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Outliner Update for iOS 7→

CarbonFin Outliner isn’t the most frequently updated app on the App Store, but I still think it offers a superior outlining experience than any other outliner for the iPhone. On the iPad, I’m torn between Outliner and The Omni Group’s update to OmniOutliner (custom keyboard shortcuts? That’s business), but Outliner is capable of syncing with Dropbox and directly to an iPhone version, which makes it preferable to OmniOutliner and OmniPresence in some aspects.

Outliner was recently updated with iOS 7 support, which means interface changes that make the app’s chrome more subdued in favor of content. This is an overly used expression these days (by me as well), but it’s true, and, in Outliner’s case, I think it benefits the app. Outlines stand out and buttons are easily recognizable; the app retains the menus it always had to allow you to indent or outdent lines with ease.

The app didn’t get iOS 7 features, but, according to the developer, background sync is on the roadmap. Outliner is a good outlining tool, albeit rarely updated with major additions. On the iPhone, I don’t think other similar apps come close to Outliner’s simplicity and elegance yet. I’d recommend getting the Universal version for $4.99 while hoping for updates in the near future.

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How Nate Boateng Almost Lost Every Family Photo He Has→

This stuff isn’t for everyone. Catastrophes like this probably won’t happen to most people. But the thing is, you don’t have a problem until you have a problem. It’s the same cringe-worthy talk we’ve had a million times with our parents about backing up data. I’d argue that this is more dire. Databases can be very stable, but I’m no longer willing to keep life’s memories in something that can seemingly turn on me in an instant. I still don’t know what actually happened; it could even have been my own fault.

You need a good photo backup workflow, and you need it now. Especially if you’re a parent with thousands of photos of your kids. I’m still relying on the Hazel + Dropbox workflow that I originally shared here (and then here), but I wish CameraSync would get an update for iOS 7. In the meantime, following Bradley’s advice, I’ve started using Everpix too. I’m liking the Flashback feature a lot.

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Steve Cheney On How iBeacon Will Transform Local Commerce→

All this begs the question—does Apple have a local strategy? In my opinion, yes. And does this strategy have the capability to change the way merchants think about local? Yes. iOS7 and iBeacon create an ecosystem-wide network effect overnight, with standard technology, offered in an open development environment. It’s very clear that Apple is starting to put the pieces together to allow consumers to make offline transactions with their device—imagine being in a store and authorizing a payment with your fingerprint and never talking to a salesperson. All Apple has to do is open its payment APIs to get to this level, the rest of the stack is already being exposed.

Some interesting thoughts by Steve on iBeacon. I can’t wait to see practical implementations in Italy.

(I’ll probably have to wait years for that, considering how I still have to try Passbook in real life – where by “real life” I don’t mean taking screenshots of the app for MacStories.)

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iOS 7 and Mail Message URLs

A feature of iOS 7 that I quickly described in my article and that I haven’t seen mentioned in other places is the possibility to make Apple’s Mail app open individual messages through a new message:// URL scheme. As I wrote:

In iOS 7, if you have a message URL that corresponds to a message, the URL will correctly open it directly in Mail. There are two limitations: the message has to be already downloaded in the Mail app, and, of course, you have to know the URL. So far, I haven’t found a way to create URLs to reference Mail messages on iOS, but the ones you create on your Mac through AppleScript and Mail.app will continue to work on iOS 7 devices. Therefore, if you have scripts that generate these URLs to, say, attach them to OmniFocus or Evernote, you’ll be able to tap them and open the associated message on an iPhone or iPad. I look forward to seeing whether developers will figure out a way to generate message:// URLs on iOS.

That wasn’t the first time I covered message:// URLs on MacStories. In November 2012, I posted an AppleScript to quickly save a message’s URL in Evernote for Mac with a hotkey; and even then, I was referencing a 2007 post by John Gruber on the topic:

The structure of these URLs is fairly simple: (1) the “message:” scheme, followed by (2) the message-id of the message, enclosed in angle brackets (“<” and “>”). The message-id is specified in each message’s “Message-ID” header field, which is part of the Internet email standard. Every message-id should be universally unique, and every message should have a message-id. In my testing, the only messages I could find that didn’t have Message-ID headers were spam; such messages cannot be referred to by Mail’s “message:” URLs.

The message:// URLs that Apple introduced in Leopard have gone mostly unchanged in terms of OS X integration throughout the years, proving to be a nice solution to reference specific messages in todo apps, note-taking apps, and so forth. Rather than searching for a message in Mail, you can generate a URL via AppleScript, archive it somewhere, and launch it (either by pasting it in Safari or right-clicking it in a Cocoa app) to open the referenced message in a separate Mail window – no matter if the message has been archived, put in a folder, or left in the inbox. Read more

David Smith’s Pedometer++ Demos the iPhone 5s’ M7→

It hasn’t been said (or if it has been it’s been buried underneath a litany of other geeky details), but the M7 coprocessor in the iPhone 5s records your movement data whether you’re using apps or not. Without apps, the M7 keeps a basic log of data, determining whether your phone is in motion and how to decide if it’s an appropriate time to ping for network data. With apps such as Pedometer++, free on the App Store, it’ll pull off current data and a small history of what the M7 has already recorded. The best part about this is when you go to switch apps or use a different one, there will already be a solid baseline of data for apps to draw upon.

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TaskAgent 3 for iOS 7→

Before OmniFocus and Reminders, TaskAgent was my todo management system of choice for a long time. TaskAgent lets you manage todos in lists that are synced to Dropbox as plain text files that you can edit on the desktop using any app you want. They look like todos in TaskAgent, but they’re actually lines of plain text that, if you want, you can interact with in various ways (perhaps with IFTTT or other automated workflows).

Developer Francisco Cantu released version 3 of TaskAgent alongside the launch of iOS 7 as a new free app with a $1.99 In-App Purchase. The app is limited to three lists, and you can unlock unlimited lists, URL scheme actions, Archive, and folder management if you want more. The app has been rewritten and redesigned for iOS 7, and Cantu is working on compatibility fixes for the Mac counterpart.

I use Reminders these days, so TaskAgent isn’t really for me anymore. However, if the idea of managing todos as plain text lists intrigues you, I’d recommend trying the free version of TaskAgent 3.

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Moleskine and FiftyThree Team Up For Paper Book→

FiftyThree, creators of Paper for iPad, have teamed up with Moleskine to create the Book, a printed notebook for Paper sketches. The Book has a special 4:3 format that matches the iPad’s screen, and sketches are printed on sustainable matte paper at double the PPI of the iPad mini.

From the FiftyThree blog:

Today we’re announcing a new product with a whole new way to share your ideas. Bring your ideas to life with a beautiful, custom-printed Book, created right from within Paper. FiftyThree and Moleskine, maker of the legendary notebook, bring you a new format designed uniquely for Paper. Book is a 15-page foldout of your sketches on sustainable matte paper, with the choice of your own custom cover or a classic hardcover. Book is the simplest and most beautiful way to share your ideas with others.

The news comes less than a week after Evernote announced their plans to move into the hardware space following last year’s partnership with Moleskine. While I wouldn’t call this a “trend” yet, it’s interesting how two popular software makers of the modern era (both heavily focused on the iOS platform) are now cutting deals with hardware partners. Paper’s move is more niche-oriented than Evernote’s general-purpose notebook and Post-it features, and I’m curious to see if they’ll consider other analog formats in the future (larger notebooks, frames, etc).

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Dropbox Automatic Screenshot Sharing Now Out of Beta→

Back in June, we noted that Dropbox was testing an automatic screenshot sharing feature in their public beta for Mac:

The first one, an automatic screenshot sharing feature, is somewhat reminiscent of tools like Droplr and CloudApp: once enabled in the Preferences, it will allow Dropbox to redirect every screenshot taken on OS X to a /Screenshots folder in your Dropbox, sharing that file and putting a public link in your system clipboard. While not as full-featured as the aforementioned third-party tools, automatic screenshot sharing could indeed make for a nice solution to quickly share screenshots on Twitter and IM — retaining control over files that are simply located in the Finder.

Today, Dropbox has promoted the feature out of the beta channel and into the public, stable release of the app:

Starting today, all the screenshots you take can automatically be saved straight to your Dropbox. And on top of that, Dropbox will also create a link to your screenshot and copy it to your clipboard — so your picture’s instantly good to share.

The update, available here, also includes the iPhoto import tool that Dropbox started testing earlier this year.

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Simple Photo Collages with Diptic PDQ

I’ve never been into the idea of sharing my photos as “collages”, especially because all the iPhone and iPad apps that promised to make it easy to assemble collages looked overly social, filter-oriented, or just badly designed. However, I recently wanted to send a photo collage of my dog to my parents, and I conveniently came across Diptic PDQ on the App Store thanks to Apple’s feature for iOS 7-ready apps. Apparently, PDQ (a Universal app) is the “lighter” version of Peak Systems’ more advanced Diptic app, which comes with all sorts of settings, textures, and In-App Purchases. I just needed to create simple collages with thin borders, so I bought PDQ and have been using it for the past week with nice results. Read more