The New Big Screencast, OS X Tips, Edition Two: Organize Your Apps
Whew! That took a little longer than I had intended. Three weeks… oy! Well, better late than never.
Welcome to Screencast Number Two: a 15-minute look at the various ways to organize your applications in OS X. Just like the first screencast, this one is aimed at switchers and other Mac newcomers, so I tried to strike the right balance of explaining enough while not insulting your intelligence. I’m happy to hear any feedback about how I did either in the comments here or at stuart@thenewbig.com
I used ScreenFlow to record this ‘cast, so if you’re interested in my further thoughts on the screencasting process, I’ll include them in the full post (click the ellipses, if you’re on the home page). Enjoy!
Show notes
- The three methods I looked at for organizing my applications were to use folders, Spotlight Comments, or standalone applications.
- Lifehacker article Tags: Metadata as a ‘filing system’, by Nick Santilli, discusses how to use Quicksilver and Spotlight Comments to organize your files.
- Punakea provides a complete tagging interface for applications.
- DockFun lets you swap in customized docks or just use the menu bar icon to access your apps.
- DragThing is a very powerful and flexible organizer that lets you access applications both online and on your computer.
- TabMeister is a simple slide drawer for files.
- Leap is a very interesting and powerful program for drilling down through large file libraries quickly and easily.
I’ll bet I missed some good software. I know I forgot to mention using Smart Folders. Anything else? Leave me a comment.
Things I learned this time:
- My workflow was basically the one I described in the after-post for the first screencast. However, I used ScreenFlow as my recording app this time. ScreenFlow is amazing, and once I had tried the demo, I couldn’t see going back to a less-capable app. That decision probably cost me a few hours during the creation process just to learn how to set up and use everything for the new workflow.
- I didn’t zoom in far enough most of the time. Once the movie was resized to fit the website, much of the text was too small. Sigh. I’ll make it better next time.
- I liked using NoteTaker to handle the display of my notes, but it was a little unwieldy to keep up with clicking through the notes and displaying them properly on the screen. I’ll refine that, too, for next time.
- I probably could have cut this into three 5-minute segments. I think I do okay keeping things moving for about 80% of the ‘cast, but I’m pretty sure shorter shows will still be better.
- I discovered this cool little online aspect ratio calculator to help me figure the values for re-sizing the movie.
Hey, thanks, Robert. I appreciate the compliment.
To be fair, I haven’t tried iShowU, but now that I’ve used and paid for ScreenFlow, it’s going to be hard for me to use something else. I really, really like the creative options that ScreenFlow gives me in post-production, and I love the results. Plus, if I can stick with it for a while, I hope that the whole process will get shorter and easier.
Great screencast. I’ve been pondering and trying out new systems for app organization. I think you did a great job of quickly showing all of the possible solutions this can be achieved from both free and non-free sources.
The screencast quality itself was also very clear and easy to watch. You had my attention the whole way through.
Do you prefer Screenflow now over iShowU?
Thanks and keep it up!