Quix, The Command Line For Your Browser

Safari is a great browser. It’s fast, simple, elegant and definitely gets the job done. I was using Firefox until some months ago, but then I switched because it became slow, unresponsive and a huge memory hog.So I started using Safari, and I couldn’t be happier than this. Well, actually yes - I could be happier. I’d like to have better support for 3rd party plugins, or at least a more extensible Safari. With more features for sharing, developing, saving stuff.

Thank God I’ve just stumbled upon Quix app, which is very likely to stay in my bookmarks toolbar for the upcoming months.

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Screenflow: QuickTime Is Not Enough. And Your Screencasts Need This.

Since Apple released Snow Leopard last year and QuickTime came with built-in screen recording capabilities, many people started thinking apps such as Screenflow or Camtasia suddenly lost all of their value.

Couldn’t be any wronger.

There’s a big difference between a simple recording tool like QuickTime and those 3rd party applications: the difference lies in the editing features. QuickTime only provides the basic editing features like trimming and a few other things,which is clearly not enough. Sure, it’s great if you have very basic needs - but if you’re really serious about screen recordings you’re gonna need a more powerful application.

Today I’ll talk about Screenflow, one of the most famous screen recording apps for Mac OS X, while next week I’ll take a look at the new kind on the block, Camtasia for Mac. Enough said, let’s how it works.

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DaisyDisk: Beautiful Disk Analyzer for Mac

I have to admit that I am addicted to keeping my computer free of clutter. I have more fun reclaiming disk space than a sane person should. However, sometimes it is hard to determine where all your hard drive space is being used. There are some applications that love to hide extremely large files in very odd places.

That is where DaisyDisk comes in quite handy.

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How Do You Touch an iSlate?

Great article over at AppleBits, which contains many questions I’ve been asking myself for a few weeks now.

I don’t agree on the keyboard shortcuts idea, but Cody brings some interesting discussions on the table, which are definitely worth a look. Here’s a brief quote:

“The first thing we have to think about is our actual desktop. What would it look like? How would we interact with it? I image the iPhone played a huge role in the development of this device, and possibly helped Apple kill two birds with one stone by being the “test” device that enabled them to study how people interact and want to interact with a touchscreen. Apple addressed the issue of menus (menus suck), by making apps front row and center on the home screen. I don’t have to page through a list of items or navigate into folders to launch an application – it’s immediately available with a tap and maybe a swipe or two of the finger. The iSlate’s desktop will be the most important element of the software, as it’s where we will spend most of our time launching apps and organizing data.”

Apple’s Mythical Tablet: The Text’s The Thing

Interesting post over at Macworld analyzing the text entries possibilities the upcoming Tablet could have. I still firmly believe the tablet won’t just copy text inputs systems from other devices, but Steve will unveil something totally original and that “makes sense”.

A vertical keyboard wouldn’t surprise me, anyway.

Chronicle 3 Winners Announced, Coupon Code for MacStories Readers.

Thanks everyone for the support and the comments! Also, I’d like to thank Littlefin for giving us these 3 licenses to give away.

Here are the winners:

Othmane Benkirane

Josinho7

Future51

You’ll receive the license straight in your inbox in a matter of a few hours.

For those who didn’t win, wait! We have a fresh coupon code, valid for this week only, which enables you to buy Chronicle at a 20% off. The coupon code is: MACSTORIES

In case you missed it, here’s my Chronicle review. At $16, you should go buy it and managing your bills. A great app.

The Secret Ingredient of Being a Great iPhone Developer? Instant Coffee. And Lots of It.

Seems like Michael can’t get anything wrong. I mean, I’m in love with Outside (read my review, then go spend 3 bucks guys. Seriously.) and I’ve just found out that Michael and the other Robocat guys have uploaded a cool video of Outside’s “behind the scenes”.

This is the original post, but I’m embedding the video below. It gives an awesome and interesting insight into what actually goes into developing and launching an iPhone app, watching it going live and see the money coming.

As for coffee, I’ll go to Copenhagen someday and bring the guys some good Italian espresso. I’ll trash the Nescafè thing myself, I promise.

Launching Outside from Michael Flarup on Vimeo.

AppSaurus: A “Genius” App Store.

It’s not a secret that finding the right applications for you in the crowded App Store is sometimes very, very hard. Maybe it’s because of the inner structure of the App Store (top grossing apps are more likely to show up in the charts), maybe it’s because of Apple’s policy and sometimes it’s due to a lack of marketing creativity from the developers themselves but the fact is - a small percentage of users really find what they’re exactly looking for. And so came Apple related blogs like MacStories to do the job of talking about less known apps worth a look. Now, even if a blog like MacStories  mentions 10 new apps a week, it’s still impossible to actually mention every single app that gets published or updated. The App Store is huge, there are thousands of developers and the App Store should be updated to a more organized structure. This is the real problem at the end of the day.

So what? Could there be a better way to discover applications you’d like to have? Like, recommendations? Sure there is. Let me talk about AppSaurus.

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MenuBrain: Simple Text Snippets in the Menubar

How many times have you wished to have a collection of text snippets a mouse click away? Yeah, my entire workflow is somewhat based on recurring snippets I usually insert into mails, posts and other invoicing stuff. I’m currently using ClipMenu (the great, free clipboard utility you must go download now) to do the whole job of keeping snippets organized into folders, but for those who don’t like Clipmenu or just want an even simpler application, I’ve just discovered MenuBrain form The IconMaster which might be perfect for you.

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