My thanks to TextSniper for sponsoring MacSparky.com this week. This is an app that I use … often.

TextSniper is a Mac OCR app that can extract text anywhere on your Mac’s screen and automatically save it to your clipboard so that you can paste it anywhere you need it. It can even read the text to you. The whole thing works a lot like the built-in screen capture on the Mac, just way more powerful.

Also, TextSniper doesn’t collect your data. The text recognition is processed on your Mac and does not require an internet connection. 

With TextSniper, you can:

• Quickly get a text from PDFs, Zoom calls, Presentations, and Videos. 
• Copy text from anywhere, even images and websites that don’t let you select text.
• Quickly grab data like email addresses, phone numbers, and links.
• Read QR codes and barcodes.
• Get text out of just about any image format, including JPG, PNG, GIF, TIFF, and BMP.

I find myself using TextSniper constantly in my daily work. Earlier this week I was signing up for a conference I’m about to attend. The website had a picture of my registration, but didn’t render it as text. That’s right. A picture. So when I needed to get my 12 digit sign up code, I just TextSnipered it out of the image into text and pasted it into the online form. Once again, TextSniper to the rescue.

TextSniper works with macOS Catalina and later and also works with Parallels Desktop

Get TextSniper now and enjoy the fastest way to copy uncopyable text, wherever it may be. Use promo code TS2022 to get an additional 25% off. 

This week MacSparky is sponsored by DEVONthink. There are a lot of ways to manage a database on your mac, but in my opinion, there is no better tool than DEVONthink. Just a few of the things I use DEVONthink for include:

• A reliable repository of research documents. DEVONthink will hold as many documents as you can throw at it. In addition, it makes import (and export) easy, so you can have all that power without feeling trapped.
• A research assistant. DEVONthink uses artificial intelligence to analyze and connect your documents in ways that may not otherwise occur to you.
• An OCR Tool. Everything you store in your DEVONthink Pro library gets OCR’d. It just happens.
• An Automation Tool. DEVONthink lets you build powerful automation subroutines into your library to help tag, move, and organize documents.

One of my uses for DEVONthink is managing all of my personal documents. I dump bills, invoices, tax records, and all the other bits of personal files that come my way into my personal records DEVONthink database. It automatically sorts them and syncs them for me using my own password. If I need to find anything, the DEVONthink search engine is always up to the task.

DEVONthink supports multiple sync methods and lets you even use your own sync password, so everything is encrypted. If you’ve got an iPad or an iPhone, you can access your DEVONthink data there, too, with DEVONthink to Go.

It is this combination of power and security that makes DEVONthink the clear winner. You can think of DEVONthink as your paperless office. You can automate your workflow from capture to filing, editing to publishing. It stores all your documents, helps you keep them organized, and presents you with what you need to get the job done.

Interested? MacSparky readers can get a 20% discount on DEVONthink. This is a limited-time offer, so check it out now.

Daylite is more than just a CRM app for small businesses. Its Productivity capability is what sets Daylite apart from other web-based competitors. Here is an example of one of Daylite’s unique features – Daylite Mail Assistant (DMA). Direct Apple Mail integration allows you to take action from your inbox and be more productive. Instead of drowning in emails all day, you and your team can capture all email communication, clear out your inbox and stay on top of the next steps. Save emails related to clients, appointments, and tasks, so you have a full history of conversations in one place. Plus, you can create tasks in Daylite right from Apple Mail.

DMA automatically scans the email addresses in the “To” and “Cc” fields. If the person is a prospect and there is no prior correspondence, with two clicks, you and your team can store that first email as a piece of history in the Daylite database. DMA then searches for additional contacts or objects associated with that prospect. If another person at the prospect’s firm has been in contact about your offer and been identified as an open Opportunity in Daylite, that Opportunity and its related history will appear, allowing you to link it to the most recent prospect.

DMA can also display upcoming Tasks and Appointments with prospects and customers and add new ones if required, providing a handle on deliverables to anyone for your business who needs to know. DMA is only one of the many productivity-boosting power features that thousands of Mac-based small businesses couldn’t do without. To learn more about how Daylite, the made-for-Mac, iPhone & iPad CRM and productivity app, has become a game-changer for Mac-based small businesses. Learn more here.

This week MacSparky is sponsored by Timing. Timing is a time tracking app that automatically records your time and then reviews it later.

Making positive changes in your life requires good data. How much time are you spending doing your work versus planning your work? How much time do you sink into YouTube, Amazon, and the like on an average day? You might think you know these things, but until you run accurate timers, you really don’t know.

That’s where Timing comes in. With Timing, you instantly see how you are spending your time so you can work more productively and make smarter decisions about how to spend your time.

The Timing app makes recording and reviewing your time easy with automatic tracking and a simple interface for adding details about what you did each day so you can see how much time was focused on each task. In addition, you can use Timing to share projects and times across your team while preserving each team member’s privacy.

I use Timing for my time tracking because the data is so good, and catching up is easy. Some days I may forget to log time, but it is trivial for me to tell exactly when I finished one thing and moved on to another with all the Timing data. Want to hear more about how I time track? We covered that on a recent Mac Power Users episode.

I run Timing on my Mac every day, and you should too. I even made some screencasts on how I use Timing. Download the free 14-day trial today and get 10% off for the first year!

One of the nice things about being a small, independent publisher is that I get to be picky about who I allow to sponsor MacSparky.com. This week’s sponsor, Hoban Cards, is one of my favorites. I first met the folks at Hoban Press years ago, when I was tired of handing cheapo business cards out to legal clients. The gang at Hoban helped me make an excellent calling card with their 1902 letterpress machine that every client, upon receiving one, made favorable comments on. (Watch the Hoban letterpress process in action.) First impressions count. My Hoban Cards are excellent ambassadors.

Over the years I bought more legal business cards, then MacSparky cards, and now I have them print my personal stationery. I just love giving quality paper products to other people. Hoban Cards makes the process easy. Just go to Hoban Cards and push a few buttons and then they arrive in the mail.

Evan and the gang at Hoban Cards are entirely dedicated to making the best possible calling cards. They have some beautiful templates to choose from, or you can roll your own.

Put simply, Hoban Cards is where you go for the unique and classy alternative to conventional, mass-produced, soulless business cards. Best of all, use ‘MacSparky’ to get $10 off any order. I’ve been carrying Hoban cards for years and I intend to keep carrying them for the duration. You should too.

How much time are you spending on emails? How much time are you wasting on emails? You know by now that you don’t get time back, but you can at least spend it wisely. Thanks to SaneBox, this week’s sponsor at MacSparky, you can do just that. You don’t have to use your time digging through countless emails in your inbox to figure out what is high priority, what can wait, and what can be deleted. 

So, how is SaneBox going to help you? This is where SaneBox’s AI comes in. SaneBox’s AI pays attention to how you interact with new email in your inbox. You’ll train SaneBox and it will learn how to handle your new emails automatically and filter unimportant emails out of your inbox. It’s not just time you’re freeing up. In terms of productivity, think about the mental space you’re freeing up that allows you to focus on the important things, and not get distracted by unimportant or low-priority emails that you can deal with later.  

Get through your inbox quickly. Get more productive. Get SaneBox. Sign up for your free trial, and you’ll get a $10 credit you can use towards a SaneBox subscription.

I’m often asked about the distinction between task lists and calendars. Some folks track tasks in an app. Others do so in a calendar. I get asked where I fall, and my answer is always both. I track tasks in an app, but I block time in my calendar to make sure the most critical tasks on that list get done. It is at that intersection between your task list and the calendar blocks that progress is made.

If you have an overflowing task list but a sense of dread about making any progress on your most important project, this technique can help you. Find one project that is important to you and block some time this week to make some progress on it. This isn’t rocket science, but does take some discipline. Nevertheless, that practice of calendaring time for the big things actually moves the needle.

And on the subject of moving the needle, you should check out this week’s sponsor, Daylite. For small businesses, it can be challenging to stay on top of clients, leads, and projects that are evolving every day. Here’s how Daylite can help supercharge your team to shine brighter, handle more clients, close more deals, and execute more projects. Designed for Mac, iPhone, and iPad exclusively. 

Daylite empowers small businesses by improving team efficiency and making collaboration easy—everything is organized, searchable, and accessible (even offline). You can easily access information and segment data tailored to your specific client’s history. You can manage and share everyone’s schedules, project status, and next steps.

Not only does Daylite make the best Mac CRM software, but they also let me use this sponsored post to write about being more productive. If you live by the Mac, you’ll love Daylite. Start your free 30-day Daylite trial today!

This week MacSparky is sponsored by DEVONthink. There are a lot of ways to manage a database on your mac, but in my opinion, there is no better tool than DEVONthink. Just a few of the things I use DEVONthink for include:

• A reliable repository of research documents. DEVONthink will hold as many documents as you can throw at it. In addition, it makes import (and export) easy, so you can have all that power without feeling trapped.
• A research assistant. DEVONthink uses artificial intelligence to analyze and connect your documents in ways that may not otherwise occur to you.
• An OCR Tool. Everything you store in your DEVONthink Pro library gets OCR’d. It just happens.
• An Automation Tool. DEVONthink lets you build powerful automation subroutines into your library to help tag, move, and organize documents.

As a lawyer, DEVONthink was my legal research assistant. I dumped legal cases, statutes, regulations, and law review articles in DEVONthink and whenever I worked on a thorny problem I let DEVONthink grind on the documents before I did. It is spooky what DEVONthink could find for me. You could also do the same with all of your personal records. Dump them into a DEVONthink database and let DEVONthink sort it for you.

DEVONthink supports multiple sync methods and lets you even use your own sync password, so everything is encrypted. If you’ve got an iPad or an iPhone, you can access your DEVONthink data there, too, with DEVONthink to Go.

It is this combination of power and security that makes DEVONthink the clear winner. You can think of DEVONthink as your paperless office. You can automate your workflow from capture to filing, editing to publishing. It stores all your documents, helps you keep them organized, and presents you with what you need to get the job done.

Interested? MacSparky readers can get a 20% discount on DEVONthink. This is a limited-time offer, so check it out now.

My thanks to MacSparky’s sponsor this week, SaneBox. One of SaneBox’s nifty features is that it can keep your email attachments in the cloud. If you’ve got Dropbox, Google Drive, Box, Evernote, or IBM Smart Cloud, any attachments that come through your email account can be automatically uploaded to your favorite cloud service with SaneBox’s SaneAttachments feature.

Some attachments, especially larger ones, can be trouble. They can fill up your storage or be hard to find. Some take too long to download and forward, especially if you’re using a mobile device. SaneAttachments solves these problems by automatically moving your file attachments from incoming emails and organizing your attachments, making it easy to find. And you can still forward these emails as you normally would, or you can send someone the link to the attachment. This way, you can keep your inbox fit and trim and make sure that only important email stays, and you can still find and get your files when you need them.

You can try SaneBox out for yourself. Use this link to sign up for a free trial and get a $10 credit you can use towards a SaneBox subscription.