Month: March 2014

Sponsor: 22Slides, a Simple Portfolio Website Builder  →

22Slides is a simple portfolio website builder created by a photographer and long-time fellow shawnblanc.net reader.

Shawn was nice enough to mention 22Slides back in 2011, and that bit of kindness helped give us the boost we needed to turn into a profitable company. We wanted to show a small token of appreciation by buying an ad, even if not all shawnblanc.net readers are our target market.

So if you’re looking to promote your startup, we can say being featured on shawnblanc.net has been a huge benefit. Or, if you know anyone looking for a good photography website, we’d be honored if you kept 22Slides in mind.

Try 22Slides for free.

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My thanks to 22Slides for sponsoring the RSS feed this week.

Sponsor: 22Slides, a Simple Portfolio Website Builder

The Making of Neon Signs  →

Here’s a fascinating short documentary (about 11 min.) on the Hong Kong neon sign industry, which was at its peak in the ’80s and ’90s but is now in serious decline with businesses installing LED signs now.

And here’s a crazy fact I bet you didn’t know: when a glassworker is designing the a neon sign, the tube’s start and stop points are determined not so much by the letter form but by where he’ll be able to most easily bend the glass without burning his hands.

(via Hoefler and Rands)

The Making of Neon Signs

The Sweet Setup’s Staff Favorites  →

Over at The Sweet Setup, we put together a running list of all our personal favorite apps on iPhone, iPad, and Mac. It’s a massive list with over 100 apps.

In a way, the list of staff favorites is a condensed version of what the site as a whole is striving towards. But it takes us so much time to do research, test, use, and then pick a “best app” for different categories. And so this running list — broken down by platform and then by category — is our way of giving as many recommendations as we can now, while we continue to build out our catalog of the in-depth comparison reviews and picks.

This list represents all the apps we, The Sweet Setup staff, use day in and day out for work and play. And, as always, if you’ve got questions or suggestions, hit us up on Twitter.

The Sweet Setup’s Staff Favorites

The Weekly Briefly: Digital v Analog  →

On this week’s episode of my podcast: analog vs digital; low-fi vs high-fi; old school versus new school; manual versus automatic — appreciating and taking advantage of today’s awesome technology while also celebrating the more traditional and hands-on way of doing things.

Brought to you by:

The Weekly Briefly: Digital v Analog

Dumb

The more I read about smartwatches, the more I appreciate my “dumb” watches.

Analog Watches

These are the two watches I wear. The one on the left is a Tissot, and the one on the right a Seiko automatic. Most days I wear the Seiko.

Here is an exhaustive rundown of all the functionality of my watches: They tell the time of day (albeit they’re imprecise, and usually off by half a minute or so) and the date. The Seiko, being fancy, also tells the day of the week. And since neither watch knows what month it is, a few times per year I have to adjust the date forward from “29” or “31” to “1”.

That’s it.

But I don’t just wear a watch to know what time it is. Part of the reason I wear one is as an excuse not to pull out my iPhone.

So often I’d be standing in line at the grocery store and I’d pull out my iPhone to see what time it was. Then, out of sheer habit, I’d swipe to unlock and the next thing you know I’m mindlessly scrolling through tweets or reading emails without actually acting on them. Then the line would move, I’d put the iPhone back in my pocket, and if you’d asked me what time it was I couldn’t even tell you.

My analog watches are my reminder that utility exists apart from an internet connection and usefulness doesn’t require the latest software.

My watches don’t have an interactive touch display. Nor do they have Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, LTE, or USB. Heck, the Seiko doesn’t even have a battery — if I don’t wear it for a day or two then it stops working until I wind it again.

There are no apps for my watches. I can’t pair them with my iPhone, can’t give them voice commands, can’t get directions from them, nor can I use them to change my music to the next track.

On the flip side, my watches don’t require updates, and they won’t be “slow and outdated” in one year’s time after the next version comes out. In fact, they will never grow outdated and irrelevant unless they break altogether.

In 15 or 20 years my sons will hopefully think it’s special when I pass down one of my old watches to them.

That’s not to say vintage technology isn’t special. But an old watch is simultaneously special and usable. In 20 years my original iPhone, as special and nostalgic as it will be, probably won’t even power on.

My affinity for analog watches doesn’t mean I dislike the concept of the smartwatch. My iPhone is one of the most incredible items I have ever owned and used. But my experience with it has also taught me that the promise of convenient notifications and relevant information is almost always paired with the reality of constant distractions, tugs for attention, and perhaps even an addiction to the “just checks”.

When I look down at my watch I know exactly what it will show me: the time.

Dumb

Checkmark 2

Here is a huge update to my favorite location-based reminders app, Checkmark.

In addition to location-based reminders, Checkmark 2 now supports scheduled and repeating reminders as well as a general project/list section. So not only is Checkmark the best app for location-based reminders, but it now aims to be your one-stop shop for all tasks and reminders, regardless of when, where, or what they are for.

I’m still deep into OmniFocus for my general to-do list, and I usually use Siri or Fantastical for setting time-based reminders. But the location-centric stuff in Checkmark is the best there is, and now it’s even better than before.

The big update with how Checkmark handles the location-based reminders is that you can now create location groups. Hooray!

Now, I don’t know about you, but my wife and I don’t shop at just one grocery store all the time; we shop at like six. In Checkmark 2, I created a location group with all the grocery stores we shop at. Then, no matter which of those stores I show up to, Checkmark will remind me of any items I’ve added to that group. (Gosh would I love to see shared reminders with this.)

Here’s how you create a group:

  • You start out just like you would create a location.
  • From the “Where” section, tap the plus button and name your location (example: “Grocery Stores” / “Hardware Stores” / “Ice Cream Shops”).
  • Next tap “Add from map” to search for the places you want to add (or Add from location if you’re at the place you want to add).
  • Once you’ve found one of the locations and the pin for it has dropped, then tap into the search box again to search for the next place you want to add.
  • Once you’ve got all the pins for that group dropped, then tap “Done”
  • Select your icon and tap Done again.

Now you have a location group and you are on your way to being the the master of never forgetting to check out this season’s sink selection next time you go to the hardware store to buy charcoal for your grill.

You can add or remove locations from a group by tapping into that group, tapping the settings gear icon in the upper-right corner, and then editing the location. I have found creating and editing groups to be a little bit finicky at times. But once a group is created, then your golden.

In addition to the awesomeness of the new groups feature, Checkmark is still faster than using any other app for adding a location-based reminder (even for specific spots, not groups). And, most importantly, Checkmark is incredibly reliable for triggering upon the arrival / departure of a location.

My one quibble with Checkmark is it’s assumption that time-based reminders are the most important. When launching Checkmark, it opens to wherever you last were in the app. If however, the app has been cleared from memory since the last time you launched it, or if you’ve restarted your iPhone, then Checkmark’s default landing screen is the “When” section. And currently there’s no way to change this setting. Which oftentimes means creating a new location-based reminder requires two additional taps: one to open the basement menu and one to tap the “Where” tab. But this is a minor quibble, and I’ve heard it may be resolved in a future update to the app.

I’ve long been a user and a fan of Checkmark because I think it handles location-based reminders better than any other app out there, including Apple’s own Reminders app. You can snag Checkmark 2 in the App Store for just $3.

Checkmark 2

The iPad 4 Is Back  →

The only devices remaining that still use the 30-pin connector are the iPod classic and the iPhone 4s. And the only non-retina iOS device is the original iPad mini. These are the extreme devices: the iPod classic for the those who want the most storage possible (160GB); the original iPad mini and the iPhone 4s for those who want the cheapest iPad/iPhone possible.

The iPad 4 Is Back

Sponsor: EverWeb Makes it Easy for Mac Users to Build Websites  →

EverWeb is a powerful, easy to use website builder that is a great alternative for Apple’s discontinued iWeb builder. EverWeb provides a full drag and drop user interface while still allowing for advanced features such as mobile websites, drop down menus, rollovers, image sliders, built in search engine optimization, and more.

EverWeb includes built in templates to help you get started with a professional looking site, or you can start from scratch. It also comes with built in widgets for adding contact forms, social media, e-commerce, and HTML5 video or audio.

Try EverWeb for free today.

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My thanks to EverWeb for sponsoring the RSS feed this week.

Sponsor: EverWeb Makes it Easy for Mac Users to Build Websites

OneNote for Mac  →

Completing the 3-app trifecta, Microsoft’s OneNote is now on the Mac App Store. I have a handful of friends who used to adore this app back when they were PC users, but now use Evernote. Personally, I’m more of the one-app-per-function persuasion: OmniFocus for tasks, Simplenote for notes, not-sure-yet for shared lists, Paprika for recipes, Pinboard for bookmarks, and Fantastical for my agenda.

OneNote for Mac

Marco Arment on Amazon Prime’s Price Increase  →

Marco:

This has not been a popular decision, to put it lightly, but most Prime customers — which I’ve been since 2005 — aren’t really going anywhere. There’s nowhere to go. Amazon has either destroyed or bought every competitor that has ever come close to its retail business.

I’ve also been a Prime customer for years, and though the $20 price hike is a bummer, of course, Prime is still worth it for us. There are so many one-off items — such as batteries, coffee filters, baby toothpaste, organic coconut oil, printer toner (ugh), charcoal lighter cubes, fine-tip gel ink pens, etc. — that are easier to order from Amazon than to put on the shopping list for the next time we’re out running errands. Heck, I have a friend who bought his lawnmower on Amazon Prime so he wouldn’t have to borrow a truck to go get one at Lowe’s.

But Marco’s complaint isn’t so much with the price increase as it is with the ever-evolving spamminess of Amazon Prime:

The biggest annoyance recently is that Prime members are now being forced through [an] interstitial ad between checkout steps […]

Showing this once is bad enough, but I see it regularly. Amazon is now annoying their best customers with desperate, obnoxious, tricky interstitial ads.

Reminds me of a few other examples of companies who spam their best customers.

Curiously, I have never once seen the ad that Marco sees regularly. However, Marco says he’s never once watched a video through Amazon Prime, whereas Anna and I have watched a few videos.

We’re fans of the Agatha Christie Poirot shows, and a few of the newer episodes aren’t on Netflix but are on Amazon Prime. We would probably use Amazon Prime more often if the viewing experience wasn’t so awkward for an Apple-centric household. To watch the Poirot episodes we had to download the Amazon Prime iPad app, find the shows, and then stream them to our Apple TV. It’s alright, but not nearly as nice as the Neftlix app on the Apple TV.

Marco Arment on Amazon Prime’s Price Increase

The Weekly Briefly: Questions and Answers  →

On this week’s episode of my podcast I answer several listener-submitted questions, mostly related to picking a CMS, building an audience, and if there’s a difference between “writing” and “blogging”.

Brought to you by:

  • CocoaConf: The developer conference for those who think different. Use the code BLANC to save 20% on tickets for any Spring event.

  • The awesome members of shawnblanc.net: thanks to their support which makes the work that I do a sustainable possibility.

The Weekly Briefly: Questions and Answers

The Problem with Quiet  →

Scott Adams:

A study showed that people are more creative when there’s human background noise, such as in a coffee shop. My experience agrees with the study. Back when I owned a restaurant, I brought my laptop to lunch one day to do some work in a booth while my order was being prepared. Ideas came to me so rapidly that I ended up writing an entire book while sitting in the restaurant during lunch rushes.

My experience agrees as well. It’s one of the reasons I’ve enjoyed working out of my coworking space for the past month and a half. Just being around others who are also working, and hearing the traffic outside, the tapping of other keyboards, and the occasional side conversations and phone calls, just helps me keep on my own track.

The Problem with Quiet