Ask any of my friends and they’ll tell you I love gadgets and technology. I definitely have techno joy. Here are a few of the apps that I use on a daily basis.

Evernote

It took me a while to fully appreciate the power of Evernote. The trick is to use it for everything, that way it will “remember everything.” I use it to clip web pages, save screenshots, take notes during phone calls, keep track of hotel and air reservations, write rough drafts, take pictures of parking spaces and WiFi passwords. If I have a burst of inspiration I make a quick note that I can flesh out later.

Once you get into the habit of putting everything into Evernote it becomes natural. Then if you want to find anything the search box gets you there instantly. All of your text is searchable – even text that is in photos.

I also use the Evernote app on my iPhone. I use my laptop to do research and take notes. Then if I’m out and about I can easily see my notes right on my phone. I use this almost every day.

Click here to learn more about Evernote.

Blogo

This little app is good, not great. It’s an app that allows me to create blog posts while I’m offline. I’m using it to write this post right now. It syncs to unlimited WordPress and Blogger sites so it makes updating multiple blogs a breeze.

It’s the best offline blog editor I’ve found for Mac, but it doesn’t hold a candle to Blogjet for Windows. I used Blogjet for years until I switched from Windows to Mac, it’s one of the only apps I miss. If you are a Windows user skip Blogo and get Blogjet.

Blogo allows you to create and preview posts offline. It’s great for writing text, but it’s not much good when trying to format photos and embedded videos. For a lot of posts I end up finishing online in the WordPress editor because I can’t tell what’s happening in Blogo.

There is no category dropdown box when creating posts either, there is a very limited “category and #tags” section but you have to know what the categories are beforehand.

Adding an embedded YouTube video is very easy, just click a button and you’re done, you can see it in this video that I just added (with one click).

 

One of the strengths of Blogo is the ability to set up your featured image dimensions and allow it do to all the hard work for you. I really like the featured image functionality of this app.

Once Blogo has a categories dropdown list and better functionality for formating photos, it will be on par with Blogjet and other Windows apps. It’s not perfect, but it is the best blogging app I’ve found for mac.

One more note: Blogo and Evernote work together. If you want to use Evernote to write your drafts and then finish them up in Blogo, you can.

Click here to learn more about Blogo.

OmniFocus

This is a to-do list on steroids. Omnifocus allows you to create tasks and then slice and dice them exactly how you want. You can set taks by project or by context. Context sensitive tasks are fantastic. A context can be things you do while online at home, or while you’re at the grocery store, work, home, or Home Depot.

Tasks are also time and date sensitive. Omnifocus integrates with your calendars and you can even add functionality to mark e-mails as tasks and have them show up in Omnifocus.

Omnifocus can be tailored to work exactly how you want it to work. You can set up custom filters to show specific tasks, this will help you tackle the important things and not be distracted by the urgent things.

FranklinCovey fans will love Omnifocus. I used a Franklin planner for over a decade and finally gave it up when I was forced to use Outlook during my years working at Intel. Omnifocus is the first app I’ve seen that delievers the same time manegement benefits as my trusty Franklin planner.

Click here to learn more about Omnifocus.

HMA Pro – VPN

I travel all over the world and have learned that Netflix in the USA isn’t the same as Netflix in South America. I’ve also learned the Facebook and Twitter are censored, or unavailable, in some places.

I mentioned this to my friend Craig and he said, “You need Hide My Ass!” Excuse me? What did you say? Yes, it’s called Hide My Ass, or HMA if you want to be polite. It’s a VPN service that allows you to connect to servers in the USA (and other parts of the world) and then surf the web as if you were actually in that place.

It’s simple, I open HMA and log in to a server in the USA. Then I surf away and every site thinks I’m in the USA. This gives me access to Netflix, Hulu, and social media sites that may not be availble in the country where I’m staying.

Another benefit, you can log in to countries all over the world. Want to see what movies are availabe in Mexico that haven’t arrived in the USA? You can do that now. Hint: I’ve already seen all of Better Call Saul and it hasn’t hit the USA Netflix page yet.

Click here to learn more about HMA PRO.

Featured Image courtesy: Alexis Kathryn.