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WinterFest 2018: Great Deals on Pro Mac Apps and Books [Sponsor]

Hosted by Tinderbox maker Eastgate, WinterFest 2018 is an amazing collection of carefully-crafted productivity apps and books available for a limited time for 20-25% off.

The 17 apps and books span the entire spectrum of the research and writing process. There are apps to plan your next big project, track your time, discover research materials, organize your research, add and tag images to your project, write, and more.

Each app is hand-crafted by some of the best Mac developers around. WinterFest includes:

  • Tinderbox – Visualize and organize ideas and plans.
  • Panorama X – Collect, organize, and understand your data.
  • Nisus Writer Pro – The powerful word processor for the Mac.
  • DEVONthink Pro Office - Your paperless Mac office.
  • Aeon Timeline 2 – The timeline tool for creative thinking.
  • TextExpander – Recall your best words. Instantly, repeatedly.
  • Take Control Books – Essential books about Mac, iOS, and key apps.
  • Storyspace – Serious hypertext narrative.
  • Bookends –The reference manager you’ve been looking for.
  • Scapple – Quickly capture and connect ideas.
  • PDFpen – Powerful PDF editing.
  • HoudahSpot – Powerful file search for Mac.
  • HoudahGeo – Photo geotagging.
  • DEVONagent Pro – Your smart (re)search assistant.
  • BBEdit 12 – Power tool for text.
  • ImageFramer Pro – Your art. Showcased.
  • Timing – Automatic time tracking for Mac.
  • Scrivener – Your complete writing studio.

Saving hundreds of dollars on these fine tools couldn’t be simpler. Visit the WinterFest website to learn more about each and purchase Eastgate’s Tinderbox and Storyspace. For everything else, just use the coupon code WINTERFEST2018 at checkout to take advantage of these fantastic deals.

Our thanks to WinterFest 2018 for sponsoring MacStories this week.

WinterFest 2018: Great Deals on Pro Mac Apps and Books [Sponsor]

Hosted by Tinderbox maker Eastgate, WinterFest 2018 is an amazing collection of carefully-crafted productivity apps and books available for a limited time for 20-25% off.

The 17 apps and books span the entire spectrum of the research and writing process. There are apps to plan your next big project, track your time, discover research materials, organize your research, add and tag images to your project, write, and more.

Each app is hand-crafted by some of the best Mac developers around. WinterFest includes:

  • Tinderbox – Visualize and organize ideas and plans.
  • Panorama X – Collect, organize, and understand your data.
  • Nisus Writer Pro – The powerful word processor for the Mac.
  • DEVONthink Pro Office - Your paperless Mac office.
  • Aeon Timeline 2 – The timeline tool for creative thinking.
  • TextExpander – Recall your best words. Instantly, repeatedly.
  • Take Control Books – Essential books about Mac, iOS, and key apps.
  • Storyspace – Serious hypertext narrative.
  • Bookends –The reference manager you’ve been looking for.
  • Scapple – Quickly capture and connect ideas.
  • PDFpen – Powerful PDF editing.
  • HoudahSpot – Powerful file search for Mac.
  • HoudahGeo – Photo geotagging.
  • DEVONagent Pro – Your smart (re)search assistant.
  • BBEdit 12 – Power tool for text.
  • ImageFramer Pro – Your art. Showcased.
  • Timing – Automatic time tracking for Mac.
  • Scrivener – Your complete writing studio.

Saving hundreds of dollars on these fine tools couldn’t be simpler. Visit the WinterFest website to learn more about each and purchase Eastgate’s Tinderbox and Storyspace. For everything else, just use the coupon code WINTERFEST2018 at checkout to take advantage of these fantastic deals.

Our thanks to WinterFest 2018 for sponsoring MacStories this week.

Compiling and Exporting Chapters for My iOS 12 Review with Drafts 5

Back in June, I wrote on MacStories that I was evaluating whether Drafts 5 could replace Editorial for my Markdown automation and become the app I use to write my annual iOS review. Putting together these longform pieces involves a lot of writing, editing, and navigating between different sections; the more I can automate these tasks, the more time I can spend doing what actually matters for the review – testing the new version of iOS and ensuring the review is up to my standards.

Once I started looking into Drafts 5, I realized I could take advantage of its JavaScript automation engine to build a custom action that would compile the latest version of my iOS review draft and back it up to multiple locations as a single Markdown (.md) text file.

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Drafts 5: The MacStories Review

There are few apps I’ve ever used which made a lasting impact on my daily workflow. But for years now, the singular app that’s been the foundation of my iOS use has been Drafts. The app has lived in my dock since I first picked it up, it’s the single most important app I use on the platform, and it’s the only paid app I mandate to anyone looking for must-have apps on iOS.

Drafts is the bedrock app from which I build all my productivity. It’s the single point of text entry that shares to any app, whether through the share sheet, a simple action, or a custom and complex action. Any time I have an idea, I put it in Drafts. Tasks to add to my task manager? I do that from Drafts. Something I want to write about on my blog? That idea starts in Drafts too. It’s the focal point for everything I do.

But times change. Apps age. New features are added in the OS that need to be integrated, which cause some developers to pull the plug. So today, I’m saying goodbye to Drafts 4. And it’s getting replaced by the only app that could possibly replace it: Drafts 5.

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    iPad Diaries: DEVONthink’s New Advanced Automation

    iPad Diaries is a regular series about using the iPad as a primary computer. You can find more installments here and subscribe to the dedicated RSS feed.

    When I covered DEVONthink To Go in the first iPad Diaries column back in February, I briefly mentioned the app’s limited support for URL schemes and automation. I concluded the article noting that DEVONthink’s advanced file management features were ideal candidates for my writing workflow – particularly given the app’s ability to store different types of documents, reference them with unique links, and search them with Boolean operators. I also expanded upon the idea of using DEVONthink as my only iOS file manager in the latest episode of Mac Power Users.

    I’ve been moving more work documents and other research material (web archives and PDFs, mostly) to DEVONthink over the past two months. The turning point occurred a few weeks ago, when DEVONtechnologies began adding advanced x-callback-url automation to DEVONthink’s beta channel and were kind enough to let me test and provide feedback for the functionality.

    I was genuinely excited by the prospect of a scriptable DEVONthink: due to iOS’ lack of a deeply integrated Finder, I’ve always wanted a file manager that could be extended and enhanced through automation and other apps. With an improved set of URL commands and various optimizations for usage in Workflow, DEVONthink To Go can now be that kind of file manager. I made my decision: this is the app I’m going to use to manage the research content for my iOS 11 review this summer.

    The automation features introduced by DEVONtechnologies in the latest DEVONthink for iOS go deep into the app’s structure, covering discrete functionalities such as file creation, search, and data retrieval. These changes will enable a greater number of users to integrate DEVONthink with their favorite iPad apps and workflows. And while the new commands are documented in the app, I thought it’d be useful to provide some concrete examples of how we can take DEVONthink to the next level through automation.

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    iPad Diaries: Advanced File Management and Research with DEVONthink

    As I wrote in my story on one year of iPad Pro, I consider cloud services a necessity for managing files on iOS. Dropbox and iCloud Drive make it possible to keep the same sets of documents and app libraries synced across devices, but, more importantly, they help overcome iOS’ file management woes through centralized storage spaces. In the article, I espoused the flexibility of Documents and its tight integration with Dropbox, noting how Readdle had built the missing iPad file manager with features Apple omitted from their iCloud Drive app.

    Since early January, I’ve been thinking about my larger writing projects scheduled for 2017 and whether Documents can scale as a reference and research tool. Looking back at 2016 and the time I poured into organizing and referencing files for my iOS 10 review draft in Scrivener (which I covered here), I realized that neither Scrivener’s built-in file manager nor Documents could meet the basic requirements I have set for this year’s review. These include the ability to search different file types with advanced operators as well as a system to reference individual files and folders throughout iOS with local URLs. It was during this meta-research phase1 that I decided to try DEVONthink To Go again.

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    My Must-Have iOS Apps & Web Services, 2016 Edition

    2016 has been the year that I got used to iOS as my primary computing platform. After years of slowly transitioning from macOS, 2016 was all about optimizing my workflows and getting the most out of my iPhone and iPad.

    As I documented in two stories – one in February, the other last week – the consolidation of my iOS-only setup revolved around the iPad Pro. I see the 12.9-inch iPad Pro as the ultimate expression of iOS for portable productivity. With my 2011 MacBook Air now used three hours a week exclusively for podcasting, I invested my time in understanding the iPad platform at a deeper level. Thus, following two years spent assessing the viability of working from iOS, 2016 was characterized by the pursuit of better iOS apps for my needs. That effort was most notable on the iPad, but it also affected the iPhone, which I see as the mobile sidekick to my iPad Pro.

    Two trends emerged once I began outlining a list of candidates for my annual Must-Have Apps roundup. First, the apps that define how I work on iOS haven’t dramatically changed since last year. As you’ll see in this year’s collection, the core of what I do on iOS is in line with last year; there are some new entries and apps that have left the list, but my overall app usage is consistent with 2015.

    The second pattern is more interesting. To be able to accomplish more every week and automate more aspects of my routine, I have increasingly switched to web services in lieu of iOS-only apps. In looking back at the past year of MacStories, I realized that a good portion of new workflows were based on web services, web automations, and open APIs. Some of those web services also offer iOS clients; others are strictly web-only, but I integrated them with iOS apps through Workflow and Zapier.

    For these reasons, you’ll notice a difference in the 2016 edition of my roundup. In addition to my must-have iOS apps, I’ve added a section for my must-have web services. Whether I primarily use them with iOS counterparts, in Safari, or via an API, these are the web services that have helped me handle more responsibilities for my two businesses at MacStories and podcasting duties at Relay FM.

    As in previous years, you’ll find a series of personal awards at the end of the story. These include my App of the Year and Runners-Up, and, for the first time, a Web Service of the Year and winners in other iOS categories.

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    A Computer for Everything: One Year of iPad Pro

    I wasn’t sure I needed a 12.9-inch iPad when Apple announced the iPad Pro in September 2015. And yet, over a year later, the iPad Pro is, by far, the best computer I’ve ever owned. I’ve never felt so satisfied with any other Apple device before – but the transition wasn’t easy.

    After years spent adapting what I learned from the Mac to bring it to iOS, what I found on the other side was a more focused, efficient way of working and communicating with people. The iPad Pro accelerated my move to an iOS-only setup; today, I genuinely don’t know how to perform certain tasks on a Mac anymore.

    I use my iPad Pro for everything. It’s my writing machine and favorite research tool, but I also rely on it to organize my finances, play games, read books and watch movies, program in Python and Workflow, and manage two successful businesses. While I’ve been advocating for such multi-purpose use of the iPad platform for a while, the iPad Pro elevated the threshold of possibilities, reaching an inflection point that has pushed others to switch to an iPad as their primary computer as well.

    Much of the iPad’s strength lies in iOS and its app ecosystem. If Apple were to stop making iPads, I’d still prefer to work on a device that runs iOS rather than macOS. iOS is where app innovation happens on a regular basis with developers one-upping each other in terms of what software can achieve; I also prefer the structure and interactions of iOS itself. The iPad Pro is the purest representation of iOS: it’s a computer that can transform into anything you need it to be.

    Even if this discussion was settled a long time ago, it bears repeating: millions of people today like working on iOS more than they do on macOS, and the iPad Pro is the best machine to run iOS. There is no sarcastic subtext about the Mac here, which is still a fantastic environment that many Apple users love and need for their line of work. The Mac and the iPad can coexist in a market where customers believe one is superior to the other. I prefer working on the iPad; others like their Macs more. And that’s fine because, ultimately, the Apple ecosystem as a whole grows stronger and we all reap the benefits.

    Over the past year of daily iPad Pro usage, I’ve made it my personal goal to optimize my iPad workflows as much as possible. This is one of the best aspects of the iOS platform: competition between developers is fierce and you can always choose between different apps to get work done – apps that are improved on a regular basis and are constantly updated for the latest iOS technologies. With enough curiosity and patience, iOS rewards you with the discovery of new ways to work and save time.

    Since my last iPad story in February, I’ve taken a hard look at my entire iPad setup and rethought the parts that weren’t working. I tried new apps, created new automations, and optimized every weak spot I could find. I improved how I collaborate with my teammates and produce weekly content for Club MacStories members. Thanks to the time I invested in understanding and fine-tuning my iPad Pro, I was able to embark on more projects, double MacStories’ growth, and manage a larger team.

    As a result, my iPad Pro today is noticeably more capable than it was a year ago – all without the need for a hardware refresh.

    Here’s what I’ve done.

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      #MacStoriesDeals Black Friday & Cyber Monday 2016: The Best Deals for iOS and Mac Apps & Games

      Every year, thousands of iOS and macOS app deals are launched for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. At MacStories, we handpick the best deals for iOS and Mac apps and collect them in a single roundup with links to buy or share discounted products directly. You don’t have to be overwhelmed by app deals; we take care of finding the best ones for you.

      Bookmark this post and come back to find updated deals starting today through Monday. Updates will be listed as new entries at the top of each section; iOS apps are organized in sub-categories for easier navigation.

      For real-time updates, you can find us as @MacStoriesDeals on Twitter.

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