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Twitter has hit something of a boom recently. From a small tech startup in San Francisco a mere seven years ago, it has blossomed to one of the largest social networks globally and the tenth most visited site on the Net. The influence of Twitter can be seen everywhere — from TV shows with hashtags in the corner to big companies promoting their brands and products with @names and hashtags — and the words “retweet” and “follower” have entered the prestigious Oxford English Dictionary as proper English words.
The Mac certainly isn’t left out here and you’ll be glad to know that there’s plenty of choice when it comes to Twitter clients. In this roundup, I take a look at eight of the best and weigh up the pros and cons of each one. If you’re unsure about which Twitter client to use, or simply fancy switching to another one, then read on for my recommendations.
In Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, Apple introduced what appeared to be a pretty promising feature called AirDrop. The goal was simple: to let you simply share files across your local network without the need for emails, flash drives, or complicated setups. Unfortunately, despite their efforts to bring the Mac and iOS to some level of feature parity, over two years later, AirDrop is still a Mac only feature.
Enter Instashare, an app which claims to be “AirDrop for iOS and OSX”, and plans to add Windows and Android versions in the near future. So, did the developers behind Instashare really beat Apple at their own game? Read on to find out!
If Apple keeps up with its new annual OS X release cycle, then we should be expecting to see a new cat roaring on our Macs before the end of 2013. Mountain Lion was released last July, and its claim to fame was bringing more iOS features to OS X. iCloud, Notes, Dictation, Reminders, and more came as a reminder (pun not intended) that iOS was Apple’s more well-known and widely used operating system these days.
There’s little more from iOS we can imagine that Apple would bring to the Mac, aside from Siri and possibly Maps (oh, and iBooks), but there’s quite a few power user features that iOS users are clamoring for in iOS 7. If anything, it seems that Apple needs to bring some Mac features to iOS this year.
That’s not to say there’s nothing for OS X 10.9 to conquer this year. At the very least, I’d love to see a vastly improved iCloud and Messages, perhaps Siri, Maps, and iBooks, and some much needed love for older OS X apps like Automator. It’d also be great to be surprised with some new, OS X only features, stuff to make Macs stand out even more than they already do from the competition – and Apple’s iOS devices. iWork and iLife could desperately use a new upgrade as well, though that’s hardly a core part of OS X.
With Jony Ive the head of Apple’s software design, it’ll be interesting at the very least to see what design changes, if nothing else, show up in the next version of OS X. So what are you hoping to see in the OS X 10.9? It may just be wishing, but we’d sure love to see what you hope to see from Apple this year in the comments below!
In recent iterations of iOS — Apple’s mobile operating system for iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad — and in recent versions of OS X on the desktop, you will undoubtedly have noticed a move towards visual elements that mimic real-life objects. The ruled, yellow notepaper for the Notes app, the torn-paper effect at the top of the stitched, leather-bound Calendar app, and more are examples of this.
These software design elements mimicking real world objects have introduced a new word into our vocabularies: skeuomorphism. Such effects have, however, divided opinion, and it is just possible that we will see Apple shift away from these elements in future.
When Google acquired Sparrow, the most popular Mac email client of the day, back in July, it seemed all hope for email on OS X was lost. People thought they’d have to resort to Apple’s stale Mail app because Sparrow’s support may end. Mail all that bad, but it really isn’t the simplest thing out there and trying to do little things is often arduous. So that gave independent developers another chance to do something big: build a great new mail app for the Mac.
It all started with .Mail, or the “Dot Mail App” as some have referred to it. This appeared to be the most beautiful mail client ever on a Mac, but it was only a mockup at the time it was first shown off. It’s now in development, but it’s still a ways off, so people are constantly searching for a Sparrow alternative. An interesting little app by the name of Inky came across my desk the other day and it looked promising. After all, who doesn’t want to try out an app that has an icon nearly identical to Pearl from Finding Nemo? (more…)
There’s no denying that Macs have been quite popular with students for years, and with good reason. Apple’s computers are ideal for an academic context (and, we’d argue, almost any context, but we might be biased), given their reliability and features that help its users to get stuff done. However, I’ve come to realize that students often use their Macs superficially. Most are not taking full advantage of everything OS X offers them, not to mention the myriad of incredible third-party apps.
I’ll attempt to capitalize on my 4-year experience with using Macs as a student. In all honesty, many of these tips can be applied to any situation, so long as it involves productivity in one way or another. Moreover, don’t expect these tips to be mindblowing; they’re aimed at new Mac users, but even old timers might find a new tip or three.
Macs may be used by everyone from NASA to the White House, but they can’t shake the perception that they’re designer goods. People readily accept that Macs are good for creatives, but not for real business work, no matter how many times they’ve been proven to simply be great computers for anyone that cares about a good computing experience.
But maybe it’s because Macs are really just so good for creatives. There’s so many little things in OS X that make it great for writing, for one thing, that I think you can easily say it’s the best OS for writers. (more…)
This post is part of a series that revisits some of our readers’ favorite articles from the past that still contain awesome and relevant information that you might find useful. This post was originally published on July 27th, 2011.
Editor’s Note: Mission Control in Mountain Lion is almost the exact same as it is in Lion, so everything here still applies even if you’ve just upgraded to Apple’s latest and greatest OS. The only real change is that there’s an option to not group windows by their application, to make it easier to see more at once.
For years Apple has been tweaking and rethinking the way we interact with open windows and applications inside of OS X. Exposé came along and allowed us to quickly view all open windows or even hide them completely. Then Spaces entered the scene and allowed us to create a number of unique workspaces or desktops, each containing its own applications and windows.
Mission Control is the evolution of this process. It represents a new and very powerful way to manage your multitasking mess inside of of OS X. Some find the new system intuitive, but many others find it completely intimidating. Today we’re going to show you how to master Mission Control so your Mac can become a beacon of productivity.
Our giveaway is now closed, and we’ve randomly selected our 3 lucky winners from the many entries we had. Congrats to Chris, Crazyhunk, and Lucas, who just won a free copy of Mountain Lion! We hope everyone gets to try out Mountain Lion sometime soon; it really is a great OS (though we might be biased…)
Today, Apple has finally released their latest addition to the OS X family with version 10.8, also known as “Mountain Lion“. This new version brings with it a whole host of improvements, most of which focus on bringing features such as the Notification Center and iCloud from iOS to the Mac. In addition to those new features, 10.8 also includes systemwide refinements, which make the OS feel like what Lion should have been. And, at only $19.99, it’s the most affordable version of OS X yet.
Read on for our in-depth review of Apple’s latest big cat, and a chance to win a free copy of Mountain Lion!
The Gold Master (GM) version of Apple’s new upcoming version of OS X, Mountain Lion, was released yesterday to registered Apple developers, hinting at an imminent release. This version is often the “final” version of the operating system before being released to the public, unless any bugs are discovered by developers and the OS code is “frozen”, often meaning no further changes are going to be made.
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