Personal Productivity Apps
By James Marwood
1Password
We all hopefully know the advice about good password security - using
complex password with a mixture of letters, numbers and symbols and making
sure not to use the same password on multiple sites. However this is
impossible to remember, especially when so many sites have different
requirements for both username and password. This is where password
managers come in. They use a secure achieve to store all your passwords and
will generate secure ones for you automatically. No more trying to remember
the password to a site, it’s just there when you need it. 1Password is my
favourite but there are several excellent alternatives, including LastPass. Most
are available for all the major platforms.
TextExpander
Another gem of an app, available for MacOS and iOS but with excellent alternatives on
other platforms. TextExpander is a really simple idea, but very powerful in execution.
It allows you to create snippets, small combinations of text which are then replaced by
a larger set. For example if I were to type bartmail TextExander would automatically
replace that with a standard email I send to people looking for more information on
Bartitsu. I use smaller snippets to create things like the longform date, or for adding
different signatures to emails. It can even include images or prompts to customise the
text. TextExpander saves me hours every week and it normally the first thing I install
on a new computer.
There are many other great tools out there, and especially for platforms I don’t use. Please do let us
know if there are others I should consider or you think are worth sharing, and we’ll include these in
future articles or podcasts.
Stay Productive
BUSINESS GENTLEMAN
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