The Mac Chimes of Death

Speaking of the Mac Power Users, if you’ve ever wondered why Stephen Hackett was the obvious choice as co-host for the Mac Power Users, look no further than this post.

Mac Power Users 584: Everything Fades to Black

It’s feedback time, so Stephen and I are answering listener email on this episode of Mac Power Users. We’re also talking about iOS apps running on Apple silicon Macs and preparing your tech for the afterlife.

This episode of Mac Power Users is sponsored by:

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The Intrazone, by Microsoft SharePoint: Your bi-weekly conversation and interview podcast about SharePoint, OneDrive and related tech within Microsoft 365.

Rumors Growing for Colorful iMacs

As the Tuesday event approaches, there are increasing rumors of the release of colorful iMacs. 9to5 Mac collects all of the rumors nicely.

I, for one, would love to see Apple add some more whimsey to their products, and colorful iMacs would be an excellent start. (If I were in charge, I’d also bring back the rainbow logo on at least some products.) Looking at the rumor images, my only complaint is they aren’t going bold enough. Forget about the pastels; go for the bold colors. Remember how everyone loved their colorful iMacs back in the day? It’s time for more of that.

Jazz Friday: Chick Corea Trilogy 2

I know I just linked Chick Corea, but I’m still trying to get over his passing and listening to a lot of his music.

Moreover, he won a posthumous Grammy for Best Improvised Jazz Solo and Best Jazz Instrumental Album for his trio performance on Trilogy 2 (Apple Music). This is a follow-up to his Trilogy album from 2013 (Apple Music). The album features Chick on piano, Christian McBride on bass, and Brian Blade on drums. The two-disc album is full of bangers, but my favorite is Chick’s own “La Fiesta”.

FoodNoms: Customized Nutrition Goals Made Easy

I’ve been getting better at food tracking lately. Back when the App Store was new and shiny, there was an initial rush of quality food-tracking apps like Lose It! and MyFitnessPal. The problem is that all of those apps became “platforms”. Things like cross-promotions and upsells just seemed to take over. A few months ago, I went spelunking into the App Store for a better food-tracking app and came back with FoodNoms.

Its clean-looking interface is excellent for tracking food. It also has a few additional features (like intermittent fasting), but all the features are implemented unobtrusively and without feeling creepy. It comes with a decent library of foods, but you can also scan bar codes for additional foods or access the user-submitted library.

This is easily the best food-tracking app I’ve ever used. It has an excellent design, it gives me the tools and food library I need, and it doesn’t make me feel like a product. There is a yearly subscription (currently $30/year), which I gladly paid.

I’m excited to have found a customizable food-tracking app that has all the features I need and doesn’t make me feel like it’s trying too hard. If you’re looking for something new or want some additional help with your diet plan, check out FoodNoms (App Store)(Website).

The Hazel Field Guide 2021 Update and Discount

Over the past several weeks, I’ve been busy recording new screencasts for the Hazel Field Guide. Hazel recently released version 5, which doesn’t make many changes to the way the application works, but lots of changes to the way the application looks. Hazel is now an app, not a system preference.

I decided that it didn’t make sense to make a new edition of the Hazel Field Guide because there isn’t a lot of new features to cover, and it didn’t make sense to charge everyone a second time. So instead, I’ve made a free update with 14 new videos clocking in a little over 30 minutes.

Get the Free Update

If you’ve already purchased the Hazel Field Guide, just log in, and you’ll see a lot of videos with (2021) in the name. Those are the new ones. The captioning and transcripts are still in process and will be uploading over the next few weeks.

Get It on Sale

If you haven’t purchased the Hazel Field Guide, now’s the time. I’ve lowered the price from $29 to $19, but that’s only good for a week. Enjoy.

Focused 123: A Focus on Time

Mike and I talk about the different ways we track our time, what tools we use, and share the focus and productivity benefits we glean from the process on this week’s Focused.

This episode of Focused is sponsored by:

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Email Gets a Lot Easier with SaneBox

I like having one less thing to deal with. SaneBox, MacSparky’s sponsor this week, helps me tremendously with this. People aren’t going to send you less emails, but with SaneBox, you can see your more important emails while the less important ones are moved out of your inbox. SaneBox’s AI and machine learning will filter into a separate folder and then summarize them in a digest so you don’t get overwhelmed but the number of emails and can focus on the things that really need your attention.

Imagine, instead of checking and managing work-related emails, and having to recover your productivity from an email interruption, or not having to ask yourself, “What was I doing?”, you could just get stuff done. With our SaneBox robot friends, you can:

Wake up every day to find the SaneBox robots have automatically sorted your incoming email for you so you can address the important and ignore the irrelevant.
Defer email for hours, days, or weeks, so it is out of your life until a more appropriate time. They’ve even added a new feature that can optionally auto-reply to snoozed email with something like, “I’m sorry, but I’m underwater right now. I’ll get back to you in a few days.” SaneBox can even auto-reply when you defer an email.
Set secret reminders so if someone doesn’t reply to an important email, SaneBox gives you a nudge to follow up.
Automatically save attachments to the cloud (like Dropbox).
Use their SaneForward service to automatically send appropriate emails to services like Evernote, Expensify, and Kayak.
Move unwanted email to the SaneBlackHole and never see anything from that person again.

I love SaneBox and other MacSparky readers have let me know that they do too. Get your time back and try SaneBox today.

Apple’s Spring Loaded Event

Today Apple announced its “Spring Loaded” event for next Tuesday, April 20. A spring event has been rumored for months. I’m glad they’ve announced it so we can get on with it.

For some pure speculation, I’m thinking we’ll see new iPad Pros and the years-rumored AirTags. I’d love to see new Apple Silicon Macs, but I expect those won’t get announced until WWDC in June.

Personalize Your Apple Watch with the Watchsmith Update

Before there was the sensation that is Widgetsmith, there was Watchsmith. If you’re an Apple Watch user, then you know that the device is a lot more than just a watch. It’s also a highly customizable accessory. But what if you wanted to make it even more personal? That’s where Watchsmith comes in. This newly updated app for your iPhone lets you customize your Apple Watch with a degree of control I have not seen from any other app.

Just like Apple left the Apple Watch with limited face options, it also left it with few complication options. Watchsmith fixes that. It starts with a comprehensive collection of highly customizable complications, ranging in function from date to weather. You can adjust each complication precisely how you want it and how that best suits your desired functionality or appearance while still retaining all the Apple Watch features and faces.

Watchsmith offers a pile of fully customizable complications ranging from today’s date to surf conditions. You also have complete control over how they look, so you can make them just about any foreground and background color. One of my more functional but straightforward complications with Watchsmith is a big, easy-to-read date complication giving me today’s date.

Version 2.0, the newest version of Watchsmith, ups the game a bit. Among the new features:

All of the complications have been updated to take advantage of the latest watchOS capabilities, which will lead to better performance and behavior when used in tinted watch faces.
A variety of new complication styles:
– Photo
– 24 Hour Dial
– Modern Moonphase
– Geometric Solar
– Moon & Stars
– Sun Timer
– Solar Path
– Golden Hour
– Step Counting
– Text Calendar

If you use the Apple Watch but aren’t satisfied with your complications, this one’s for you.