MacSparky

Speaking of OmniFocus … if you like the built-in OmniFocus design aesthetic but wish there were more options today’s your lucky day. Josh Hughes has an excellent set of graphics for use as OmniFocus perspectives that fit right in.

This week MacSparky is sponsored by OmniFocus 3. I’ve heard from lots of readers that are loving the new OmniFocus 3 features. I sure do.…

Years ago I published an AppleScript that allows you to automatically insert a recipient’s name to an email using TextExpander on your Mac. This is a cool trick because when you use it, you never get a person’s name wrong when replying to them. …

Guilherme Rambo, the gent who keeps finding scoops for 9to5Mac with some very clever sleuthing, recently published a simple app to make using AirPods with your Mac easier called AirBuddy. Once installed, it keeps an eye out for your AirPods. When you open them…

With G Suite, Google offers paid versions of its free web apps and services. On this week’s episode of Mac Power Users, Stephen and I discuss our usage of these tools and how G Suite compares to other solutions available to individuals and small…

There is a thread in the Focused forums referring to an article from The Guardian where a block scheduler gives herself 3-minute bathroom break blocks. I think that is too much. When the blocks get too small, you spend your time arranging your time instead of…

I enjoyed John Gruber’s response to the Wall Street Journal piece on the risks posed by webcams. In the article, Joanna Stern for the WSJ found a white hat hacker to try and break into her webcam on a Mac an Windows PC. On the Mac, getting access to the…

Today for Jazz Friday I want to share a contemporary saxophone player that I enjoy, Ben Wendell. Ben plays the sax and bassoon. He's been a sideman for many artists in many genres (including Snoop Dogg!), but some of my favorite music from Ben are shorts he…

I've come a long way in my relationship with Emoji since they first appeared on the iPhone. At this point, I use them every day, and I do think they can convey a certain level of emotion with text with the right people. Meanwhile, the emoji machine keeps…

Remember that thing I wrote a few weeks ago about 773 Million email and passwords being published in hacker circles? Well now they’ve released 2.2 Billion more. Mac Power Users has covered digital security. It’s not a bad time to go back and listen to that…

On this week’s episode of Focused, Mike and I navigate the minefield of email. We share strategies and workflow tips to help you curb inbox addiction and reclaim your focus.…

I’ve always like the way OmniFocus can create links to Apple Mail messages when saving an email as a task. With help from listener Jacob (@evansio), I’ve now got a script that can do that anywhere via a text expander snippet. Here’s the AppleScript:…

This week I'm pleased to welcome back HoudahSpot as a sponsor. Apple’s Spotlight search is a powerful tool. But imagine if there were a group of engineers at Apple that wanted to turn up the Spotlight search a notch or two and had nobody in management to…

Christina Warren, tech commentator, podcaster, and Cloud Developer Advocate at Microsoft, drops by this week’s episode of Mac Power Users to talk about using a Mac at work, the state of PowerPoint, and how to get the most out of tech when traveling the…

The latest episode of Automators is live and ready for download. This time we are joined by Myke Hurley, who is relatively new to the automation game but nevertheless found many relatively simple, yet clever, ways to use automation to get through his day…

This week MacSparky is sponsored by OmniOutliner, the best outliner available for the Mac, iPad, and iPhone. OmniOutliner combines powerful outlining tools plus a smart, simple interface to allow you to make beautiful outlines that can be as complex as you…

The latest version of Pixelmator Pro for Mac is out. Version 1.3 “Prism” goes deep on layer support. Now it includes clipping masks, layer tagging, layer filtering and search, and opacity and blending controls. If you use a lot of layers, you’ll…

Last week Apple released a collection of new videos about getting work done on the iPad. I finally got around to watching them today and they are really good. What I like about them is that each video takes its time demonstrating actual workflows. I think that…

This year I participated in the annual Six Colors Apple Report Card. It is always interesting to see how Apple's grades change overtime.

On this week’s episode of Mac Power Users, Stephen and I discuss how the iPhone and Apple Watch can be helpful in managing health and fitness, and coupled with the breadth of options in the App Store, they can become powerful tools in improving our…