Appletell

When the SDK for the iPhone is launched at WWDC, it is going to be exhilarating.  Apple has given developers plenty of time to create useful and outstanding apps, and I expect there will be plenty of them.  For example, at the keynote, developers had already made Spore and an instant messaging client in only a couple weeks.  Also, third party developers that have been using Installer.app have also made extremely awesome and helpful apps in a short amount of time.  What does this all mean?  Excitement.  When this whole deal is officially released, there are going to be hundreds of apps released with it.  The functionality of the iPhone is going to skyrocket and it is going to be even more desired.  But the real question is what apps do you really want to see.

First and foremost for me, and probably many others, is some sort of iChat. This would be great to keep in contact with friends on the go and, not to mention, save me a ton of money on text messaging overage fees.  Another application I would love to see would be for voice recording.  Whenever I am on the go, I always end up thinking of something I want to remember.  It could be so easy just to record it in the phone rather than writing a whole note.  This could also be very useful for business people who need to record a quick interview on their phone for later.  Lastly, and more general, I would love to see some awesome games.  There are a lot of times where I’m bored in the car or on a plane and iPhone games would be perfect to pass the time with.  What do you want to see and/or waste your time with?  Games, productivity, educational?  Let us know in the comments!

Rob Griffiths over at Macworld.com has put together an article and video outlining some great tips and tricks for being slightly more productive in OS X. These tips include some basic QuickTime and Quicklook video functions, Printing selected pages in Preview, and even some more ‘hardcore’ Terminal commands to help with Time Machine.

The three tips that I found the most useful have to be the ability to turn off the Time Machine nags about which disk you prefer to backup to - especially a problem if you have multiple drives connected to your Mac. It can easily be shut off using the following command typed into Terminal:

defaults write com.apple.TimeMachine DoNotOfferNewDisksForBackup -bool YES

The second is actually not an OS X-specific tip, but definitely a useful one. It is a bookmarklet that you can keep in your bookmarks folder that lets you do site-specific Google searches while on a page. It’s very easy to get set up and extremely useful. Drag me into your bookmark bar (don’t click on the link, add it to your bookmarks), or save the following code in the address field of a bookmark:

javascript:Qr=prompt(’Search%20Site%20for’,’’);if(Qr)location.href=’http://www.google.com/search?&q=site:’+encodeURIComponent(window.location.hostname)+’+’+escape(Qr)

The third is the ability to go from Terminal to Finder or Finder to Terminal very easily while keeping the structure you were in. i.e. If you are in Finder and in the Applications folder, you can run this app and will end up in the Terminal in the Applications directory - ready to run a command. To do so you will need to create a script, in AppleScript, using the following code:

tell application “Finder”
set myWin to window 1
set theWin to (quoted form of POSIX path of (target of myWin as alias))
tell application “Terminal”
activate
tell window 1
do script “cd “ & theWin
end tell
end tell
end tell

To get a better understanding of the methods I posted here, and to view the full list, check out the article and video at Macworld.com.

Read [MacWorld]

We’ve all got lots of things to do in our life and all of that clutter in our working environment doesn’t help at all. In real life you’ve got a garbage can and sticky notes, it does the job and that’s about it. On my computer I’ve got a simple, yet feature full version of that, ShoveBox. ShoveBox is the “the smart clutter-catcher for you and your Mac.” This neat little Mac app sits in your menu bar, waiting to capture and sort your information. If you’ve used a to-do list app or stickies app you’ve probably realized that text just isn’t good enough to keep track of your life. From the menu bar, you may choose to capture clutter by typing it down, or “QuickJot.” Or import from your clipboard, create a longer text note, or record using your iSight or built in camera.

Read the complete review after the jump.

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Mindjet has released version 7 of their MindManager application, which now supports Leopard. The ability to use QuickLook has been added, along with other Leopard-only features like Microsoft Office 2008 integration with a new redesigned Microsoft fluent UI. MindManager 7 is an application designed to help you be more productive. It works by simply creating a single focus in the centre, and adding links from it - you can even add links to files and web pages. It really allows you to capture innovative thinking and organise it structurally. MindManager 7 Mac is available for $130, with upgrades priced at $70. MindManager 7 Mac requires Mac OS X 10.4 or later.

Some other new improvements are the faster formatting on map styles and galleries, and enhanced ScreenTops that allow you to select topics with rules that users can save and apply as filters. The printing has been enhanced too, with support for large maps that span across multiple pages, headers and footers and more.

Via [MacNN]