Link: MacBreak Weekly 242: The World’s Largest Dongle.

While talking about Together, Leo remarks about “forking”, where there are differences between the versions on the Mac App Store and developers’ sites, that I would like to address.

In the case of Together (and just about all other examples I’ve seen of this), it’s the Mac App Store guidelines forcing the differences or limitations. If it were up to me, I would have the versions as close to identical as possible.

With Together, Apple rejected it because for the “Save PDF to Together” feature to work, Together has to put a file in your Library/PDF Services folder, which is prohibited by the guidelines. It’s a stupid limitation, because putting files in the PDF Services folders is a completely supported Mac OS X thing otherwise.

In this case, there is a workaround in the form of an installer that you can get from the Together downloads page. I hope to come up with a smarter workaround in the future.

Links:
YouTube — Together for Mac
T4 Show – Together for Mac

Probably worth noting that Flash caused the hang. Get rid of it!

I authorized Poster to access my Flickr account and a beautiful window came up. It showed my uploaded photo in a pane on the left, and in the right sidebar it showed all of the meta data that goes along with a photo on Flickr. I could change the name, enter a description, enter tags, select a set to add the photo to, put it in a group and change moderation settings like privacy, safety, content type and accessibility to public searches. Rather than being utilitarian, the interface is what you’ve come to expect from great Mac software; simple, yet elegant. Even the tags autofill from YOUR tags you’ve used in the past.

Link: NosillaCast #293

Allison also interviews me afterwards on her own podcast, NosillaCast, so I get to explain the difference between groups and smart groups, and also mention some future plans for Together and Feeder. Unfortunately, due to Skype woes, the sound quality of the interview wasn’t so great, so you can hear me clearly while Allison’s audio was very quiet. Normally it’s the other way around!

Update: Allison informs me that the audio is fixed, thanks to some late night work by Ambrosia Software, so now you can hear her ask the questions that I answer!

Also, Together was reviewed on MacApper last week and that seems favourable too.

I must be doing something right.

For anyone who doesn’t know, Late Night Cocoa looks at a different topic every week with a guest developer and is suitable for both novice and experienced Cocoa developers. It stands out because its host, Steve Scott, aka Scotty, does an excellent job producing a podcast that is not only useful and informative but also sounds good too. A lot of work goes in behind the scenes to make that happen.

And, as always with a podcast, you can listen to what you want when it suits you, so if one topic doesn’t interest you, there are bound to be plenty more that do. So if Cocoa development interests you, check it out.

This is one of those tools that has a TON of cool features and capabilities that you can love even if you don’t use all of it.

I didn’t know in advance, but the review was actually done by Allison Sheridan of the NosillaCast – a “technology geek podcast with an EVER so slight Macintosh bias”. Allison is actually a registered user of both my products, I know her in particular as an enthusiastic Feeder user.

NosillaCast stands out by being quite varied in nature with lots of original content ideas, so it’s always interesting. Allison is also quite brave at doing her own experiments with technology and her friendly style makes the podcast easy listening. Check it out.

If you need to do anything with making an RSS feed, Feeder is going to make it very easy for you [...] Fantastic application, I bought it in a minute.

- Merlin Mann

You can hear the full review and the rest of the show here: MacBreak Weekly 31

Don’t think this is some cliquey arrangement with Frank whereby he reviews both my apps; Frank told me he went looking for such an app and wound up back here, at Reinvented Software.

It’s another good review, Frank gives KIT quite a good going over and really gets the app. Frank always gives some developer feedback, in this case he first finds a bug creating a new library (not sure when this popped up, I’ll get it fixed soon!) and also wants KIT to search inside files.

KIT actually does that with as many file types as Spotlight can index – you choose All Contents from the search menu – so I guess I need to make that clearer and add an option to only search the contents. Oh well!

Also, if you listen to the podcast, there’s a chance to win one of three free copies and a special discount code (which is quite funny) if you don’t. In fact, just about every episode lately has had free copies or some special deal. NeatLittleMacApps is a neat little podcast that quickly showcases a different app each week and Frank’s easy style and warm sense of humour make it a pleasure. Check it out and tell all your friends!

Sounds like NLMA is doing well in the iTunes Technology Top 100 also, so keep it up, Frank, and good luck with building that house!

In the beginning there was nothing…

No wait, there was something. There was an RSS-feed creation tool called Feeder. And then there was podcasting.

Ok now combine this with a developer who updates his software so fast that he must be psychic, and you get probably the best and most used podcast/rss-feed creating App out there.

Thanks, Frank! For every app Frank reviews, he gives a developer tip such as a feature request, something he thinks is not quite right or whatever.

I won’t spoil the podcast by revealing that here, but I will say: yes, that is becoming one of the most requested features for Feeder, something like that is coming and you might be pleasantly surprised at how it works out.

It’s a great review of Feeder, check it out as there is also the chance to win some free copies and a promotional code.

ScreenCastsOnline is an innovative video podcast that shows you how to use your Mac to its full potential. Each week Don guides you through something new, whether it’s using RapidWeaver or how to get the best out of .Mac, and you can watch how it’s done on your screen or iPod.

Don has found that it takes a lot of hard work to create and maintain the show and that if he wants to take it to the next level and have any kind of work/life balance, he needs to do it full time. I fully understand!

To achieve this Don is now adding Extra! subscriptions that provide exclusive premium content, the ScreenCastsOnline DVD, high definition versions, ad-free shows, monthly newsletters and much more. Check it all out at ScreenCastsOnline.

Best wishes and congratulations to Don for making the jump!

Update: Great to hear Don on DSC #359 and Adam being so encouraging about Don’s plans.