Back to the Mac Podcast, Episode 2 – Jacob, Johnny and Richard Look Back and Look Forward

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Back to the Mac Podcast, Episode 2 – Jacob, Johnny and Richard Look Back and Look Forward

This podcast was a collaboration with Dr Richard Harkness and Jacob Penderworth. It was the second podcast that I recorded and edited for publication by Alex Arena.

Back to the Mac, or BTTM, ran for a total of 26 episodes, most of which have been lost to internet history. It was good fun whilst it lasted and we had an average five-star review from seven listeners. I’m not sure how many more we reached.

Above is the second episode that I found on a server.

Letterpress Techniques and Strategies to Make You a Winner

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This article first appeared on iPad.Appstorm, a popular Envato website reviewing iPad apps. The site was subsequently sold to a new owner and, a number of years later, the article was lost. I have republished it here for reference.

It has been available on the App Store for less than two months but Letterpress already has a massive following. If you are a fan of word games, or even a fan of strategy games, then Letterpress could be for you. It’s completely addictive, and I’ve come up with a few strategies to turn Letterpress matches to your advantage.

In my previous article, Letterpress: Perfecting the Perfect Word Game, I talked about how the app itself could be improved in the future. In this article, I discuss ways that you can raise your game and win more often.

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Back to the Mac Podcast, Episode 1 – Richard and Johnny Have a Chat

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Back to the Mac Podcast, Episode 1 – Richard and Johnny Have a Chat

This podcast was a collaboration with Dr Richard Harkness and was the first podcast that I recorded and edited for publication by Alex Arena.

Back to the Mac, or BTTM, ran for a total of 26 episodes, most of which have been lost to internet history. It was good fun whilst it lasted and we had an average five-star review from seven listeners. I’m not sure how many more we reached.

Above is the first episode that I found on a server.

 

Improve Your Communications With Wavedeck Voice Messenger

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This article first appeared on iPhone.Appstorm, a popular Envato website reviewing iPhone apps. The site was subsequently sold to a new owner and, a number of years later, the article was lost. I have republished it here for reference.

With the advent of smartphones, and largely driven by the market-defining success of the iPhone, the way in which we employ these devices has changed. The telephone and the mobile phone were designed so that we could speak to each other with distance being no object. Nowadays, we increasingly email, text, iMessage, twitter, facebook or google. We are using mobile phones to talk increasingly less. Despite this, an app called Wavedeck Voice Messenger PTT makes it easier to communicate than, say, texting.

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Picking Passwords: Pitfalls, Practicalities and Protection

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Like many people, you probably have a password for logging on to your computer at work, another one for logging into your work email, and then there’s your personal email. Your Mac at home. The AppleID for your iPhone. Twitter. Facebook. LinkedIn. And more?

Oh, and you have to use a capital letter, some lowercase, at least one digit, a punctuation mark or other special characters and it has to be more than 12 characters long. Perhaps you can’t use more than 16 characters? Or perhaps that particular service doesn’t, afterall, allow you to use special characters – even more confusing!

Read more at Envato…

Back to the Mac Podcast, Episode 0 – The Pilot

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Back to the Mac Podcast, Episode 0 – The Pilot

This podcast was a collaboration with Alex Arena and Jacob Penderworth and was my introduction to producing a podcast.

Back to the Mac, or BTTM, ran for a total of 26 episodes, most of which have been lost to internet history. It was good fun whilst it lasted and we had an average five-star review from seven listeners. I’m not sure how many more we reached.

Above is the pilot episode that I found on a server.

 

Letterpress: Perfecting the Perfect Word Game

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This article first appeared on iPad.Appstorm, a popular Envato website reviewing iPad apps. The site was subsequently sold to a new owner and, a number of years later, the article was lost. I have republished it here for reference.

It’s only been out since 24th October 2012, but Letterpress (the new iOS app from Loren Brichter of Tweetie fame) has taken iOS gaming by storm. The crashing of Game Centre — the weekend following the launch of Letterpress app — has been attributed to its huge success. So what is the appeal of Letterpress, is it really the perfect word game? Following it’s update to version 1.1, on 17th November, is there really any room for improvement?

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The Future for Apple Human Interface Design

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This article first appeared on Mac.Appstorm, a popular Envato website reviewing Mac apps. The site was subsequently sold to a new owner and, a number of years later, the article was lost. I have republished it here for reference.

In recent iterations of iOS — Apple’s mobile operating system for iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad — and in recent versions of OS X on the desktop, you will undoubtedly have noticed a move towards visual elements that mimic real-life objects. The ruled, yellow notepaper for the Notes app, the torn-paper effect at the top of the stitched, leather-bound Calendar app, and more are examples of this.

These software design elements mimicking real world objects have introduced a new word into our vocabularies: skeuomorphism. Such effects have, however, divided opinion, and it is just possible that we will see Apple shift away from these elements in future.

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How to Set Up Shared Reminder Lists in Mountain Lion

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One of the new features to included in Mountain Lion and iOS 6 is the iCloud-enabled reminders app. Reminders is a basic reminder list management application that incorporates the ability to wirelessly synchronize reminders across your iOS and desktop devices using Apple’s iCloud.

Reminders can also share reminder lists with other people. Let’s see how.

Read more at Envato…

How to Reveal the Library Folder in Lion or Mountain Lion

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Did you know that you will find Library folders in three locations on your Mac? There’s a Library folder at the root-level of your hard drive, there’s a second Library folder inside the root-level System folder and another Library folder in each User’s Home folder. In the normal day-to-day course of events, you don’t need to worry about any of them, and that’s fine because they’re all hidden away from you by default.

There are, however, occasions when you may need to access the User Library folder (also known as ~/Library) and this article will show you how.

Read more at Envato…