Posts Tagged
sync
Several months ago, I wrote this piece regarding the then-current state of syncing among Mac apps and their mobile counterparts. What I didn’t know at the time was that Apple was toiling away in the forges of 1 Infinite Loop on what we now eagerly look forward to as iCloud. In case you’ve been living under a rock, iCloud is Apple’s latest attempt at a cloud-based sync service. Though we all saw the tragic end to .Mac and MobileMe, iCloud shows quite a bit more promise.
Today, I’d like to explore what iCloud means for third party developers. Specifically, I want to outline the potential I see in iCloud, and where I would like to see it go with regard to third party software.
Keeping files synced between different computers, servers and external drives isn’t the easiest task in the world. You constantly have to compare multiple versions to see which is the most recent and spend far too much time manually copying files from one location to another. This is especially true of web developers who work locally and then have to push those changes to the web for testing.
With FolderWatch, virtually all of the work is removed from this process. After a simple setup process, FolderWatch will keep an eye on the specified folders and sync any changes automatically.
I’ll be honest: the past 18 years of school have made me a forgetful, disorganized, unmotivated procrastinator. Since I like shiny, pretty interfaces and putting off doing work, I’ve spent a lot of time looking into various GTD and to-do list apps. During the school year, I used a full-featured GTD app (Things) to track and organize dozens of readings, assignments and exams.
However, now that school’s out and I’m freelancing a lot more, Things is starting to seem a bit excessive, and I’m still waiting on the promised iPhone cloud-sync. Enter SpeedTask, the iPhone-turned-Mac to-do list app that promises clever, easy-to-use features and powerful cloud sync.
SpeedTask deserves to be looked at from three different angles: as a Mac app, as an iPhone app, and as a cloud-syncing solution, so we’ll discuss each feature one at a time.
The productivity app space yields what can only be described as an embarrassment of riches these days, but is there something for everyone amongst the goods?
iProcrastinate is a productivity/to do list app clearly geared toward students. It appears to be a one man show over at craigotis.com, but the results seem solid. My first experience for iProcrastinate was way back before a major UI redesign, and (I believe) while the app was originally available for the first generation jailbroken iPod touch.
The app has come a long way since then, but what does it have to offer in the ever expanding sea of productivity tools?
In the mobile, digital world in which we live, it is more important than ever to have your data, calendar appointments, contacts, notes, and to do lists up-to-date, no matter where you are or what device you are using.
In a perfect world (for me, anyway), all of the software I use would stay synced with MobileMe (and MobileMe would be free!). Unfortunately, that’s not the case, and different software developers provide different services and methods for keeping the desktop and mobile versions of their apps in sync.
So what are the options, and which one is best?
Despite many complaints, niggles and annoyances, Apple has stuck by their cloud service for over a decade. Originally introduced in January, 2000 as iTools, it has gone through countless revisions, updates and re-branding efforts. Now called MobileMe, it’s a huge improvement over the years of neglect we saw to .Mac.
But does MobileMe cut it as a cloud service? Although it now does a pretty great job of syncing all your information, it falls down when it comes to file sharing and cloud data storage. There are plenty of rumours circulating about a major upgrade (centred around their big data centre project), but these are now over a year old and we haven’t seen an announcement.
Personally, I’ve been a MobileMe subscriber for the past five years. I love the sync functionality, and consider the price to be justified for this integration alone. Of course it’s possible to use Google’s free option, but it never feels quite as polished to me.
What do you think? Are you a loyal MobileMe subscriber of several years, or is it something that you’d never consider in the present format? Have your say in the poll and feel free to share any thoughts in the comments!
Interested in learning about some of the alternatives available? Check out MobileMe: A Worthy Investment? (And a Few Alternatives) for everything you need to know!
Perhaps you have more than one Mac in your life. I know several people that have an iMac in their house, a work machine, and also their own Macbook for travelling around. If that’s the case, then it can be hard to avoid a “media mess” spread all over your different machines. Now, you can fix this by using web services like Dropbox, but if you want something more specific and easier to setup, this might not be a good fit.
That’s where applications like iPhotoSync come in. This one in particular aims to offer an easy iPhoto synchronization process across different computers, so that you can automatically have the same photographs available on all your machines. But does it deliver?
I remember five years ago when I got my first Mac. Soon after, I had a .Mac account (the old version of MobileMe) in hopes I’d be able to enjoy some of the features of cloud storage and syncing.
Fast forward into today’s culture. Cloud storage is even easier to acquire (even for us Mac users) and syncing online has become an omnipresent feature with services like Dropbox. Today, I wanted to take a look at why people have moved away from MobileMe and give a few possible alternative solutions to avoid paying $99 a year.
SpiderOak is an online backup, syncing and sharing service similar to Dropbox or SugarSync. It is powerful, versatile and free to use for up to two gigabytes of storage.
Today we’ll look at how to setup SpiderOak on your Mac, how to use its main features and how I think it stacks up to some of the other services out there.
In this Quick Look, we’re highlighting SpiderOak. The developer describes SpiderOak as providing an easy, secure and consolidated free cross-plaform online backup, sync, sharing, access & storage solution for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux (Ubuntu, Debian & Fedora). You can manage your shared files from anywhere securely with our iPhone application, and keep all your devices backed up, accessible and synchronised.
Read on for more information and screenshots!
