BitDepth#1486
Mark Lyndersay
IT SHOULDN'T surprise you that Apple encourages its developers to create software that works on all its current devices.
A year ago, I jumped to an all-Apple device ecosystem after years of managing a hybrid environment. For me, that's a Mac laptop, an iPad, an iPhone, and an Apple Watch.
Most recently, Apple introduced iPhone Mirroring, which allows you to use a virtual representation of your iPhone on the Mac desktop. Apparently frivolous, until you realise you can copy text off the virtualised OS and paste it into an app on the desktop.
Many of Apple's own apps work seamlessly across all these devices, but not always in the ways you might expect.
I track my lap swimming on an Apple Watch, which displays only general information about activity, but uploads more detailed statistics when it connects to an iPhone.
There it appears in the Fitness app. Oddly, on an iPad the data shows up in the Health app, because on iPad the Fitness app is a portal for paid exercise videos.
And there is no way to see this information on MacOS.
So, by Apple's own yardstick, an app that shares usable data across three devices is acceptable, one that synchronises with four is a distinct winner.
Several regulars make the cut easily. Pages, my word processor of choice, is available everywhere except for the watch, which would make no sense at all.
Evernote has its own synchronisation system that adds deeper database capabilities, but there is no use case for its data collection on a watch face.
Microsoft To Do was already in use on all my devices before the watch got added to the mix, and the implementation there is clutter free and clear. I can mark items done directly on my wrist, though I'm unlikely to create a to-do task there.
If you want to ramp up your list-making capacity across an all-Apple ecosystem, you have other choices. Long-standing task organiser Things is available everywhere, though it just shows the Today list on the watch.
Structured takes a different approach, mixing calendar planning with task lists drawn from the native Calendar and Reminder apps.
It all feels a little new-age, with a strong implication throughout the design and encouragements that the goal is less about getting things done than managing work-life balance. The company avoids hard descriptions like to-do lists in favour of the much softer "day-planner."
Like Things, it can synchronise with instances of itself across all Apple's consumer hardware.
Structured taps into Apple's iCloud data transfer system and rides on the existing synchronisation capabilities of the Calendar and Reminder apps. It also offers a private cloud synchronisation option, like Things, which bypasses Apple's iCloud data exchange.
Is there an advantage to this?
It's necessary for apps like Structured, Evernote and Microsoft To Do, which exchange their data with instances on other platforms.
Apps that use iCloud natively, such as Pages, Keynote and the Safari browser support HandOff, are part of a la
