We had reports of Picasa showing face at Macworld, and today Google has themselves announced Picasa on the official Google blog. 

Today, we’re releasing Picasa for Mac. While we’ve previously offered both a standalone Picasa Web Albums uploader and an iPhoto plugin for Mac users, Picasa for Mac finally brings all of the advanced sharing and sync features of Picasa to the millions of Mac OS X users who use Picasa Web Albums. Not to mention the “it-slices-and-dices” feature list that covers everything from color balance to collages.

Picasa for Mac looks and works much like Picasa on other platforms, and offers trademark Picasa features — such as non-destructive editing, and the ability to keep track of photos anywhere on your hard drive, then automatically account for new images as you add them.

If you’ve seen Picasa 3 for the PC, it should be just about the same on the Mac. Picasa will also have a one-way integration with iPhoto, being able to import tags and ratings along with the pictures.

Should iPhoto users switch to Picasa? We can only say that once we take a good look at that and iPhoto 09 that’s set

to release today. Before we leave it at that, I just want to comment on how out of place the UI is. Everything from the buttons to the shading doesn’t look like anything on the Macintosh. This will of course be perfect for Windows switchers looking for some familiarity.

The team will be demoing this release at Macworld, but you can download the beta yourself from Picasa.Google.com. Official screencast after the break. Continue Reading »

FileMaker Inc., a subsidiary of Apple, has just upgraded their flagship database suite to version 10. Incorporating a whole new user interface and features. 

With a fresh new interface, FileMaker Pro 10 delivers the most dramatic design changes in over a decade. The redesigned and customizable Status Toolbar — similar to browser toolbars — puts commonly used FileMaker Pro features, previously only accessible from the main menu, right at users’ fingertips for streamlined navigation, better workflow and time-saving shortcuts.

Other major new features, such as the ability to save the results of a search, and Script Triggers, which launch scripts triggered by user actions or based on time limits, make using databases easier than ever before. - FileMaker Press Release

FileMaker is a professional database application and comes in many flavours. Available immediately, FileMaker Pro 10 is offered at a suggested retail price of $299 /$179 upgrade. Your other options are:

• FileMaker Pro 10 Advanced for $499/$299 upgrade.
• FileMaker Server 10 is $999/$599 upgrade.
• FileMaker Server 10 Advanced is $2,999/$1,799 upgrade

For home and small business users considering using a database app on the Mac, do check out Bento 2 ($49), made by the same people who make FileMaker. Dipped in Cocoa, Bento 2 features the integration that a Mac application should boast of.

Ed note: If time permits, we’ll be doing a full review of both FileMaker and Bento 2, so stay tuned for more updates. 

I was crushed to learn that Leopard was not going to sport the spotlight window (remember that?!) which displayed the results in a clean way, with collapsible file types, reordering of searches, and the fact that you would see around 15 results per file type. I hate Leopard’s Finder search, since it puts everything together, shows you every file on your system related to that match, and looks pretty much like a mess.

I’ve known about HoudahSpot for a while now (I even won a license back in 2005, which I totally forgot about), but never got round to using it. A recent update caught my attention, and here I am with a small review of this search tool that promises to companion Spotlight during those difficult times

HoudahSpot does not attempt to replace the Spotlight menubar. I still use that for quick look ups, which when used with conditional searches works for most part. I do however sometimes find the need to grab very specific results, and the Finder search as I have mentioned is quite painful. 

Daily use

HoudahSpot instead promises a very advanced search that is super simple to use. I could find very specific files by quickly setting up conditions and locations. Most of the time I could narrow it down to less than 10 results, with my required file right at the top. All this done with just a few mouse clicks. 

The performance of the search is super fast (except in certain cases where it would lock up for a few seconds). This is partly because it conducts the search after you have hit enter, after which it will live update according to the search criteria. It doesn’t render any icon previews, and there’s even an option to turn off the icons completely. 

The interface is very pleasant (I’m told the previous UI colour was a hideous yellow), and features a button for an inspector as well as integrated Quick Look support. The bottom of the window shows a path bar so you know exactly where the file comes from. 

Features

Saved templates is similar to saved searches in Spotlight, but they’re much more flexible. It comes with a bunch of search templates for finding long lost files, recent files, music gone astray, and you can create your own templates. The devs have also put up a whole lot of tips and tricks you can do with the app. 

Blitz Search is something that I just don’t understand. It’s a spotlight-like drop down search from the menubar, but all it does is spawn a new search window. I mean, why wouldn’t I just hit the shortcut to go to the main search instead of coming to this? Perhaps there’s more to it than meets the eye. 

For what its worth

My only complaint about this app, is its price. At $25, it may be a few dollars too much for casual usage. If you plan to use this app extensively, it will definitely be worth it. Features wise, it is perfect. 

For me however, I don’t usually need to use anything other than the spotlight menu (not many files I’d say), and even then, I wouldn’t mind taking the extra effort to find something in Finder. A demo version is available, to give you a sneak preview of what the app is all about. 

Any HoudahSpot users out here? What’s your opinion about this app?

Want to make your iPhone browsing experience even more awesome? Bring it closer to some of the functions of your desktop browser? Similar to Pastebud’s solution, iPuhelin has introduced a bunch of bookmarklets that allow your mobile Safari to do a lot more things that it could, without any jailbreak. 

The biggest feature in my opinion is the Find function. You can search for a word, and it tells you how many matches along with highlight all those words in your web page. They also have bookmarklets for ‘scroll to bottom’, ‘find similar sites’, ‘display all images’ and a bunch of translation options. I’ve tried most of these bookmarlets and they work just as advertised. Highly recommended for all iPhone or iPod Touch users. 

To add them all you need to do is visit Safari+, bookmark the pages, and then remove some text as specified by the instructions. I’d highly suggest you do this on the desktop and then let MobileMe sync them over, as it will be much quicker that way.

Apple Mail can be a very simple application to get you started, but once you get comfortable using it, you need to bring in the power. I’ve discussed a lot of Mail related tips and plugins here on SA (take a look at the related posts in the post footer), and here’s my latest addition to Mail tips. Add a spiffy HTML/CSS signature to your outgoing emails that will definitely cause some sort of unrest on the receiving end. 

Before I go further, I would like to give full credit to All Forces.com, from where this is based off. Continue Reading »

As it goes Facebook is becoming increasingly popular around the globe. All of my friends are on facebook and everyone seems to have facebook in their bookmarks toolbar. So why not get Facebook down to your desktop? Here are a bunch of Facebook applications that losely tie up to the Facebook API bringing certain features to the desktop.

AddressbookSync 1.1.1 »

You’ve got your address book neatly filled out, but when it comes to pictures it’s either too much trouble or you don’t have the pics at hand. AddressBookSync will not only search through your address book for matches, it will also copy over the birthdays of your contacts.

This is a great way to fill out your address book, as well as keep up to date with the latest pictures. Unfortunately, phone numbers are not synced, as the facebook API does not allow access to it. For copying over contacts, there was an application Facebook Sync that could do this. I say was, because Facebook has since made the developer remove that functionality from his app. If you are determined enough, you can find someone who can send it to you (don’t ask me!). 

Amigo »

The Facebook notification applet resides in your menubar letting you know when someone has ‘poked’, prodded, or kicked you. You also get to see when there’s a new wall post or when you are invited to a party. It also gives you quick access to your friend’s profiles, walls and all that. At $20, the app is terribly overpriced. The trial however has no limitations other than a buggy message every time you launch the app.

PhotoBook »

This is a really slick application for viewing Facebook albums. You get access to all your friend’s photos, which you can search through, or view as a slideshow. The full view shows additional info for each picture and a single click adds any selected photos to your iPhoto library. Unfortunately, the app lacks an upload option, which would have sealed the deal.

Facebook Export for iPhoto »

Made by the Facebook guys themselves, the iPhoto exporter is very similar to the FlickrExport developed by Fraser Speirs. The plugin puts in an extra pane in your iPhoto export window, from where you can tag a picture (it pulls names from your facebook friends list), set albums, comments — and hit upload!

Facebook Dashboard widget »

For those of you who contantly use the Dashboard, the Facebook widget will update you on new pokes, messages, wall posts, events, and other notifications. Very simple to install and use, and uses just a tiny bit of dash real estate.

EventBox »

This is my favourite app, and is the one reason I continue to keep my facebook account alive. It displays facebook status updates, pictures, and also features a photo uploading tool. You can update your status from the EventBox window as well as leave comments on people’s photos. EventBox goes far beyond Facebook and is highly recommended for anyone who interacts with the internet. Use the coupon code in the Smoking Apples magazine to get a 20% discount on the $15 pricetag that EventBox commands.

Any of you active Facebookers know of some other cool apps? Do let us know so we can check them out.

Well it’s been a fun year, Smoking Apples has been a blast to work with and I’ve had quite a year myself too. Preshit and Milind have given their top choices, I too have my own apps. Some have been here for a while and some are brand new. Either way I still love em’!

Mac

Skitch »
I love this app to death. When I had to reinstall my OS, Skitch was one of the first apps I reinstalled. I’m a heavy forum user and this is awesome for taking quick snapshots of something, adding a few drawings/text, and then uploading it to a site with the click of a button.

Cyberduck »
I’ve used this app off and on a few times but never hardcore. Now that I have my own website I’ve been finding it to be insanely useful, and it’s great because it’s also free. The interface is great along with the capability to edit my files with TextWrangler is just great.

Quicksilver »
This is probably the second app that I would have right away after I reinstall my OS. It’s made my “work” efficiency increase exponentially, and I’m not even using all the features! With the quick tap of Ctrl+Space I can quickly type in a few letters and start whatever app I want. Not only that but you can do some of the functions within each app with those triggers. It’s a free download and oh so worth it to check out.

Littlesnapper »
It’s like my backup to Skitch. I’ve used it mostly just to take quick snaps of websites, videos on YouTube and then sharing them through email and the forums. I just love the interface as well and it just screams Mac for me.

1Password »
I’m not very good with passwords and have resorted using the same one for years now (unsafe!!!). With 1Password I can have a randomly generated 12-16 character password for any site I go to without worrying about getting cracked or anything. My only worry now is what will happen if I lose all those passwords (of course I back them up to a physical medium just to be safe). Oh and it’s also got a free iPhone counterpart which is a plus.

iPhone

Fieldrunners »
Yes, I’m addicted. Tower Defense was the perfect time waster and now it’s been brought to the iPhone/iPod. The first version of the app was a little bare, no sound and only one map. It was still fun but later on the developers finally brought sound to the game along with a few other expansions. It’s graphically pretty, polished, challenging, and extremely addicting.

Frenzic »
I learned about this game from the review here on Smoking Apples. After a while of Milind constantly talking up this game I decided to check it out. Man is this game ever fun! I’ve played quite a few games and even had my Mother try (which she did terrible at it). It’s a great thing to do if you have a small amount of time and it’s extremely fast paced.

Things »
There have been few “to do list” apps on the iPhone. I’ve only tried a few of them (and the free ones at that), none have compared to that of Things. It’s got everything you could want from a to do list app. Great organization, easy to use, great at managing deadlines, and it’s got quite a few more things as well. Ten bucks might be a little steep but I think it’s still worth the buck.

Tweetie »
I’ve been using Twinkle for the longest time and I’ve recently tried Tweetie. It might not quite look as good as Twinkle but it’s got more features and I don’t feel quite so limited. Great for iPhone Twitter users.

BibleXpress »
This is the app that I had to do quite a bit of thinking on how to justify the $29.99 price tag. I’ve looked around at getting other Bibles on my iPod but they all are limited to using Wi-Fi. I want a Bible that is stored on my device and that’s exactly what BibleXpress is. It’s got quite a few translations included and the developer has been working hard on getting more. BibleXpress has a full feature set including bookmarks, notes for individual verses, and it’s all easy to navigate. Why does it cost so much though, well it’s gotta pay for the rights to have the different translations. This app is really only for the person who is going to use it consistently though, so it (obviously) isn’t for everyone.

Cultured Code has kept their star app Things in a public beta state for a while now. The getting things done application has stolen many a heart, doing the thing it does best. The team has been slowly culturing their code, and we’re finally approaching the final release date, 6th Jan, Macworld 09. 

With just 7 days to go, Cultured Code has also pushed out the Release Candidate for Things 1.0. This is a feature complete version that includes a whole lot of changes including some slick new icons, increased flexibility with moving around items, rearrangement and change of functionality in Areas and Projects, and a whole lot of bug fixes. 

We’ll be doing a full review of Things, including the let’s-not-forget iPhone version, so stay tuned for more updates on that. Things costs $50 for a single user license, but using the coupon code “THINGSPRESALE20” will get you a 20% discount through January 15. In the meantime you can go ahead and download the release candidate to check it out for yourself.

Originally published in the Smoking Apples Magazine, Issue 2 (December 2008). Free PDF direct download.

After putting Tweetie through its paces, we had to get to know the brains behind the application. Loren Brichter, the guy behind Atebits Software was kind enough to share with us some thoughts on the whats, whys and hows of Tweetie, the App Store and how it all affects Atebits software.  

Atebits as a company, what can you tell us? What’s your set-up like?
Atebits started in December of 2007 when I released my first app, Scribbles. It put enough food on the table that I figured I could run with this indie developer thing.  It’s just me and my 2 Macs, iPhone and iPod touch. I work from a home office a lot of the time, but carry a laptop and work wherever I happen to travel.

So Tweetie is finally out in the App Store. What has the response been like? Has it made you proud or disappointed?
The response has been fantastic. Everyone I’ve talked to loves the app, they tell me it’s changed the way they use twitter on-the-go. Many have said it’s the best iPhone Twitter client, a few have even said it’s the best Twitter client on any platform.  I couldn’t be happier.  At the same time I’m working like mad to make it even better.  As I write this I’m putting the finishing touches on 1.1 (now out in the App Store) which adds some really great new features like an inline image viewer, location aware features and beautiful new themes.

We’re very excited about 1.1. Now your previous app, Scribbles was a mac application. What made you decide to move to the iPhone platform?
Part curiosity, part tales of success.

There were already so many twitter clients for the iPhone. Many of them free. What made you think adding another twitter client in the lineup would make a difference?
It’s a crowded space, no doubt.  You could call it a brief fit of madness, where I convinced myself that I could write something better. There are some solid apps out there, I just couldn’t find one that meshed with the way I use twitter.  I like following conversations, so being able to navigate “reply-chains” was really important. I didn’t have a particularly long list of things I wanted to see: fast, polished and full-featured enough that I didn’t have to go to the twitter website *all the time*.  Some apps were really polished but lacking in features, others could do everything but they looked like some sort of missile control panel.  If Apple’s products prove anything, it’s that power and simplicity aren’t mutually exclusive.

Given the current trend of devs pricing apps at $0.99, what are your thoughts on the pricing of Tweetie? Was it always going to be $2.99?
Coming up with a price was really, really hard.  On the one hand, yes, you have all of these free Twitter apps, some of which are pretty decent.  On the other hand, your target audience is iPhone users, all of whom you know will pay for quality.  I think Tweetie at $2.99 is vastly undervalued, but I wanted it to be very accessible during it’s initial release.  I have been planning on raising the price slowly as I add features (so go buy it now while it’s cheap!).  It’s also better to start with a lower price because it’s hard to start high and drop it without insulting early-adopters.  I’m not a fan of ads, so the thought of doing an ad-supported version never really crossed my mind.

How long did it take you to get tweetie from brainstorming to final product? Was it hard work?
I did the bulk of the programming over the course of two weeks.  I had already written some code that vastly simplified a lot of nitty gritty stuff like URL loading and XML parsing, and some convenience classes to wrap UIKit in cases where I think Apple made the wrong API decisions. It wasn’t too much work to get a basic twitter bridge and UI up and running.  I built it for speed from the beginning and never let the app get slow, so I didn’t really have to spend any time optimizing (call me crazy).  Where I did spend a lot of time was making sure I handled low-memory situations gracefully.  When users see an app crash, a lot of the time it’s not a crash at all, but rather the system killing the app because it’s using too much memory.  A ton of work went into making sure I was as stingy with memory as possible.

The speed optimisations really show! Tweetie is not only the most feature rich, it’s also the fastest.

So tell us how it is working with Apple. We’re so used to hearing that Apple is a closed door. Did they help out in most of your issues or did you just have to fend for yourself. Were you in any way worried about rejections?
I wasn’t worried about rejections, but I should have been.  The first version of Tweetie was rejected.  The folks at Apple disagreed with my use of the standard “bookmarks” icon for the saved searches button.  The annoying part wasn’t having to resubmit because of a UI nitpick (in fact I wish Apple was a lot stricter with UI/HIG violations), it was being kept in the dark about how long the resubmitted review process would take.  I think I have the same set of nitpicks regarding the App Store as every other developer, mainly that the process is too much like a black box.

So that’s the real story! We were wondering why it took so long for Tweetie to show up on the App Store. 

The NDA removal. Did that help you in coding Tweetie or was it anyway going to be so awesome?
It didn’t really influence Tweetie’s development, but it’s definitely a step in the right direction.  I know it’s been said before, but for as much as the App Store gets wrong, it gets far, far more stuff right.  It’s a clumsy process to get on the store, but once you’re there it’s incredible - think about it: sanctioned third party apps are available with a single tap from the home screen of any iPhone.  Independent developers have never had this kind of opportunity or exposure on any platform.  I think Apple has good intentions, and they’re probably working as hard as they can to make the App Store even better for users *and* developers.

Seeing the success of your first iPhone app, what’s your status with regard to Mac applications? Is it going to be iPhone only or do we see some apps for our beloved Macs?
Absolutely. For the past year or so I’ve been working on a big Mac graphics app - I’m definitely going to continue working on it, but it might get delayed a bit considering the huge potential for success on the iPhone platform.

That’s great news! (Psst. We’d love to be your guinnea pigs for early alpha testing! )

  (Loren’s first mac app was a simple drawing tool ‘Scribbles’)

So now that you have an application each for the iPhone and the Mac, what according to you has more potential as a platform? What are you more looking forward to develop for?
iPhone. No question. Mobile computing is the future, and the iPhone is the face of it. From a business perspective the sheer potential for growth is really exciting.  From a developer perspective the constraints of a 3.5” screen and less than 100M of memory are downright fun to work with.

Now that the iPhone platform has been great for you, are you eyeing the Andriod market?
No… at least not any time soon.  I saw a G1 in person the other day and was thoroughly unimpressed.  It’s going to be years before any other company catches up to where Apple was even with iPhone 1.0.  The thing that other companies don’t “get” is that it’s not about the features, it’s about the whole user experience.  I saw an ad for a Blackberry Storm recently that touted the fact that it had copy-and-paste.  Sure, it’s something that the iPhone lacks, but it gives me the impression that the people working on the Storm just came up with this big checklist of features, and decided that if they could check them all off, somehow they could “beat” the iPhone.  Sorry, it doesn’t work like that.

But back to Android, it’s not great now, but it does have potential. And I think it will keep Apple honest.  If Apple starts getting too insane with App Store rejections then I know a whole lot of developers (myself included) who would seriously consider moving over to a more open platform.  But I really do think that Apple has good intentions with regard to independent developers.

Thank you so much for giving us an insight into Atebits. We hope we see some more awesome software out Atebits. We’re watching you!
Thanks, some great new apps are definitely in the works.

To find out more about Loren you can visit Atebits.com, or follow him on twitter. You could leave him a nice comment here telling him how much you love Tweetie!!!

There are FTP clients, and then there’s Flow. Ever since Adam Betts wrote about the Flow (may 2007) on his blog, I’ve been captivated by this beautifully crafted FTP client. As a Coda user however, I never really got a chance to use this FTP client, and eventually I forgot about it. A few days ago one of our team members mentioned Flow, and I thought I’d take a look at what it has grown into. 

Turns out my review is just in time, as 1.1.1 has been released just today! I played around with the beta versions for a few days just to see that everything works. With a lot of fixes in its kitty [release notes], Flow 1.1.1 brings enhanced local browsing support, fixes for Amazon S3, WebDAV and MobileMe iDisk. So without further ado, here’s what Flow is all about.

The User Interface

If there’s one thing that sets this app apart, its a well thought out user interface. Helpful Core Animation effects aside, everything is placed just right. At all times, you know exactly where you are, and the path bar can be used to quickly jump to wherever you wish to go.  

Features

If you thought Flow was all about the looks, take a look at the arsenal of features. I honestly didn’t think there’d be so many of them. Besides regular old FTP and SFTP features, Flow comes loaded with some features you might not even need. 

Full Support for Amazon S3, WebDAV, and MobileMe iDisk
Connecting to your MobileMe iDisk is super simple, and requires just your username and password. Once connected, things are at least 2x faster than using plain old finder. All your local files are available in the sidebar (finally!), or you can drag files in from any Finder window. If you want quick file transfers to your iDisk, FTP is the way to go.

I don’t have an Amazon S3 account so I couldn’t test that out, but it looks just as simple.

Editing
Flow features a built in text editor, albeit a basic one. So if you want to just change a few details in your web documents, just double click and you can edit them directly on the server. Of course, editing with your favourite editor is just a right click away. Note that this editor can only be used for the most basic tasks, as it doesn’t have any features that might be required for coding web pages.

QuickLook
Everyone who uses Leopard loves Quick Look (you should try it sometimes!). I was very surprised to find Quick Look support directly in Flow. Hit spacebar and out pops the window. 

Copying URLs
Flow is supposed to be URL smart, being able to copy a URL on your remote server or open it in your browser. This would have been a very handy feature, had it worked. Unfortunately, I tried Flow on two different Macs and three different FTP connections, but in all cases all I saw were greyed out options. Update: Apparently, one needs to set the base url for the copying URLs feature to work. Instructions for that are in this help page. Works very well now, and is awesome! 

I also really like the bookmarks feature, where you can store all your web locations in a convenient sidebar, as well as the stunning transfers view. 

The baddies

Yes, there are some of those as well. I noticed Flow crashes every now and then, with no resume-where-you-left-off support. The new version being in a crash report sending feature, so hopefully they will take care of the bugs. 

The second baddie, is support. Whenever I review an application, I always check out what the support is like. I usually send in a fake support request just to guage the quality of support. Sadly, I didn’t even get a reply to the two support requests I sent in. That is just plain unacceptable.

I then spoke to Brian Amerige, the lead developer of Flow, who admitted that their support system is flawed. He said they are going to bring in a new support system when it’s ready. “We don’t want to rush anything out the door”, he says. Watch out for updates regarding this on the ExtendMac Blog.

In conclusion

Flow is a really sweet FTP client, one that literally stays far ahead of the rest in terms of user interface, simplicity, and features. However, the small time crashes (3 times in 13 days) do bring it down to earth, while the lack of after sales support is a bit disturbing. However, considering that you don’t really need any support since the entire app is so easy to use, I’d leave it aside as something that shouldn’t matter much. 

I personally use Coda for my little FTP needs, while many others use the free Cyberduck (also fully featured) for their FTP purposes. But when it comes to a good mix of features and stunning interface, you can’t go wrong with Flow. At $30 for a single user license, Flow is decently priced. A 15 day trial awaits, but I think if it’s simple and clean FTP you need, Flow will win you over.