Category: Mac

At Envato we’ve been building something really awesome over the last couple of months, and it’s finally time reveal it! We’re extremely excited to announce the launch of the Tuts+ Jobs.

Tuts+ Jobs is a job board for full time, part time and casual employment opportunities for web and creative professionals, such as app developers and interface designers. A brand new site to go alongside the Tuts+ Educational Network and the Envato Marketplaces, all run by Envato. Read on to find out more!

Earn and Learn

Envato is committed to helping people earn and learn online. We provide a wealth of educational material through Tuts+ and Tuts+ Premium, alongside the Envato Marketplaces to help you benefit from the creative skills you learn.

Tuts+ Jobs furthers this vision perfectly. With Tuts+ you can learn the skills you need to become a creative professional, and with Tuts+ Jobs you can find an amazing job that uses those skills. Our goal here is to take the hassle out of finding a job, so we’ve made the process as simple as can be!

Tuts+ Jobs

Finding a Job

With Tuts+ Jobs we’re committed to making every step of the job-finding process more intuitive, simpler and more efficient. We don’t want to stand between you and a great opportunity.

It’s totally free to sign up and start applying for jobs, and if nothing matches your initial search you can receive notifications when jobs come up that match your criteria. We will have full time, part time and casual listings from all around the world. Check the listing to find out where the job is based, as some jobs may offer remote opportunities.

Posting a Job

If you have a position that you need to fill, or a great part/full-time opportunity, then Tuts+ Jobs is the best way to find a talented and creative individual to do that job. Each 30-day listing costs just $99, regardless of the type of job you’re posting.

Your job listing will be promoted across the entire Tuts+ network. With exposure to our ten million visitors over the course of 30 days, it’s a brilliant way to reach exactly the type of audience you’re looking for.

We’re so confident you’ll find the person you’ve been looking for that if, at the end of the 30 days, you haven’t found the right person you can re-list your job for free or get a full refund under our money back guarantee.

What About FreelanceSwitch Jobs?

At present Tuts+ Jobs doesn’t offer freelance opportunities, it’s for part/full-time jobs only, but we still have our sister site, FreelanceSwitch, for freelance work.

We will be merging both of these sites in the future so Tuts+ Jobs will cover every type of opportunity — from temporary freelance gigs, to high-level full-time positions. In the meantime, FreelanceSwitch is the place to go for smaller freelance projects!

Sign Up, Explore, and Subscribe

We’ll be posting plenty of exciting job positions over the next few weeks, so now is the best time to head over to the site and subscribe to a job search that interests you. That way you’ll be the first to know when any new listings show up that match your skill set and requirements.

Check out Tuts+ Jobs

We recently rounded up ten of the best journal and note-taking apps here at Mac.AppStorm. Many people commented, listing their favourite apps and why they’ve remained so dedicated to them all this time. While some of the apps in that roundup have probably been in your Launchpad at one time or another, there is a newcomer that has only been recently released.

The new guy is Sockii’s Capture 365 Journal. After mentioning it in the roundup, we felt it was time to compare it to Day One and have a full look at what the app’s capabilities are and why you should or should not use it. If you’ve been waiting for this kind of a read before you spend your hard-earned cash on such a young app, the following review should prove most helpful. The main question is, does this app live up to reasonable expectations for a digital journal?

Skip Setup, Jump Right In

Capture 365 Journal does not have a setup process, so you can just start using it right after you download the 7.9 MB file. Even though this can seem inviting to some people, a journaling app should have some sort of setup for importing your old journal or even pulling your recent Tweets or Facebook status updates to make something. There’s not another app out there that does the latter, but it’d definitely be a nice thing to have and people would use it.

Not having a setup process simplifies things — anyone will tell you that. However, it doesn’t necessarily help the features list get bigger. It’s also unfortunate that there is no tutorial or introduction video for this app because it can get more confusing down the road. For instance, adding an entry to a specific day requires that you click it and then click the Add Entry on [day here] button instead of just the usual + button. Two separate buttons makes things confusing and can be frustrating to some people.

No Importing, But Adding Entries is Simple

Try exporting instead of importing.

I briefly mentioned importing an older journal in the previous section. Now it’s time to go into more detail on the matter. As I said before, Capture 365 doesn’t support importing entries from MacJournal, PDF documents, or even plain text. You would at least expect there to be support for the last one, but instead the File menu holds an Export feature. All this lets you do is select a date range and export things as PDF or print them. The exported PDF document looks nice, though the font is nothing to get excited about (it’s Helvetica).

Without a way to import all my old entries, how am I to use this new app as a replacement for something like Day One? This is a obligatory feature in all journaling apps without even considering what crowd you are looking to serve the software to. It’s as if the apple strudel has no sweetener in this case.

Use CMD + N to create a new entry.

When it comes to adding a new journal entry, it can be done from anywhere in the app with the click of a button. The big red ribbon in the top right corner with a + on it will create a new journal entry in separate window when you click it. You can then type whatever you wish into the text box and click Save to finish things up. This process starts out streamlined, but then it just gets tedious due to the clicking of a button to save what you’ve typed. It seems like an unnecessary step in the composition process; why not just use CMD + Return or something instead?

Speaking of shortcuts, this app desperately needs to make use of them. CMD + N will create a new journal entry as you would expect, but the interesting thing is the developer doesn’t tell you that. In the File menu, CMD + N’s command is titled New Journal, hinting that it will create a completely different journal window or something of the sort. It’d help if things were a little more clear on the menus, and there should be more shortcuts for navigating the interface. The Escape key would be good for closing an entry, but instead you have to press it and then Return, even if the entry is blank. It’s all a bit too tedious.

A User Interface with Potential

Browsing the journal.

The main reason Capture 365 Journal looked promising was its user interface. It’s not skeumorphic as many Mac apps have become. Instead, the designer took a nice simple approach to things, which is good. The main background of entries is a paper-like texture that can barely be told different from a regular white background; the journal entries pane has a nice leather background that is also dimmed so it doesn’t jump out at you like Apple’s Calendar app; and finally, the ribbon at the top does not try to look realistic, but rather like a computer-generated image, which is much better than many others out there.

From top to bottom, the user interface doesn’t really mix well. One would hope for a simplified approach to things, but this app has different types of design all throughout. First there’s the leather, which, while perfectly fine, does not mix with the paper and ribbon. Likewise, the ribbon doesn’t mix with the leather, but it looks fine alongside the paper. These are just some little mistakes that throw things off.

Markdown is Left in the Cold

A favourite feature of many Mac apps is support for John Gruber’s Markdown code. Everyone enjoys being able to type quickly without putting extra symbols like with HTML. Sadly, not all apps support it, and this one is on that list. When you’re developing an app in which the user handles text extensively, a good thing to remember is that it will be hard to format it with rich text, and it’s always been the ugliest thing anyway. Markdown is clean when typed out and looks great when it’s formatted. If only this developer remembered that.

Photos are Nice, But Incomplete

This is a photo entry.

As with Day One, you can add a photo to your entry. That’s about the only thing you can do with a photograph though. If you feel like actually looking at the image, it’s too small to view, but you can go through three screens to get a larger version of it. Another problem with this feature is the way the image is embedded in an entry. Day One has things right: inline images. Capture 365 just doesn’t understand what to do with an image besides make the caption the main point of the entry. There’s also no way to just browse photos, like with a library view of sorts.

Journal on the Go with iCloud Sync

Head to the Preferences window and check this box to turn on iCloud.

Capture 365′s last most notable feature is iCloud synchronisation, which works well and keeps everything backed up to a safe server maintained by Apple Inc. The funny thing is, this feature does not come enabled by default, nor does the developer tell you that it’s there. If you venture into the Preferences window, you’ll find a checkbox in the iCloud tab that switches on cloud capabilities. Once you’ve checked it, things will begin uploading. One thing that’d be nice is a progress bar so you know if things are finished or if you can continue your work and close the journal. That can be added in a future release though.

The main purpose of iCloud sync with this app is so you can take your journal with you everywhere. There is an iOS app titled Capture 365 Journal Pro and it costs $3.99, which is less than Day One’s iOS companion. The app is universal and shouldn’t be too hard to use on an iPad if you’ve already figured out the desktop app because it has the same basic design. On the iPhone, it’s just like browsing your calendar with extra information on days and photos here and there. The nice thing is, the photos in these apps actually work much better than in the desktop one.

Having iCloud gives this app a distinct advantage when compared to most journaling software out there. Day One does have this feature and the developer has implemented it well, but most other apps are lacking it. Having the same information on every device is a plus for any app or service.

Comparing It to Day One

Little app, meet big app.

At the end of Day One, the good old Bloom Built app comes to haunt you with its steadily beautiful interface and good deal of features. When it comes down to it, Capture 365 has nothing to hold up as a weapon in its battle against the the mighty Day One. Day One is much simpler for a first-time user, not having a menu bar app for quickly adding an entry is disappointing, and the user interface is nowhere near as beautiful, nor consistent, as it could be.

Worth Your Time?

If you don’t already use Day One or are new to journaling on a Mac, consider this app one that’s still in development. It’s not going to be as good as Day One, even if you do like its current user interface and lack of core features. You could always start here and then export things in the future, but again, importing them somewhere else could end up showing the same problems. You don’t want to get stuck and end up losing all those precious thoughts and memories, that’s for sure.

Nothing is here.

On the other hand, you could be a journaling legend, in which case this app is out the door right from the start. Without a way to import things that you’ve already written down, how are you supposed to use this as a replacement for, say, MacJournal or Day One? The only way right now is to copy and paste everything, which is a dull and unnecessary task. If the app isn’t ready at the beginning of things, it won’t make it ten minutes on your Mac.

Whatever the case is, the documentation of this app really isn’t that good at the start and there are no tips later on. The user experience can definitely be improved a bit, CMD + W to close a journal entry window would be nice, not having to click exactly on the + button to create a new entry makes sense, and everything else is just obvious. There are many improvements to be made here, and at least the developers got one thing that counts: an iOS companion with iCloud sync.

After a slightly embarrassing setback to its development, iTunes 11 has finally been released by Apple after a month’s delay, bringing a whole new sleuth of features to the renowned music player. The new version was first announced at the iPhone 5 media event back in September, with a promised release date of October, however Apple decided that they needed “a little more time” to get it just right.

Well, it’s now available and ready for the world to see. Let’s take a quick peek inside and see what’s new. We will, of course, be getting a full review to you in the next couple of days 🙂

A new, overhauled interface (and a new icon)

Perhaps the most striking feature about iTunes 11 is the completely revamped interface. I’ll admit that I was getting a bit tired of the old one, which was starting to look a little outdated (it hadn’t changed considerably since iTunes was first released, albeit with a few tweaks here and there) however this new version has brought iTunes into the 21st century.

The new interface present in iTunes 11.

The sidebar, which has been a feature of iTunes pretty much since the start has now gone in the default view (you can bring it back up by clicking on View then Show Sidebar). Now you’ve got an edge-to-edge interface with much more concentration on your albums and songs, which is very reminiscent of the new iPad music application on iOS 6. Apple is presumably trying to bring all three together into a more unified collection.

Artists and genres are now displayed in a scrollable list on the left-hand side.

Clicking on either the Artists or Genres brings up a scrollable list of either on the left-hand side, with your songs organised by albums as default. You can, of course, still search for albums, artists or songs using the Search Library feature in the top-right hand corner or by pressing the first letter of the artist on your Mac’s keyboard.

The new options available when playing a song.

If you hover over the grey box in the top-centre of your screen and click on the little rightwards-pointing arrow, you are now presented with a greater range of options, including quick links to other songs or albums by the artist or to start a new Genius playlist. The default iTunes font has also been overhauled to Helvetica Neue as well, again bringing it more inline with the Music application on iOS devices.

A new Mini Player

I’ll admit, the previous mini iTunes player was absolutely terrible. You could pause, rewind and fast forward songs and that was about it. Now, in iTunes 11, you’ve got a far greater choice with the mini player. You can add songs to the new “Up Next” feature or choose another random song from your library to play next.

The revamped mini player with a sleuth of better options.

As well as this, you can choose the output of your music (either via your Mac or via AirPlay) and search your library straight from the mini player.

A revamped iTunes Store interface

The iTunes Store interface has finally been revamped to match the new ones within iOS 6, with featured items being displayed in the traditional “Cover Flow” style. There’s also far more focus on cover art (as in iOS 6 with the application icons) in this release and it makes for a much more pleasant browsing experience.

The new iTunes Store is reminiscent of the revamped store in iOS 6.

What do you think?

Although this release has been slightly delayed, it seems like Apple really have hit the nail on the head again – this new version really is beautiful. We’ll have a full rundown of all the new features as soon as possible but for now, you can grab iTunes 11 by heading over to the Software Update section of the App Store, where it should be waiting for you (the Windows version has also been released as well). On OS X, the download weighs in at 198 MB.

And of course, please feel free to share your thoughts and views about this new version in the Comments section below!

At the end of last year, it looked like Apple just might release a TV in 2012. Our readers were skeptical, but still, many indicators seemed to point in that direction. But here we stand, with the year all but past, and unless Apple decides to release something in the next 4 weeks, 2012 will end without a TV from Apple.

That is, except for the Apple TV. No, Apple doesn’t make a TV itself, but its $99 set top box just might be the handiest little device you can hook up to your TV. Steve Jobs referred to it as a hobby, but it’s been a hobby Apple keeps coming back to. It’s more affordable than ever, so tiny you’ll hardly notice it in your living room, and with AirPlay and a Mac or iOS device, it can be the simplest way to show off a presentation or play a game on the big screen.

That’s why we’re wondering if you have an Apple TV. If so, do you ever use it with your Mac via AirPlay, or do you just use it to play online and iTunes media on your TV? Or is an Apple TV on your Christmas wish list? We’d love to hear your thoughts on Apple’s non-TV in the comments below.

FTP, or File Transfer Protocol, is the standard way of transferring files between your computer and your server, whether it be shared or dedicated. One of the nice things about FTP is the fact that you can view and edit the entire file structure of your website or file server remotely, without ever touching your server. In order to do this, you’ll need an FTP client. FTP clients allow you to connect your Mac to your remote server via the Internet.

While FTP clients are pretty basic applications, they’re not all created equally. Some feature different price-tags, feature lists and other important differences. There’s a number of well known paid FTP apps for the Mac, but what if you just want to upload a couple files and don’t want to spend a ton to do it? That’s why we’ve thrown together a list of the best free FTP clients for Mac OS X. At the end of the article, we’ll also show you a few paid alternatives which are sure to fit the needs of the power user, if you outgrown the free FTP options.

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Three paid alternatives

Conclusion

There you have it, the best free FTP clients for Mac OS X. After checking out a few of these free but functional applications for yourself, be sure to leave a comment below telling us which is your favorite. And if you’re already using an FTP client which isn’t on this list, feel free to let us know!

Before the rise of wireless networks, getting online or setting up a network required running a cable to each place that you want to connect your computer. Now, almost every device from computers to phones comes with wireless built in, and in many cases is the only option to get that device onto the network.

Installing a wireless network isn’t always easy. Interference from other nearby networks and electronics can interfere with your signal, a common problem in crowded small apartments. In an office or enterprise, machinery and other system can produce problems. In addition, covering a larger area will often require multiple access points while trying to place them in a way that will adequately cover the entire area using as little equipment as possible.

You can overcome these problems by trial and error, but it’s better to find a program to help you out. NetSpot is just the app for the job. We previously looked at NetSpot on Mac Appstorm, but recently version 2.0 of the software came out adding new features and functionality. How does this version stack up and can it work for the home and enterprise? Let’s see.

New in NetSpot 2

NetSpot can be downloaded from http://www.netspotapp.com/. The basic version is free and allows non-commercial use. New to version 2.0 are Pro and Enterprise modes. The Pro (one user at $99) and Enterprise (company-wide at $399) versions add additional features primarily of use for those those wishing to use the program in an office or enterprise environment. These versions allow multiple floor scanning to visualize how access points on different floors interact with each other. They also add active scanning and visualizations to show upload/downloads speeds of the wireless network. The commercial versions also add troubleshooting options and auto-saving of survey information.

Even in the free version, NetSpot adds several new features over the previous version 1.3. You gain the ability to delete bad sample points if you click on the wrong location, for example. Previously, a mistake could require restarting the scan from scratch. If the program misidentifies the location of an access point (AP), then you can manually move the AP to the correct location on the map to produce more accurate results. The interface overall seems better laid out and easier to work with. Perhaps the most useful feature is the new troubleshooting mode that displays several overlays on the map to help identify the cause, and suggests resolutions to common wireless problems such as interference or something blocking the signal.

Discover Mode shows you the wireless networks around you in real time.

NetSpot 2.0 also includes a Discover mode that provides a real time analysis of the wireless networks around you. This can be useful when you want a look at what’s around you without doing a complete time consuming survey. It’s also helpful when searching for rogue, unauthorized, or unknown access points in an enterprise environment.

Using NetSpot

A Survey Starts with Creating a Map

The primary use of NetSpot comes when you do a wireless survey. This is the process of moving to several locations in the area, letting NetSpot scan at each location. You begin by loading or creating a map of the area to survey. This will likely be the hardest part for most home users. You will need to either have a map in a graphic format that you can import, the ability to create a map in another program such as Adobe Illustrator you can then import, or draw a map by hand.

For your home, a quick sketch will suffice and the built in drawing tools will let you do something similar to the rough sketch of the building I tested shown below. For an office or more complex building you will want architectural drawings or blueprints. When drawing a map you’ll specify the size of the area, and when importing a map, you’ll be asked to click on two points on the map and then provide the actual distance to allow NetSpot to calculate the scale for you.

A survey in progress. Each dot shows a location that’s been scanned and the green area shows the area that NetSpot feels it has information about.

With a map in place, you now begin the survey. This process consists of moving to a location on your map, clicking on that spot on the displayed map, and then letting the program scan the wireless networks at each location. You will generally want to work along the borders of the location and rooms in a clockwise or counter-clockwise direction and then depending on the size of the area you are surveying at some spots inside the area being mapped. Once you’ve covered most of the area, shown by the coloring on the map as you go, you then click Stop Scan and let NetSpot analyze the gathered information to produce a map of the coverage of your area.

A completed survey showing good coverage throughout this building.

Once you complete a survey, you have a number of ways to view the data. The traditional signal to noise ratio map will show the strength of your connection at various parts of the map. This can help you identify areas where the wireless signal may be weak or blocked. You can also view noise levels, useful for finding interference that can be harming your wireless network. You can also view maps showing the transfer speeds if you choose that option during your scan.

Conclusion

Overall NetSpot does a great job at a complex job. Perfecting the location of wireless equipment always includes an element of trial and error due to the complexities of wireless environments such as the construction materials used in a building, noisy devices such as old microwaves or cordless phones, and location of devices needed wireless service.

I’ve used a number of programs for this purpose and NetSpot combines a good ease of use and powerful features. It lacks some of the highest end features in the free version, but the free version will work for most home needs. The commercial Pro and Enterprise version compares well to many commercial packages that cost much more. I found the first version useful for tweaking the location of wireless devices in my home network and this one looks useful in location in an enterprise environment. If you’re looking to better use the wireless devices in your house, give NetSpot a look.

I’m always looking for apps to make things easier and make my workflow run more smoothly. Especially when I’m repeatedly opening the same document or the same website, over and over again, I want to make what I’m doing less of a chore. I stick things on my Dock or in my bookmarks bar, but then I just end up with a lot of clutter. What I need is workflow help that goes unseen until I really need it.

RocketShip may be the app I’ve been looking for. It allows users to create shortcuts to just about anything, including applications and URLs. Instead of clicking an icon in your Dock or on your menubar, you get there by typing a keystroke you created yourself. Can RocketShip save me the time, and most of all the stopping and starting, of switching among applications and websites all day?

Blast Off!

RocketShip is easy to setup the first time out. Click the RocketShip menubar icon and choose Shortcuts from the menu. To create a new shortcut, click the plus sign in the list on the lefthand side. Changing the name of the shortcut is simple enough; just double click on its title and change it to whatever you’d like.

It’s easy to create a new shortcut in RocketShip

To actually make it do something, though, that’s the real trick. Click the dropdown menu to the right, and choose an action. Most of mine seem to be Launch Application or Open Website, but you can open files or folders, run scripts, and more. Once you’ve chosen your action, tap the arrow to the right. That lets you browse for the thing you’re going to do. Select the application, folder, file, or if you’re opening a website, enter the URL.

It’s worth noting that when you enter a URL, RocketShip can get a bit feisty. You have to right-click to paste a URL, not Command+V here. Also, every time I added an HTTPS site, RocketShip couldn’t handle it. It would create the URL as https://https://url.com, and I’d get a 404 error. My solution was to add the site as url.com, as I have a browser extension that forces HTTPS wherever possible. It will still be an issue for people who don’t use an extension like that or just happen to add an HTTPS URL without realizing it, as I did again and again.

Be careful entering a URL, or your shortcut may break.

Assigning Your Shortcuts

After deciding what you want your shortcut to do, you need to choose a shortcut keystroke. You really have limited choices here, but that sort of makes them easier to remember. You can make it Option+KEY, Command+KEY, or Option+Command+KEY. To choose whether you want to use Option or Command or both, select or deselect them above the dropdown menu. Click the huge button and then tap a key on your keyboard to complete the shortcut keystroke.

Unfortunately, those really are your only options. No Control, Shift, or Fn here. You also can’t combine other keys. For instance, if you want to open your Dropbox folder, Option+D+B isn’t going to get the job done.

The real drawback is that so many shortcuts are already assigned. Command+C can’t be my shortcut to Calendar because it’s going to fight for its right to copy. I ended up just making all of my shortcuts Option+Command+KEY because I was a lot less likely to run into a conflict, though it did happen when I chose Option+Command+D. I didn’t know what was happening, other than my desktop seemed to be going berserk, until I realized that’s also the shortcut to toggle Dock hiding on and off.

RocketShip’s Preferences

Whenever you use a RocketShip shortcut, you’ll see the keystroke displayed across a charcoal banner on the bottom left of your screen. It’s a great indication that RocketShip heard you loud and clear and is processing whatever your command was. You can turn this off, however, in the Preferences, available from the dropdown in the menubar icon.

The preferences are simple but offer a couple of key features.

Preferences also allows you to turn all of your shortcuts on or off with a single click without closing the application. If you find you’re having a lot of overlap with other system shortcuts or you’re handing your Mac over to a friend who may not be expecting the array of commands her fingers will unleash, it’s probably a good idea to toggle those off.

Conclusion

RocketShip is a really simple little app that let’s you make some pretty simple customizations you may have been looking for. If you’re always going for the same few applications, files, or websites, you might want to put those at your fingertips with just a keystroke.

However, the customization is limited. There are similar apps that allow you to choose from an array of shortcuts, pulling you outside the Option and Command kiddie pool. There are also much more powerful launcher apps that let you do a whole lot more than RocketShip is built for.

That said, not everyone needs all the bells and whistles. There’s no learning curve with RocketShip, while you can easily get lost in a more complicated application. Just open up RocketShip and start creating your shortcuts. There’s not anything else to do, and with the ability to launch scripts, the sky really is the limit. Just be careful your shortcuts don’t overlap, or you may be in for some trouble!

If there is one reason we Mac users love our computers, it’s because of their outstanding aesthetics in their hardware and OS. Having a beautiful computer and user interface is one thing, but having it accompanied by a beautiful wallpaper is another one. OS X includes a number of great desktop backgrounds, but they can get boring after a while. I used to be in a constant search for fresh wallpapers, sometimes spending hours a week on sites like DeviantArt, Customize.org, Interface Lift, and more.

Now that I found Kuvva, that quest has come to an end. Read on to find out why.

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“The free app that streams wallpapers right to your desktop.”

These words, used as a baseline for Kuvva’s dedicated website, explain it all. Kuvva is a tiny app that delivers curated art to your desktop.

I rarely include screenshots of an app simply featured on its developer website.But this one just perfectly illustrates Kuvva: minimalist, elegant, up-to-the-point.

I don’t know about you, but on every Mac I own, I set my wallpaper to change at least everyday. I like to start a new day with something new and inspiring right in front of my eyes. In addition to that, I really don’t like having my OS X desktop cluttered with tons of icons and/or folders. In fact, my desktop has nothing on it: no icons, no folders, not even aliases, I even hid all mounted drives and devices by digging through the Finder appearance preferences. I really want my desktop to be something I want to look at, not more.

That’s where Kuvva came to make my day.

When this tiny app is running, it will modify your wallpaper at the interval you set it to (from a new one each hour to only one per week), getting images from three “streaming” sources:

• ‘Featured’: every week, seven wallpapers from an artist’s work are selected and showcased in Kuvva (both within the app and on the website); this means you get a different wallpaper from this artist daily during a week
• ‘Popular’ rolls through the most user-favorited wallpapers
• and ‘Favorites’ corresponds to your own selection of wallpapers from the Kuvva catalog (more on this later)

Discrete but powerful

When Kuvva is running, you won’t even notice it, unless you peak at your menubar or your Dock. Indeed, you can choose where to put this little’s app icon, and clicking (menubar) or right-clicking (Dock) on that icon will give you access to a few useful features and settings.

Kuvva features can be accessed through the menubar…

First, if you don’t like the current wallpaper, you can change it by clicking on ‘Next’ or ‘Previous’. This is blind navigation however, because whereas ‘Previous’ will of course take you back to the wallpaper previously displayed, you never really know what you’ll get by clicking ‘Next’, as there is no gallery displayed within the app. Actually, I find this is one of the things that makes this app charming: letting serendipity do its job.

… or you can access Kuvva features from the Dock, if you’d rather have it sit there, instead of in the menubar by default.

Just next to the ‘Next’ and ‘Previous’ button, you can switch between the three different, previously described streaming channels: Featured, Popular and Favorites. Talking about Favorites, there is an option to actually add or remove the currently displayed wallpaper to and from your favorites.

Kuvva is also a bit social as you will find an option to direcly tweet your current image. A nice addition, though it is not (yet?) integrated in Mountain Lion’s tweet sheets so you’ll have to tweet from the official Twitter website.

Finally, you can:

• get directed to Kuvva’s website to know a bit more about the artist whose wallpaper is currently displayed, by clicking on the self-descriptive ‘About the artist…’ option
• have access to a few more Preferences for this app, including the frequency at which your wallpaper will be changed (you can even set it to ‘Manually’ if you really like the current one and want to keep it for a moment)
• and simply quit this app, which will prevent it from overwriting your system settings for wallpapers, but won’t modify your current wallpaper (that is, the latest displayed by Kuvva)

In line with the general aspect of Kuvva, its Preferences window is not cluttered but useful and well thought.

A welcome addition: your Kuvva account

From within Kuvva’s preferences, or on the website, you can sign up for a free account. This gives you the ability to have your favorited wallpapers synchronized between your computers (and your phone, because there now is a Kuvva app for iPhone too).

The main point of signing up for a Kuvva account is to have your favorited wallpapers available on all your machines.

On the beautifully designed, elegant and minimalist web site, you can browse through albums and retrieve the Featured and Popular categories found in the desktop app. You can also browse through the entire collection of images, viewing them one by one, thanks to the ‘Explore’ feature.

The Kuvva website presents wallpapers in a beautiful, minimalist grid design.

Each wallpaper can be downloaded at various sizes for a use even without the Kuvva desktop app.

When selecting a wallpaper on the Kuvva.com website, you have it showcased on the desktop of a virtual MacBook.You can also download it at various sizes, show it some love by sharing it, and browse through related wallpapers.

Additionally, once signed in, you can browse your favorites and easily remove some of them or add new ones from the Featured/Popular/Explore categories with a single click. I found this to be the fastest way to manage your favorites, and just for that, the website itself is a nice addition to the rather minimalistic desktop app.

Conclusion

Maybe am I not partial enough, but I completely felt in love with Kuvva. I admit this might be a niche app, but if you’re constantly looking for beautiful desktop art, like me, search no more: this tiny piece of software just totally meets your expectations. All of this in a nice, minimalist, elegant, easy-to-use package that ‘just works’.

The sublime content is diversified enough to suit various tastes and moods. The app is both useful, elegant, and well-thought. It shows great attention to details (notice how the menu bar app transforms into a blue, subtle progress indicator when switching channels, for instance). I would have loved to be able to have some kind of a gallery view, though (honestly the only little drawback I see to this app).

I’d love to see more little apps like this one that don’t stand on your way on the Mac App Store. Kuvva is the kind of apps that makes you happy to own a Mac and makes it even more attractive in return.

After attending too many Thanksgiving parties and gatherings in America, it’s time to settle down in you New Zealand home. (That’s assuming you have one. If you don’t, don’t read these app recommendations and go buy one.) When you lean back in your familiar desk chair for your morning cappuccino and enjoy the beautiful sunrise over the Shire’s green mountains, it’s time to start reading this week’s edition of app deals.

Because, of course, you are eager to get some shiny new software from the Mac App Store, whether it disrupts your bliss morning or not. This week is especially profuse in such bargains, and even Pixelmator has graced us with another appearance.

Pixelmator, Other Apps, and The End

We’ve reached the end of yet another weekly deals roundup. Of course, there are a few great apps from last week and ohers that remain on sale. One of them is Pixelmator. It’s $14.99 for the current version (a new one will be released soon) and if you haven’t already downloaded it, now would be a good time. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is still $7.99 if you have the graphics card to support it; 1Password has been $34.99 for the past week; and MoneyWiz is still $19.99 if you need to manage your finances by spending some money.

If there are any other deals you enjoyed reading about this week, do let us know about them in the comments. If not, see you next time.

‘Tis the season for bundles, deals … and our favorite, giveaways! Our friends over at StackSocial have two great bundles this week, and today we’ve got 2 copies of their Mac Utility Bundle to giveaway to our readers. The giveaway ends in just 36 hours, though, so you’ve only got 24 hours to get your entry in. That means you’d better keep reading, fast.

The Mac Utility Bundle includes the latest version of Parallels, so you can run Windows, Linux, Dos, OS X, or any other OS you want on your Mac without having to reboot. We found Parallels 8 to be a great way to run Windows programs and more on your Mac in our recent review, and if you’ve been wanting to try out Windows 8, you’ll be glad to hear that it’s fully ready for Microsoft’s latest OS.

The bundle then includes Snagit, one of the best known screenshot tools. It’s great for capturing screenshots – even full-length shots of websites – and quickly annotating and sharing them. Those two apps make the bundle more than worth its price of $59.99, but you’ll also get several utilities to go along with it.

Plus, you just might win a free copy from AppStorm! All you’ll need to do to enter is post a comment below letting us know if you’d be more excited about getting Parallels 8 or Snagit, then share the giveaway on Twitter, Facebook, or App.net and share the link to your post below for an extra entry. We’ll randomly select two winners 24 hours from now, so be sure to get your entry in quickly!

Envato staff or those who have written more than two articles or tutorials for AppStorm are ineligible to enter.

When you bought your Mac, or perhaps another smart device, chances are you didn’t plan on just using the bundles apps that were already installed on it. There’s dozens of apps we all use every day that make our machines vastly more useful than they’d be on their own. When we don’t know what to use for a job, a quick visit to the App Store is usually all that’s required to find an app that’ll fit the bill.

Problem is, there’s too many apps for any of us to ever use, much less master. And there’s always that nagging suspicion that there’s a better app that could let you do what you’re doing faster.

If only you had the best app.

Surely there’s an app for that…

Ever tried to make a map? Unless you just want to print off Google Maps, it’s no where near as easy as it looks. Just trying to figure out what streets to show is difficult enough, and then you’ve got to draw the actual map. My quick App Store search didn’t yield any apps that would magically make it easier to make a map, so I resorted to Adobe Illustrator.

No, I’m not a designer. I know Photoshop fairly well, but Illustrator is Greek to me. Even still, 45 minutes later, I had a half-way decent map, but it was never good enough. So I gave up. Time to call in the pros.

A couple days later, my fiancé asked a friend if he could make a map for us, since we’d seen a small map he’d made for an invite that looked quite nice. He takes on the job, and a few minutes later he calls me over to double-check the location names. That’s when I see the app my friend had just made a professional-looking map in.

Microsoft Paint.

Paint to the rescue.

I’m sure none of us would call Microsoft Paint a pro app, and most of us reading Mac.AppStorm would have a hard time thinking that a PC app was better for the job than a Mac app. The thing is, it wasn’t that Paint was the very best app for making maps, period. But for my friend, it was the best app because he knew how to do it.

I, being a perfectionist, couldn’t settle for my own efforts in a pro app, while my friend took an app he knew how to use and made something far nicer in minutes.

The Russians Used a Pencil

There’s an oft-repeated tale that during the space race, NASA spent millions developing an ink pen that could be used in zero gravity, while the Russians simply used pencils. The real story wasn’t quite as simple, but it’s amusing to think about how much we often overcomplicate tasks. We’re so used to needing a specialized app for everything, we often overlook the simple tools we have at hand that could solve the job in an easier way.

Sure, that’s not the best strategy if you’re, say, trying to store the data of your nation’s census. In that case, you might want to really search for the best tool. But when you’re needing to do a simple task on your computer, you likely already have an app that could do it just fine.

The fewer the tools, the greater the imagination.

~Ben Orki

Should you use Powerpoint or Keynote as a page layout tool? Perhaps not, but it sure has worked plenty of times for me when I needed to make quick fliers. How about saving webpages as PDF, combining them in Preview, then reading them later? Might not be the best way to save web pages for later, but it sure worked for me in college on internal sites that wouldn’t work with Instapaper. Or should you use Numbers (or Excel, or Google Spreadsheets) to pick random winners of giveaways? There might be a better app, but randbetween() in a spreadsheet has been working fine for me for years now.

Imagine what we could do just with the preloaded apps on a Mac. Really.

Sometimes, enough is enough.

It’s nice to have tons of fancy apps, and a limitless app budget. But as our friend Patrick Rhone would say, perhaps what you have is enough. As app reviewers, we make it easy to get tempted to buy all the apps that come out. Sorry! But don’t think apps are the only answer. Sometimes, throw in a little ingenuity, and you’ll find that the tools you already have are plenty powerful enough for the little tasks that come up in your life.

So go make the most of the apps you have, the apps you already know inside out. They might have more potential in them than you’d ever have imagined.

Gone are the days of pocket notebooks, or journals that people threw their many emotions and adventures into, or little metal-bound notepads that bear many lists, from wishes to tasks. A new era is upon us, the age of digitalisation. With it, traditional scribblers are called to conform to the rules of modern note-taking, journaling, and really, writing anything at all down. Because in this age of high-definition displays and shiny new phones that appear on the shelves of our favourite electronics store every few months, there’s not time to pull out the little notebook when the smartphone is right there.

This isn’t a mobile blog though, so where am I going with this elaborate point? Well, the Mac has applications for all these things too. Whether it be for journaling or jotting down a quick thought, the Mac App Store is full of solutions to help you make these tasks easier. It’s definitely a big market, and if the developer knows what he’s doing, a New and Noteworthy app can end up being your daily tool. Let’s take a look at the best ones there are for putting your thoughts in the safe confines of your Mac’s hard drive, or iCloud, or just some other cloud.Like the article? You should subscribe and follow us on twitter.

Journals

If it’s a good day you had, put all the details in your digital book. If you have more than just words, throw in some pictures.

Notebooks

Whether you need to write down a quick thought or organise a plethora of them, one of these apps will get the job done.

What’s Your Favourite?

These are just some of the nice journaling and note-taking apps available for OS X. Among the many others, there might be one of your preference. Don’t just sit there and read this paragraph; tell us all about it. We’d like to know why you use your set of journaling or note-taking apps and what makes them unique. If you’re a developer who has a journal app in your plans, be sure to contact us about it.

If you are afraid of the kitchen or haven’t gotten around to discover the trills of making a beautifully-presented dish all by yourself, but you are looking to venture into this world, you’re on the wrong website. Well, actually, this time you aren’t. See, while this isn’t a cooking website, we do tend to cover a wide variety of topics; after all, apps are helpful for many things.

This time, we will cover The Video Cookbook. The Video Cookbook is meant to help you discover and understand the intricacies of cooking. The question here however, is whether or not this app can make you into a cooking expert or simply provide you with some basic recipes.

The Video Cookbook’s Home Screen.

Introduction to The Video Cookbook

The Video Cookbook is a cooking guide of sorts that will not only give you some good video recipes, but it will also help you keep track of ingredients needed to prepare dishes, provide you with a glossary of terms used in the world of cuisine, and hold your hand throughout your experimentation in the kitchen.

In other words, The Video Cookbook is a great app to have if you’re planning on cooking some of the dishes featured in it, but as far as every other dish that isn’t included, you’ll have to do that on your own.

Think of it like this… The Video Cookbook is a cookbook with pictures and videos. So then, what makes it worth your money?

The Video Cookbook’s Features

The features built into The Video Cookbook are what make this app better than picking up a normal cookbook — sort of. See, even though there are a few useful features that this app provides, the developers don’t make them as useful as they could be.

The shopping list. The app gives you two different formats.

Shopping List: This feature allows you to create a very detailed list of ingredients that you’ll need to prepare whatever dish you add to it. This is great except for a few things. First, you can’t add a personal dish to the app, so basically you can’t create custom shopping lists. Also, adding a dish to your shopping list is kind of… well, pointless. Why would someone need to add the dish to the shopping list if there is already a list of ingredients in the recipe pane itself? The only advantage of adding the dish to the shopping list is that you can then email or print out the list, but again, why can’t this just be on the recipe tab? It makes no sense.

Definitions of all cooking-related things.

Glossary: This is the coolest feature of The Video Cookbook. The glossary, as you may have guessed, displays many terms used in the kitchen; you know, things like: al dente, boudin, bruschetta, Frappé, etc. Some of the words you may not know how to pronounce are accompanied by a playable voice recording that will help you with the proper pronunciation. Handy feature.

Download it all in one click.

Download all videos at once: This isn’t really a feature, but it is good to mention that you can download all the videos with one click.

Downloading videos is perhaps the biggest downside of the app. Why can’t we stream them? Why do we have sit and download them? Why must I waste hard drive space on videos when I could stream them?

The Video Cookbook Looks

Feedback windows looks like a different app altogether.

The Video Cookbook looks, in all honesty, like a web browser. From the way it’s presented to the way it behaves, it’s like a web app. Well, to be fair, some parts look like a normal app. Things like the shopping list and the glossary act pretty much like a normal app, but there is no consistency throughout the application. When you switch from the shopping list, to the recipes, to the settings, it is all different.

The recipes tab is also very convoluted. There are buttons and actions everywhere in the UI, and you kind of have to mess with them to know what everything does.

The Verdict

Varied recipes throughout. No cheesecake, thought?

The Video Cookbook is an app for a very select audience. If you want to learn how to cook, you will probably want to spend a bit of money elsewhere. If you want to practice with the recipes in this app, go ahead, but with YouTube at your disposal, it is kind of hard to find a real incentive to pay for this app.

On top of that, there are a few in-app purchases that would allow you to gain more recipes. This is kind of annoying. No matter how cheap they may be, you can probably find many of these recipes online — Google being your best friend. Sure, this app has “professionals” showing you what to do, but there are some great free alternatives to this application.

Putting videos, shopping lists, ingredients, step-by-step instructions and so on in a handy application is great, but the problem here is how this application is delivered.

If this application was ten or 12 dollars with an ever growing library of free video recipes, then we would have something. If the app would evolve and improve on the features it has plus adding a number of other functionalities, then we would have a beast. Sadly, this isn’t the case with The Video Cookbook — not currently, anyway.

Our sponsor this week is Doxie One, the little scanner that makes scanning simple. Doxie One scans your paper – simply, automatically, and with no computer required. To scan, just push the button and insert your sheet. Doxie scans anywhere with a simple, elegant design.

Doxie’s different than other scanners. It’s small – about the size of an empty paper towel roll – so you can tuck it in a drawer when you’re not scanning. Setup is easy: Connect power, insert an SD card (included), press Doxie’s button, and you’re ready to start scanning.

When you’re ready to organize, sync scans to your Mac or iPad, just like a digital camera. Doxie’s elegant Mac app creates multi-page searchable PDFs you can save to your computer, send to your favorite apps like Evernote and Dropbox, or share via iMessage. Doxie even works with your iPad with both Apple’s Lightning and 30-pin SD Card Reader accessories.

Doxie’s app sends your paper to Evernote, Dropbox, and even to friends or colleagues with iMessage on iPhone, iPad, and OS X – so it’s easy to share, back up, and access your paper everywhere you go.

Doxie is paperless for everyone – now shipping for just $149. Reserve one now.

We’re focusing on apps to help you with writing this month, and software art practice Dark Heartfelt Software makes some of the best. They’ve already had great success with minimalist writing apps Grandview and Launchwrite, which force you to focus on the current word and sentence rather than the entire document. Now they’ve released a new app, Notesdeck, which allows you to edit and consolidate notes across four different cloud services and between your Mac and iOS devices.

We got the chance to interview the man behind Dark Heartfelt, Michael Petruzzo, about his apps and design process. Read on to hear about Notesdeck, software design as art, App Store frustrations, and more.

Tell us about your latest app, Notesdeck. Why build an app for consolidating notes stored across multiple cloud services?

Before we start I want to say thanks to you and to Mac.AppStorm for the opportunity and the great questions you’ve asked. It’s my pleasure to shed some light on my process.

Notesdeck is three things:

• The fastest note app on Mac, iPad and iPhone
• Access and edit point for all your notes from Evernote, Simplenote and Dropbox
• A easy, elegant word processor with Markdown preview

Let’s say I get asked by a lovely writer at Mac.AppStorm to be interviewed about my apps and my design process. Say he’s really, really nice and even gives me a few weeks to answer his great questions while I drive across the US. Moving across the country is self-defining and dredges up a slew of feelings, notions and shifts in perspective. So as I’ve been traveling I’ve been collecting thoughts in Notesdeck and Evernote for iOS and occasionally sitting down at my Mac to relate these thoughts to the questions in this interview.

Fragmentation is an essential concept in software design today. There are so many solutions and products and each individual service is valuable for different actions. Maybe you use Evernote to organize your recipes and inspiration, Dropbox for work-related information and Simplenote for more personal notes. Notesdeck exists to align these services, highlighting the value inherent in each by putting them into a cohesive perspective. And it’s a great space for writing. I’m really proud of it.

Petruzzo’s latest app, Notesdeck, allows you to write, edit, and consolidate notes across multiple cloud-based services.

I read that you don’t actually do any coding. Is that still true? What problems did you run into outsourcing the programming?

So I have a buddy who lives between Russia and Bali who’s been managing coding for me. He’s been amazing, but we lack the benefits of in-person communication. I had a few problems early on with other developers, but these were likely miscommunications caused by my own lack of experience. I’ve been learning how to communicate more specifically and directly. I’m finding it’s almost always best to look inward when I’m not seeing the results I want.

Could you explain your process for creating apps, and what your role is post-conceptualization? Am I right in thinking that it’s still a part-time endeavor? What else do you work on?

I’ve mainly been designing for myself. Writing is an activity that aids in my personal development and it’s a big part of my process. That writing piles up in different services for various reasons and I can’t get a good perspective of it all. Having to jump back and forth between Evernote, Simplenote and Dropbox is was disrupting my flow. Notesdeck is a solution to that problem and a space to make navigating these services easier.

I work as a scenic artist for film and television — I try to take jobs while I have big batches of coding being written. I also make sculpture, photography and writing and I’d like to make more time for that type of work. There is definitely a loss of momentum when I switch back and forth between different modes, but I do this because I enjoy it and it enriches the development of my software, specifically of Notesdeck. I think it’s essential and has differentiated me from a funded startup or programmer who is breaking out with something awesome.

What does the name Dark Heartfelt mean? Also, why do you refer to Dark Heartfelt Software as an art practice rather than a development studio?

The words “dark” and “heartfelt” are the types of films that Netflix was recommending for me when I started out making Mac Apps. Also I have sort of obnoxious, dark flowing hair. Most of my life has been experienced through the lens of art and Dark Heartfelt Software is a somewhat personal space to do my “research.” It’s not exactly Xerox PARC.

I love the way that your apps focus on the words. It’s easy to get caught up on the mechanics of writing, but when you only see one word at a time (like in Grandview) that’s not really possible. Every word has the same weight and importance, and you’re driven to look forward rather than backward. Is that the intended effect? What do you hope people will get out of Dark Heartfelt’s software?

Grandview displays word one at a time as you write. It literally alters your consciousness by being extremely reactive — emphasizing each word as quickly as you can type it. The experience is an emphasis on the present, what you are writing each moment.

Word processors have a long and rich history. If WordPerfect is Michelangelo’s David, Grandview is Salvador Dali’s Clocks.

Grandview forces you to focus on one word at a time, transforming your writing process.

What inspired you to create your apps? I understand that Grandview came out of difficulty finishing a screenplay. What about your other apps — Launchwrite, Live Subtitles, and Notesdeck?

Live Subtitles was originally a custom app created for a production company. It allows you to write words over your screen for screencasts and live performances. With Launchwrite I wanted to combine the “moon-world” feeling of Apple’s Launchpad app with a word processor. This makes for a super simple notepad that is now available for free.

There’s a huge number of writing apps for the Mac, many of which are brilliant. How do you stand out in such a strong and crowded field?

That’s easy: I don’t focus on standing out, I focus on offering solutions that are unique. There always has to be variation.

You’ve written before about frustrations with Apple’s Mac App Store policies. Do you feel restrained by any of its limitations, or is it just the long approval times? Have you considered selling apps outside the App Store?

I waited for two months for Notesdeck to be reviewed for the Mac App Store only to be rejected, then another two months after I resubmitted to finally be approved. Four months is a long time, and something like that would have destroyed me about a year ago. I used to get really bent out of shape.

Lately I’ve been reading the I-Ching and trying to be more patient, so I decided to take a job on an independent film for very little money while I waited to be approved. Sometimes the answer is to just give more to the universe and help others.

The App Stores have their downfalls but they allow me to manage users and updates in a really simple way. I’ve experimented with selling outside the App Store with Grandview but the fragmentation of releasing updates eventually overshadowed the small bump in sales. I’m gracious to finally have users, and though I wish I had more avenues to communicate with them, I am thankful for Apple’s App Stores.

Could you talk briefly about your workflow? What apps help you get things done?

Michael Petruzzo.

Writing every morning is something I picked up from Julia Cameron (she calls this “morning pages”) and helps with everything I do. By letting my mind wander I can dissolve barriers rather than over-analyze them.

I am a big fan of OmniFocus and certainly all of the apps I support with Notesdeck. I have no idea how I survived without Siri and Reminders. I can’t even make tea without talking to my iPhone. It’s kind of embarrassing.

What are you working on now? Do you have plans to make any new apps?

I’ve got a full plate — Notesdeck has just reached the App Store a few months ago and I know that this solution is only going to be as good as I can communicate with my initial users. My primary focus is working with users to create a great product.

Many of my friends are musicians, and I really dig the variation between avenues they create music for — they have albums, EP’s, remixes, collaborations and live shows — all of which work “in concert” to inform each other. Notesdeck is an opus and my primary activity is enriching it’s feature set and making it a more stable and useful piece of software.

You’re headed across the country from Maryland to California soon. Which city are you moving to and why?

I’m a fairly all or nothing guy and I’ve learned that I need to place myself in the right situations or I stagnate. I like to be in an immersive environment. I got a chance to stay in Berkeley for about a month and I never felt so surrounded by focused, solution-driven individuals that were eager to not only succeed but also to lend a hand. That’s why I’ve decided to move to the bay area this year as I work on this application.

Thanks Michael!

We’d like to thank Michael for taking the time out of his cross-country travels to do this interview. We’re big fans of Grandview and early signs suggest that Notesdeck is a winner too.