. Thanks for reading AppStorm!

In today’s interview, I’m talking to Andrew Pepperrell, the developer behind one of my favourite applications of the year—Alfred. This is a fantastic application launcher, and seems to keep growing and expanding every month. It’s certainly been developed with care and attention to detail!

Andrew has taken a few minutes out of his busy day to answer our questions, talk about how Alfred is developed, share his thoughts on the latest Apple developments, and even drop a few hints about what to expect in future versions…

I hope you enjoy the interview!

Tell us a little bit about the Alfred team – where are you based, how many of you are there, and what motivates you as a company?

The team behind Alfred is composed of three people and based in Cambridge, UK. I’m the developer, single-handedly designing and coding Alfred – currently still during evenings and weekends. We’ve got our fingers crossed that, very soon, I’ll be able to make Mac development as my everyday job a reality.

Vero takes care of marketing activities and customer service (and is also my wife) and Anna is the voice behind our demo videos and is now overhauling our help documentation. They also split their time, working on Pepsmedia, where they help other businesses successfully market themselves online.

In the early days, Ollie Kavanagh, who’s a brilliant graphic designer, helped us create the Alfred identity.

As someone who uses your Mac all day, every day, do you feel the need to always be running the latest hardware?

As difficult as it is to resist the latest shiny Apple thing, I don’t think running the latest hardware is necessarily the way to go. Our test machine is an old G4 Mac Mini running 10.5 and half of the Alfred development has been done on a four-year-old black MacBook.

That being said, I recently treated myself to a new 13″ MacBook Air, which feels monstrously powerful! Vero owns an iPad, Anna and I have each an iPhone 4 – we do love our gadgets.

What’s your take on the recent announcement of the Mac App Store – do you think it’ll be a “game changer”?

There’s no doubt that the Mac App Store will change the landscape of Mac software, in particular for indie developers.

For users like Mac.AppStorm readers, who already know how to install an app and keep on top of the latest Mac news, it won’t turn their world upside down. On the other hand, there’s a whole new audience of Mac users who will look at alternatives and new software for the first time. Developers who don’t consider the App Store seriously will likely be left behind.

I’m hoping that this new marketplace doesn’t result in a price race to the bottom, with tons of rubbish 99c apps appearing. It’s not a sustainable model and developers who take that route aren’t doing themselves any favours by setting price expectations unrealistically low.

We’re lucky to have such a lively buzzing community who already spread the word about Alfred, yet the App Store will allow us to reach a volume of users we could only otherwise dream of.

As far as I can see, there will continue to be an ecosystem outside of the App Store for certain types of apps, so it’ll be interesting to see how engrained this App Store becomes in comparison to the unavoidable iOS one.

How do you think the addition of “Mission Control” and “LaunchPad” will affect Alfred in OS X Lion?

We think that Alfred complements these very well. The LaunchPad still requires use of the mouse, while Alfred is keyboard and efficiency driven. If most people’s LaunchPads are as messy as Vero’s iPad and iPhone pages, they’ll still need Alfred to simply find the apps!

In particular with the Powerpack, Alfred goes far beyond simply app-launching – file navigation, iTunes control, Clipboard, etc – so we’re confident that users will still find a place on their Mac for us.

Which are the main apps that you use every day, and why?

Xcode, Coda and TextMate are always nearby during development. I use Fireworks for the design and mockups.

I have a love-hate relationship with Tweetie but it remains my Twitter client of choice. Vero prefers Tweetdeck and Anna uses Mixero, so to each their own! For chatting, Adium is often open in the background on all our Macs.

Of course, we’ll also be running the latest build of Alfred, continuing to test it for stability as we use it every day.

Which websites, Twitter users, and magazines do you follow in an effort to stay up-to-date with the activities of other developers, and the Apple eco-system in general?

I’m usually head down coding, with Bassdrive.com fueling me through the evening. When I do take time to catch up on tech news, my usual reads include I can has cheezburger, failblog…

Joking aside, I enjoy reading Cocoa with Love, AppleInsider, MacRumors, and of course Mac.AppStorm!

Also, a day can’t go by without reading Questionable Content.

For someone interested in developing their very first Mac app, where would you recommend they start?

My biggest piece of advice is to just get XCode and start programming. Find a project or an idea that solves a real problem you’re having and jump right in.

The first book I bought was an earlier edition of Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X by Aaron Hillegass which gives a good understanding of Cocoa. The problem with books is that references go out of date very quickly as XCode gets updates.

As for documentation, most of my time is spent on the Apple developer docs and guides.

I also recommend getting an Objective C and a Patterns book.

Be sure to check out CocoaDev and Cocoa With Love. Finally, make good friends with Instruments, in particular the memory allocations and leaks detection – it’s downright awesome!

Do you have any interesting updates or apps in the pipeline that you can give us a sneak peak at?

Alfred is growing very quickly, something our users seem to love. The next release will contain Address Book integration, a number of improvements to relevancy and knowledge, a fun stats page and much more.

We’re already in the planning stage of creating a second productivity app which will complement Alfred very well. For now, however, we can’t quite give you a sneak preview 😉

Thanks, Andrew!

Thanks to Andrew and Vero for taking the time to answer our questions, and share a little insight behind the scenes of Alfred. I’m thoroughly excited about the new updates and apps in the pipeline, and can’t wait to see what this talented team have in store for us…

If you’ve made it to the end of this interview without opening a new tab to download Alfred, shame on you! Give Alfred a try now—you won’t regret it.

Also be sure to check out their Christmas Calendar, which launched today, giving a trick, tip or treat every day until Christmas!

We’d like to say a big thank you to this month’s Mac.AppStorm sponsors, and the great software they create! If you’re interested in advertising, you can purchase a banner advertisement through BuySellAds, or sign up for a Weekly Sponsorship slot.

Thank you to the fantastic applications we had sponsoring each week during the month, all of which we personally recommend you download and try out!

• CleanMyMac – A great tool for keeping your Mac in tip-top shape that packs an impressive functionality punch for the price. I run CleanMyMac every couple of months, and it always manages to free up several gigabytes of unnecessary data.
• Billings Pro – The basic version of Billings is perfect for freelancers and small companies – but if you run a larger organisation, it’s definitely worth taking a look at Billings Pro. This advanced version offers powerful time tracking, synchronization between different computers, and the ability to review and approve invoices. It’s a powerful beast.
• Radium – A lightweight internet radio player with a wonderfully retro icon! Radium allows you to listen to thousands of radio stations from around the world, right from your OS X menu bar. It’s simple, functional, and an absolutely fantastic way to listen to the radio on your Mac.
• TextExpander – If you regularly find yourself typing the same piece of text over and over again, TextExpander could be a real life-saver. It’s a simple way to store a library of regularly used text snippets, and easily recall them using a pre-defined keyword. We also have an exclusive discount code (APPSTORMTE) for AppStorm readers, good for 20% off until the 5th December.

Thanks for reading AppStorm this month, and for checking out the software that our sponsors create. I really appreciate it.

I’m looking forward to all the exciting things we have planned for next month. It’s going to be a pretty amazing end to the year, so stay tuned!