Federico Viticci

Editor-in-chief

Mastodon: @viticci@macstories.netEmail: viticci@macstories.net

Federico is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of MacStories, where he writes about Apple with a focus on apps, developers, iPad, and iOS productivity. He founded MacStories in April 2009 and has been writing about Apple since. Federico is also the co-host of AppStories, a weekly podcast exploring the world of apps, and Dialog, a show where creativity meets technology.

He can also be found on his two other podcasts on Relay FM – Connected and Remaster.

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449 — January 18, 2025

Importing GoodLinks Articles Into Readwise Reader via the API

Federico

SHORTCUTS CORNER

Get help and suggestions for your iOS shortcuts and productivity apps.

Shortcuts Essentials

Importing GoodLinks Articles Into Readwise Reader via the API

Federico

I know, I know.

A few months ago, I wrote about finally having found the read-later app I’d been looking for in GoodLinks, a fantastic native experience for Apple platforms that supports highlights, has extensive Shortcuts actions, and integrates with widgets on both the Home and Lock Screens. The problem was, the more I used GoodLinks, the more I realized I had miscalculated something: I rely on Readwise Reader’s text-to-speech to listen to articles while I’m driving more than I thought.

449 — January 18, 2025

Interesting Links

INTERESTING LINKS

Great reads and links from around the web.

John

Antonio Di Benedetto’s story for The Verge about giant gaming handhelds has big NPC energy. Di Benedetto combined an ASUS Flow Z13 and GameSir G8 Plus controller into a ridiculously large gaming tablet. (Link)

Kashmir Hill, writing for The New York Times, profiles a woman who spends over 20 hours per week in ChatGPT, which she considers her AI boyfriend. (Link)

449 — January 18, 2025

App Debuts

APP DEBUTS

Noteworthy new app releases and updates, handpicked by the MacStories team.

Federico

Explode‎

I wouldn’t be surprised if Explode turns out to be the next viral iPhone app, or at the very least, a utility that will be acquired by Meta, Apple, or Snap. It’s an iPhone/iMessage app combo that lets you send self-destructing (thus the name) texts to your friends using Messages. You can set a timer for texts and photos that will only be viewed once and then explode into a pile of pixelated squares. Every interaction in the app is well-crafted and cleverly aimed at encouraging you to purchase the full experience by leveraging your social graph. I could see this sort of functionality being baked directly into iMessage at some point.

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448 — January 11, 2025

Funnel →

Federico

MACSTORIES RECOMMENDS

Great apps, accessories, gear, and media recommended by the MacStories team.

Funnel

Federico

In my quest to find the easiest, fastest, and most reliable way to append text to a section of my daily note in Obsidian, I want to highlight an app that I’ve been using with great success over my holiday break: Funnel, created by indie developer Dharam Kapila.

Funnel has been around for a while, but it received a major 2.0 update just before Christmas, which prompted me to take it for a spin again, and I was impressed. At a high level, Funnel feels like what would happen if the original version of Drafts came out in 2025. It’s an app that lets you jot down ideas and notes and quickly send them off to a list of predefined destinations. The app is organized into two main tabs: Destinations, where you can set up compatible apps and services that can receive data from Funnel, and Capture, where you’re presented with different options to save your ideas.

448 — January 11, 2025

Interesting Links

INTERESTING LINKS

Great reads and links from around the web.

Federico

Cupertino is a new Obsidian theme designed to give the app a native and minimal experience on Apple platforms. I may consider switching to it if they ever add Minimal Theme-like cards for Dataview tables. (Link)

After years of using Raindrop.io to save shopping links, HeyDingus’ Jarrod Blundy writes about his decision to switch to Apple Notes. (Link)

448 — January 11, 2025

App Debuts

APP DEBUTS

Noteworthy new app releases and updates, handpicked by the MacStories team.

Federico

Gazzetta

This new app by indie developer Oliver White wants to simplify the process of finding trending links on Mastodon. You can either follow servers and individual accounts or log in with your own account to find links from your timeline. Then, you can add those links to your favorites, bookmarks, or a built-in reading list. The app is very young and lacks an iPad version, but it’s one worth keeping an eye on over the coming weeks as more and more people and organizations migrate away from Meta services.

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447 — December 21, 2024

Quickly Appending Notes to My Obsidian Daily Note with Drafts

Federico

TIPS

Tips and tricks to master your apps and be more productive.

Quickly Appending Notes to My Obsidian Daily Note with Drafts

Federico

As I will share in the final AppStories episode of the year next week, one of the projects I will tackle over the holidays is spending more time with Obsidian again, fine-tuning the daily note template I teased a while back and optimizing the app for writing and note-taking with automation. Hopefully, this will result in a completely revamped Obsidian setup that will be my focus in MacStories Weekly and the Automation Academy for the first months of 2025.

In the meantime, I’m building my new Obsidian workflow step by step, identifying specific areas that could use new shortcuts, plugins, and, broadly speaking, faster ways to enter text and save ideas.