Just Tweet It!

SimplyTweet (US$4.99) is a beautiful creation straight from the ingenious developers that are MotionObj. This app not just another iPhone Twitter client. This app is a well thought out masterpiece of Twitter perfection. SimplyTweet is not a simple iPhone app. It is simple to use, but, 'under the hood' this app is an intricate piece of coding.

The main screen is presented in tab form, with five tabs at the bottom of the screen for friends, mentions, direct messages and more! These can be customised to suit your needs. For example, being the Twitterer that I am, I absolutely love being able to see what is currently trending. This is a feature that is not possible in many of the other Twitter clients available for iPhone. Twitter timeline updates are presented in a column under the "friends" tab, and you are automatically placed at the last tweet you have viewed, to catch up on anything you may have missed. New tweets are also marked with a blue dot (like that found next to unwatched movies in iTunes). Tapping a tweet shows it in a larger form, with options like retweeting, replying, posting a link to the tweet, emailing a link, and tracking the conversation that the tweet is part of (if available).

SimplyTweet has five various themes that can be applied to suit your style. (Personally, I don't like the pink template - black is more my style.) SimplyTweet also incorporates a much-needed feature that is lacking in many other Twitter clients, Push Notifications. Of course, push notifications are only sent for mentions and direct messages. A smart move by MotionObj, I must say. (Seriously, imagine getting notified for each individual tweet in your timeline. Not a pretty sight.)



SimplyTweet garners a handy 'new tweet' button at the top right of the screen, to make it easy to blast out a new update. A character count, and a handy hash symbol shortcut are also present. You can also insert your current location, based on your iPhone's GPS signal, or typing in landscape mode if you wish. There is also support for URL shorteners, text shortening, and photo and video uploading. And just in case you want to don't want to tweet just yet, you can save it for later as a draft.

While viewing a user's profile, you can see their picture (full screen!), check their following/followers count, as well as their update totals and favourite tweets. Perhaps most useful of all, SimplyTweet allows you to follow people straight from the app. Speaking about doing things straight from the app, any links you find in your timeline can be opened directly within the app, so you can come back without hassle.

For people with multiple Twitter accounts (myself included), you can easily switch accounts by hitting the username at the top of the screen, provided they have been set up correctly, which is a breeze. If you have a HootSuite Account, you can import your Twitter profiles directly from that, although I don't have one, so this feature remained untested.



All in all, SimplyTweet is your dream Twitter client for iPhone, and with a new update being rolled out the day of this review, my favourite Twitter client just keeps getting better. Without further ado, I proudly present SimplyTweet with the holy grail of ratings. Well done, MotionObj.

MyAppSource Rating: Five Stars!

Just Awesome!

Awesome Note (US$4.99) is another organisation and time management based application, with a similar premise to Put Things Off. Awesome Note has been created (by BRID) to help you poor souls with time management issues be able to run your lives a little smoother. The idea is good, the purpose is solid and the menus and options are very useful. So what is it that makes me feel that this app isn't as good as is iTunes reviews may state?

I have been thinking about that question for a while and I think I may come to a conclusion. I believe that this application has tried too hard to do everything an organisation application could possibly need to do and this has led to the app having too many features. You're probably thinking to yourself "Man, I love tacos." But, if you were actually pating attention you would be wondering how can too many features possibly be a problem, well, let me show you through the magical powers of words.

First of all, this app is supposed be a time saver and make note taking quick and easy. With all the options, like the ability to colour coordinate absolutely everything, modify any (and every) image, change fonts at will, modify note backgrounds and alter the note category order, by the time you have tested these you will have spent 15 minutes playing around with features instead of writing any notes! What's worse is that these features have minimal effect on the usefullness and effectiveness of taking a simple note.

Second of all, people who are time poor will be attracted to this app because they need all the organisation help they can get. These people have a tendancy to waste time on trivial tasks and often procrastinate to the nth degree. Awesome Note enables them to do this, while giving them the impression that they are solving their time management issues, which they clearly are not!

In all honesty, Awesome Note is a solid and useful note taking application, that is, until all the features steal half an hour of your precious time. The layout is great and aesthetically it is gorgeous. If this app was a little simpler (aka had a little less features) and did not focus so much on changing settings it would be excellent. This wouldn't be the first note taking app I would recommend, but all those high iTunes ratings can't be wrong. If too many features are never enough for you, then I strongly suggest you purchase this app.

MyAppSource Rating: 3 Stars!