Software Saturday: Groceries

This week's selection is an app I use nearly every day.  Groceries, as the name implies, allows you to organize your grocery list on your iOS device.

Prior to purchasing this app, my wife & I usually kept a Post It notepad in our kitchen and would add items to it throughout the week as we'd run out of products around the house.  It was a decidedly low-tech solution, but mostly met our needs.  The problem arose when we wanted to add an item to the list when we weren't nearby, or when we decided to run to the grocery store but didn't have the list with us in the car.

Groceries addresses both of those issues.  Since I always have my phone with me, I can add items on the fly, regardless of my current location.  Further, if my wife decides she'll run to the store instead of me, I can e-mail the list from my phone to her phone.

The application comes preloaded with thousands of brands of items, ranging from Tabasco Green Pepper Sauce to Snuggle Original Scent dryer sheets.  If an item doesn't already exist in the app's database, you can add new ones as needed.  Items can be marked as favorites if you frequently purchase the same ones.  This allows you to quickly add those items to your new grocery list.  The products on your list are organized by the grocery store aisle most likely to contain the item.  I've found this really speeds up my shopping process since I'm not continuously scanning the entire list looking for which items might be in my current aisle.

Earlier this week, Groceries updated to a new version with support for the iPhone 4's high resolution Retina Display and fast app switching.  The design of the app was gorgeous before, but it really pops off the screen in the new version.

You can read more about the app and find the download link at the developer's website below:

http://www.sophiestication.com/groceries/

Favorite App For Week Ending 8/6: Pixelpipe

This week's selection is a handy utility to work around a limitation in iOS 4.  While the iPhone 4 is touted as being able to shoot 720p video, actually getting that video off the device in HD resolution isn't as simple as you might expect.

If you upload a video to YouTube directly from your phone's Camera Roll, the video is compressed before uploading.  There are 2 ways around this.  First, you can connect your iPhone 4 to your computer, and export the file manually (via Image Capture or iPhoto in OS X) to get the video in its full resolution.  The second option is Pixelpipe.

This service allows you to export your photos & videos to all the major social networks & photo/video sharing sites.  The truly notable aspect of their iPhone app, however, is that it will export your 720p videos in full resolution...all wirelessly from your phone.

I've been utilizing this solution to push my iPhone 4 720p videos to YouTube for the past several weeks.  It works just as advertised.

The Pixelpipe service & iOS app are both free.  A Pixelpipe account is required before you can link your social media accounts to the app.

You can sign up & find the link to the app at Pixelpipe's site:

http://pixelpipe.com

Hat tip to Gizmodo for the news:

http://gizmodo.com/5577354/pixelpipe-uploads-hd-videos-straight-from-your-iphone

Favorite App For Week Ending 7/30: Penultimate

I bought this app in preparation for the TEDxHouston conference last month, but have really started using it more & more in my daily notetaking at the office.

Penultimate is essentially an electronic sketchpad app for the iPad.  It allows you to create & store multiple notebooks, each with as many pages as you need.

You can write notes directly onto the iPad's screen with your finger, however I opted to pick up a Pogo Sketch Stylus from the Apple Store and have been rather pleased with the results.  This makes for a more natural "pencil-to-paper" feel when you're writing.

Working with the foam-tipped stylus, I find it's best to write bigger on each virtual page within the notebook, since small letters aren't as precisely interpreted by the app.  Yes, you'll end up with more pages in your notebook if you write bigger, but they're virtual pages.

Perhaps my favorite feature is that you can e-mail your notes directly from the app.  If the note you want to send is only a single page, it will export as a PNG file.  If you want to send an entire multi-page notebook, it will export as a PDF file.  I utilize this feature to backup my notes to Google Docs.

TUAW has a more in-depth review here:

http://www.tuaw.com/2010/04/19/tuaw-review-write-and-organize-handwritten-notes-on-your-ipad-w/

For more information from the developer, check out their site below:

http://www.cocoabox.com/