software

Norwegians FTW

Monday, December 9, 2024

Norwegians are the best. Listeners of Hemispheric Views will already know of the esteem in which I hold fürstenberg; who is essentially Norwegian me. We have many similarities across our respective histories; it’s quite fun! Now, I’ve got another Norwegian to thank: Erland. I discovered Erland through Mastodon, I think. Although he also has a micro.blog site, so it could have been there. Like myself, Erland also seems to have an interest in notetaking apps, and his favourite is Paper.

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My 2023 Mac Apps of the Year

Sunday, December 3, 2023

Once again, I’m here to blog about my favourite Mac Apps for the year. See previously: 2022 2017 The Standard Criteria For my purposes, to be considered an App of the Year, the software needs to be something I used extensively, value and enjoy. I also must feel I would miss them if they suddenly went away. Of course, it also needs to be a Mac App. OmniFocus It’s almost to the point where this app needs to be put into the Hall of Fame, and removed from future consideration.

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Browser-based Apps Just Aren't as Nice

Thursday, July 6, 2023

I can’t believe that 40 years of computer software design has led us to a world where we are all reliant on a range of entirely bespoke browser-based apps. The tech world has really ended up in a basket-case of UI design. I don’t mind server-based stuff, but I love a native front-end. It’s such a shame that market economics has resulted in us running complex apps in an app that was never designed for that purpose.

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Reddit is Enshittified

Friday, June 9, 2023

Social Media Deathwatch II - Mark writes: When a site tells you they don’t want you using it, except by their captured clients, you should stop using it. All they want is to control you and put ads in your eyeballs, until you explode. … Reddit came out of Digg being fed into a woodchipper just because Kevin Rose wanted a little bit of money… Don’t use closed networks owned by someone else.

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Quality Tech Support from Indie Mac Developers

Tuesday, December 13, 2022

How good is the Mac indie developer community? Caddyshack Good GIFfrom Caddyshack GIFs I have been a long-time user of the SearchLink service developed by Brett Terpstra. I use it so regularly that I have it tied to a button on my Stream Deck, as well as keyboard shortcut, ⌃ + ⌘ + L. Last night I attempted to use SearchLink while typing in the all new MarsEdit 5. Instead of it working as it always has, I received a confounding error:

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Rebuilding Drafts

Monday, May 16, 2022

I’ve been a long-time user of Drafts, but my subscription is due to expire next month and I have been thinking that I’d let it go. I’ve been using Tot more these days, and Drafts had become an intimidating mess that I didn’t enjoy using. However, after listening to a Mac Power Users podcast featuring the Drafts app and an interview with its developer, and then reading a blog post by Jason Burk about his Drafts setup (plus a personal conversation with him), I realised that it wasn’t necessarily Drafts that was the problem - it was what I had done to it.

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Subscription Services

Thursday, January 6, 2022

It’s that time of year when many are making lists and undertaking audits of their subscription services. I had an old list in Dynalist that was almost complete. I’ve updated it and moved it into Craft, where I will attempt to maintain it over time.

The King is Dead; Long Live the King

Tuesday, December 14, 2021

Update: 14 December 2021: John, a kind reader of this blog emailed me to correct the record regarding the age of these apps. I imply below that Quicksilver predated Launchbar when in fact Launchbar is the oldest of the crop. In my usage, Quicksilver was the first King - it was my gateway drug to this application category. But Quicksilver was not the first. A few days ago I noticed that Launchbar was consuming excessive CPU cycles on my iMac.

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Tot, redux: iOS Edition

Tuesday, August 17, 2021

By way of follow-up to yesterday’s review of Tot, I can confirm I’ve bought the iOS version.

Tot

Tuesday, August 17, 2021

Update: The day after writing this, I bought the iOS version of Tot. My friend and Hemispheric Views podcast co-host Martin Feld is Mr. Default. He likes Reminders. He like Mail.app. He likes Calendar. Not for him the world of OmniFocus, MailMate or Fantastical. No sirree. Keep it simple, keep it made by Apple. Except… he uses Tot. I’m sure he uses Notes as well, but Tot. Not Drafts. I installed Tot on my Mac when it was released, because as with anything made by The Iconfactory, it’s worth a look.

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BBEdit 14

Thursday, July 22, 2021

I want to use and love BBEdit. I bought version 13 with a similar thought and feeling. That purchase seems like it was only a few months ago - in fact, I checked to see if I was eligible for the free upgrade. According to my receipt stored in 1Password, however, my v13 license was acquired on 21 December 2019. Time flies, especially in 2020, the year of our COVID.

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The Archive

Sunday, March 28, 2021

The Archive owes its heritage to nvAlt, which owes its heritage to Notational Velocity — a unique piece of software that broke new ground by integrating new note creation with search in an Omnibar. I’m old enough to remember using the original Notational Velocity. The Archive is true to the heritage of the OG, but moves it in a direction specifically suited to the zettelkasten philosophy of note taking. What’s zettelkasten, you ask?

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I Forgot About 1Writer

Tuesday, March 2, 2021

I also own 1Writer, which also plugs directly into Dropbox, and is, arguably, a better editor. It’s certainly a more fully-featured one. Yes, I own many text editors. It’s the curse of the tinkerer. I also forgot that you can pretend a file name with _ in Blot and it won’t publish it as a live post. I’ve done that with this entry, so ideally it will publish when I’m finished and ready - not when I’m just getting started.

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Posting here using Byword

Tuesday, March 2, 2021

I’ve owned Byword for many years. I think it was the first Markdown editor I bought, for both iOS and macOS. I abandoned it a long time ago as well, as it seemed to pale in comparison with other Markdown editors. In looking for an easier way to post to Blot via Dropbox, however, Greg Moore suggested Byword. I’ve installed it here on my iPad, and it does connect neatly to Dropbox - bypassing the futzy iOS Files.

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Dynalist as a Tool for Daily Notes

Tuesday, December 29, 2020

I’ve been consciously taking more and better daily notes. Part of this is to build a greater awareness of what I do and how I spend my time. Part of it is to be able to capture and later resurface information. I’ve tried a number of various solutions to this. I experimented with Bullet Journaling (with a pen and journal) and using the Cortext Podcast’s Theme Journal. However, paper creates too much friction considering that I am usually in front of a screen of some sort and I want digital information in any case.

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HyperPlan

Monday, February 17, 2020

Have you ever used a pivot table in Excel, and thought that there must be a better way? Have you ever built a Kanban board in Trello but realised you need a second axis? Have you ever designed a table in OmniGraffle or PowerPoint and thought there must a more straightforward way? I have. So I purchased a license for the Home version of HyperPlan. My Uses to Date I’ve owned HyperPlan for just a couple of weeks.

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Agenda & NotePlan

Friday, January 3, 2020

Agenda and NotePlan: two apps that ostensibly do the same thing. They provide a method by which to take notes with regard to meetings, projects and daily happenings. Design Decisions Both apps have been carefully designed but have ended up operating quite differently to one another. Agenda feels practically overwrought. It feels slow in operation, fiddly with a range of sliding panes, non-standard drop-down menus and a hybrid rich-text/markdown environment. Everything that is put into the app is tied up into its proprietary datastore.

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My App Toolkit

Thursday, January 2, 2020

At the beginning of 2020, an update on my current app toolbox. Of course, it is overflowing with too many tools. My ideal state would be to have one centralised repository for everything. Yet each app offers a different set of features and benefits, and scratch particular itches. So I think the unified data store remains off in the distance. Purpose iOS Primary iOS Secondary macOS Primary macOS Secondary Best Cross Platform Blot via Git Drafts 1Writer iA Writer Drafts iA Writer Micro.

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MailMate Review

Thursday, August 22, 2019

I have bought a license for MailMate - a mail application for the Mac. This cost me AU$84. Why pay that kind of money for a mail app, when Apple provide Mail for free, and I have access to a good web app for Fastmail and Outlook for work email? I was happy to pay the money because MailMate is excellent artisanal software that offers unparalleled features and power. That money also goes straight to the single developer who has committed to this app for years.

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So Many Markdown Editor Options

Sunday, June 16, 2019

The search for the right Mac Markdown editor is like a quest for the Holy Grail. There are many options, but finding the ideal fit is a challenge. It got to the point where I had to do an audit of the options that exist on my computer, and consider which one might be best for my needs. The list I came up with is, in potential order of preference:

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Will I End up Buying BBEdit?

Saturday, June 15, 2019

I’ve always had a version of BBEdit on my Mac. For a while it was TextWrangler, but now it’s back to BBEdit (unregistered). It’s one of those apps I don’t use very often, but when I want a pure Mac text editing experience, I know I can rely on it. BBEdit can do a whole bunch of things that I don’t understand and have no need for. But it is working very nicely as an integrated text editor for GitHub Desktop, and I feel like I might now benefit from the ‘unlocked’ version of BBEdit.

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Read-it-Later with...

Friday, June 7, 2019

I’ve used Instapaper relatively consistently since Marco Arment introduced it. Was that a decade ago now? Occasionally I’ve stopped using it, or toyed with other services like Pocket, or Safari’s Reading List feature. In the end, however, I’ve always gone back to Instapaper. Despite that usage, I’ve never been interested in any of the service’s ‘power user’ features. They’ve always felt disjointed from my larger workflows. My Instapaper history is an island of data that is unconnected from my other information, which is primarily kept in DEVONthink.

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OmniOutliner as a Daybook

Monday, March 25, 2019

I’ve recently taken to using OmniOutliner as a daybook/Bullet Journal. I don’t actively follow the bullet journal methodology, although the more I think about it, the more useful it seems.1 Traditionally, I’ve not been one to record daily events as they occur and make notes about all the little things. More recently, however, I’m finding that I want to recall something that happened earlier, or a decision that was made, or an event.

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Imposter Syndrome

Wednesday, February 20, 2019

I have a tendency to suffer Imposter Syndrome. At times when it strikes, it’s important to remember that while your own knowledge seems obvious, other people don’t share your brain. As such, sharing your information can deliver genuine insight and help. This is why, in TheBrain, I keep these two nodes linked.