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More updates for macOS, iOS 10, watchOS 3 & tvOS.

Some minor changes to Mail on the Mac and iOS, some big changes to Maps on iOS and a first look at setting up Home Automation with HomeKit and the new Home App on iPad and iPhone.

Tap Forms 5 is an extremely capable database application for the Mac, iPad and iPhone. 



Rather relying on spreadsheets to store your data, Tap Forms 5 gives you the additional power of multiple database "documents" and forms, as well as the ability to create useful layouts to both view and enter your data. 



All of your data is stored locally making it perfect for offline use, with the added advantage of a robust syncing mechanism provided by IBM.



Todd Olthoff takes us through the core features of this newly updated app.

A new presenter for this week - Mike Schmitz.

Mike is a productivity wizard and takes us through some of the first principles of being productive on your Mac and iOS device - how to effortlessly capture thoughts, ideas, tasks and reference files for later action.

We’ve covered BusyCal before but the Mac version has had a big upgrade and they’ve recently released a brand new iOS version of BusyCal too!



BusyCal has for a long time been one of the premier calendaring applications for the Mac, and with the introduction of the new iOS version, you can now also use BusyCal to manage your calendars via your iPad and iPhone.

The iOS App will work completely independently from the Mac app, as it uses your iCloud calendar data as well as supporting integration with Google Calendar, Exchange and more. So you don’t need both the Mac and iOS app, you can use either or both. The underlying calendar data is also accessible from your standard Mac and iOS Calendar apps.



In this episode, Todd Olthoff gives you a refresher on the existing features of BusyCal on the Mac and take a look at some of the brand new features, as well as taking a look at the new iOS app on the iPad.


In this episode, Todd Olthoff takes a look at some sample workflows to automate the capture and manipulation of digital files using some of our favourite tools - Hazel & DEVONthink Pro. He also takes a look at a great iOS app that allows you to scan and process documents directly on your iOS device - Scanner Pro 7

Airmail is not a new email app, but with the advent of Airmail 3 for the Mac and Airmail 1.1 for the iPad and iPhone, it’s actually a very robust and feature packed alternative to the standard Apple Mail client.



In this second and final tutorial, I take a look at some of the more advanced features as well as customising Airmail on both OS X and iOS
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Airmail is not a new email app, but with the advent of Airmail 3 for the Mac and Airmail 1.1 for the iPad and iPhone, it’s actually a very robust and feature packed alternative to the standard Apple Mail client.



In this first of a two part series, I take a look at setting up Airmail with an iCloud account and a Gmail account, followed up by a look at some of its basic features. 



In two weeks, (SCOM0563), I’ll take a look at some of the more advanced features and customising Airmail.

LiquidText is a unique app for the iPad that allows you to read and annotate your documents in a completely new way.

No longer constrained by the inflexibility of scrolling through pages and pages of documents, with a few simple gestures you can annotate and “scrunch” sections together. It’s difficult to explain, but so simple when you see it in action!


Following on from the previous episode, I take a look at some of the more advanced aspects of Slack including installing and configuring some sample integrations, as well as building and configuring Teams. 



Slack is a great way to centralise your communications, all within a single app. Slack also integrates with over 80 web services making it as flexible or as powerful as you want.

In this episode, I take a look at integrations with services we’ve previously looked at on ScreenCastsOnline - Dropbox, Twitter, Trello and Airtable.

 I also show you how you can request an automated invitation to the SCO Demo Slack team and try it out for yourself!

Email is great but sometimes Slack is better!

Slack is a collaboration tool that allows you to message, chat and share files. It also integrates with most of the top online services making it a great way for everyone, from small teams to large organisations, to communicate and collaborate. 

With support for multiple teams, all your communications can be centralised within a single app.

Text expansion is one of the best ways to increase your productivity. Just type abbreviated keywords and have them expand into words, sentences, paragraphs or whole pages of text. Expand into images or formatted text, or use fill in snippets to prompt you to complete boilerplate text. These are just some of the options available using TextExpander and other text expansion utilities.



In this episode, we take a look at the newly released TextExpander 6 as well as some other alternative apps.


Ulysses is a fantastic plain text editor for the Mac, iPad and iPhone. It allows you to create plain text documents or “sheets” and use markdown formatting to control the final look and format of your writing. PDF, ePub, HTML, Text, DOCX and even publishing to Medium are all included in this great app, giving you ultimate control of your writing.

As well as a wealth of formatting and exporting capabilities, Ulysses takes away the pain of managing your documents across all your devices. All your sheets are contained in a single Ulysses library, that syncs amazingly well with iCloud. It will even allow you to edit external files from a multitude of sources.

Please note that Ulysses has moved to a subscription service as of August 2017

Ulysses is a fantastic text editor for the Mac, iPad and iPhone. It allows you to create plain text documents or “sheets” and use markdown formatting to control the styling of your documents, allowing you to export them in a multitude of formats. 

It's really simple to export to PDF, ePub, HTML, Text, DOCX and even publish direct to Medium from the Mac, iPad or iPhone. 

As well as the wealth of formatting and exporting capabilities, Ulysses takes away the pain of managing your documents across all your devices. All your sheets are contained in a single Ulysses library, that syncs amazingly well with iCloud. It will even allow you to edit external files from a multitude of sources.

This first episode focuses on the basic principles of Ulysses and we will follow up in the next episode with a look at some of its more advanced features.

Update: As of August 2017, Ulysses has changed to a subscription model.

Notability is a fantastic note taking app for the iPad, iPhone and now the Mac.

It has excellent stylus support for hand-written notes and typed notes, including a unique "Zoom" feature. You can sketch drawings and annotations, type notes, and even audio record lectures and other events that stay timed with your notes. 

Editing your hand-written notes is easy because they're all vectors. This means with the swipe of an eraser, you can erase large or small sections of words or sketches, and moving or changing colour and line thickness is a snap.

An iPad Pro with Apple Pencil is not required, but it makes Notability even more natural and useful.

And now with a new Mac App and iCloud syncing, you can now access all of your notes across all of your devices.


In this episode I cover the basics of Copy and Paste.

Starting with the basic built in keyboard commands, to an easy way to copy and paste using the Mouse or Trackpad with PopClip, finishing off with a look at one of the best clipboard managers I’ve seen for a long time - Copied.


Airtable is an amazing cloud based database app that runs in your browser as well as natively on your iPhone and iPad (with an Android app on the way). Being cloud based, it’s truly cross platform and updates are synchronised almost instantaneously across all platforms and devices.

Best of all, there is a generous free version, it’s really easy to use and it’s extremely powerful!

Together 3 for the Mac, and Together Mobile for iOS are apps that allow you to collect and organise all your stuff - together!



With a multitude of capture and organisational features, Together 3 acts as a repository for many different types of files and documents. With the App Store version, it allows you to store your Together 3 library in iCloud, allowing you to sync it across your Macs and also your iOS devices using Together Mobile.

It takes a lot to impress me, but I’ve been blown away by Airtable! 



Airtable is an amazing cloud based database app that runs in your browser, and has native iPhone, iPad Apps (with Android apps on the way). Being cloud based, it’s truly cross platform and synchronises across all your devices almost instantaneously.

There is a fully featured free version, it’s really easy to use and it’s extremely powerful!

The first episode for 2016 and I take a look at a great tool for organising and planning - Trello.

Time for an update on two of my favourite productivity applications - TextExpander 5 and Keyboard Maestro 7