Posts in Featured

Meet Cloudette, A Free CloudApp Client for iPhone

Together with Dropbox, CloudApp is another tool I couldn’t work without anymore. Originally developed as Mac-only sharing utility by the Linebreak guys, CloudApp eventually evolved to have a full-featured web interface and an API for developers to plug into and create unofficial clients. Thanks to this integration with 3rd party applications, some great pieces of software like Courier for Mac, Weet and Prizmo for iPhone gained CloudApp uploading capabilities. Not to mention Cloud2Go, the first unofficial (and paid) CloudApp client for iPhone.

Cloudette is a new CloudApp client for iPhone (and soon iPad) which lets you check on your files, and upload new ones. For free. Read more

PlainText: It’s Like Text Edit for iOS, Plus Sync

There’s no shortage of writing apps on the iPad. With the release of Writer by IA last week (which seems to be doing great in the App Store) and the likes of Simplenote and Elements before it, there are enough applications to satisfy any kind of user. PlainText is the latest app from well-known developer Jesse Grosjean of HogBay Software (developer of Writeroom and Taskpaper) that allows you to write in a clutter-free paper-like environment while syncing everything to Dropbox. Plus, it’s free in the App Store. Read more

TotalFinder: What Mac’s Finder Should Have Been

Over the years I’ve tried many solutions to make the default OS X file manager, Finder, better and more suitable to my needs: PathFinder, a 3rd party application that can live on top of Apple’s Finder and brings dual-pane navigation and tabs to the mix, plus some custom Applescript and Automator workflows that allowed me to easily perform certain tasks like “move these files to another location” or “copy newly downloaded files with .pdf extension in Dropbox”.

None of the aforementioned apps and scripts managed to work for me for more than a month. I grew tired of them, and most of all I grew tired of PathFinder living as a layer above Finder, but not really replacing it. I even tried to completely replace Finder.app in CoreServices, you can guess how it ended. I wanted a better Finder with dual-pane navigation and tabs, but I also wanted to be able to tweak it and customize it, yet retaining the stability and efficiency of the default Finder.app. I didn’t want a standalone app, I was looking forward to something that would let me modify the native app without replacing it. A few weeks later TotalFinder by BinaryAge came out (as an alpha build) and I immediately started testing it.

A year later, here we are with a final 1.0 build of TotalFinder and months of reinvented workflow to talk about. TotalFinder reinvented the way I interact and work with OS X so much that I cannot imagine going back to Apple’s default file manager anymore. Read more

iPhone 4 Sold Out In China

This is surprising: the iPhone 4 went on sale in China last weekend, and chinese carrier Unicom can’t keep up with the demand which has already exceeded the initial supply. Unicom received 200,000 preorders since September 17th and sold more than 60,000 units last Saturday. More than 1,000 people waited in line at Apple’s Beijing store to get their hands on an iPhone 4. Read more

Apple Adds Badge to Game Center Apps in the App Store

This is a neat little feature, a small improvement, but we like it: Apple has added an indicator in the App Store page of Game Center-compatible apps. You can check it out in the top-right corner of a page like this one.

It’s easier now to know whether a game supports Game Center or not, but an indicator is not enough: what does the app allow you to do on GC? How many achievements does it come with? I don’t think that developers should put all this information in the product description, a dedicated one is needed. Also, what about already-purchased apps? You still have to try and click Buy to find out, as there’s no indicator for that. (Update: not to mention a “Retina Display-ready badge)

Apple is working on making the App Store a better marketplace (remember, it’s not a simple showcase of 10.00o apps anymore), but it still lacks basic features like a complete and detailed history, or a better wishlist. We’ll just have to wait, I guess. Read more