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Todd Plants
Don’t fight the power. Be the power.
My 2015 Homescreen
M.G. Siegler
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My 2016 Home Screen

Inspired by M.G. Siegler, I reorganized my homescreen to focus on my most used apps and am now posting it to the Mediums because I am ridiculous.

The rundown:

  • Wallet. Apple Pay, Starbucks card, etc.
  • Calendar. We use Google Apps calendar for work, but the stock app here seems pretty good. Not sure I need 17 services monitoring my inbox for potential appointments, tho.
  • Photos. I really like iCloud Photos Library. I’m interested in using Google Photos too, but Google’s focus on lo-res versions of the images makes me leery. Makes it a photo-sharing tool, not a photo library tool.
  • Camera. Best camera phone makes the best photos. I need to take more.
  • Apple Notes. Switched from Evernote after the iOS 9 update, on David Pogue’s recommendation.
  • 1Password. I have nearly 400 passwords in my vault. I couldn’t keep them straight without a top-notch password manager.
  • Maps. I rarely use Google Maps. Don’t tell all the other hipsters. (Actually, the Siri integration is killer.)
  • Weather. I check the temperature almost every day before leaving the house…so at like noon.
  • Kindle. I read almost everything as an ebook now — mostly on iPad but on my phone on the train from time to time as well. Amazon gets my business because of their advanced sharing features. Tracy and I can essentially share one library.
  • Duolingo. I got pretty good with Italian before our trip this summer but have fallen out of practice. I want to pick it back up and maybe add another language. Chinese?
  • MapMyRide. Used for biking and running. Annoyed to learn recently that the Apple Watch app is only available through MapMyRun. Seems a little silly to have different apps anyway.
  • Health. I like tracking all my numbers. Helped me lose 20 pounds last year.
  • ESPN. Scores. Highlights. News. Even full game streaming.
  • Apple News. A good way to find something to read. This will be a theme.
  • NYT Now. The best news coverage in a streamlined app. I’ve also appreciate deep links to the NYT website opening in the full NYT apps.
  • Medium. This has become another good source of interesting reading material. I hope to write more here too.
  • Messages. The vast majority of my friends are on iPhones, so iMessage is the way to go for most personal messaging.
  • Slack. We’re switching to Slack at work. I already want to build my own bot.
  • Hangouts. There are still a few Gchat holdouts at work. Looking at you, Ryan Aquilina.
  • Messenger. My sister doesn’t do iMessage. My mom is on Android. My dad doesn’t have a smart phone (!). Facebook Messenger is the common denominator.
  • Twitter. My most used app, staying connected with the news and finding interesting things to read.
  • Facebook. I do wish I could just get the unfiltered feed from my friends permanently. It would make Facebook more useful to me.
  • Instagram. I read a post once that said you should look at Instagram first thing every morning because it would be nearly impossible to do so and not get happy.
  • Tumblr. Home to Song of the Day and another good way to find good stuff to read.

Dock

  • Phone. Unlike a lot of iPhone users, I’m on the phone for hours every work day. Never leaving my dock.
  • Inbox by Google. I’m a recent convert from the Gmail app. Inbox is just sooooooo much faster. It’s great for email triage.
  • Safari. Probably my second most used app. Again looking for interesting things to read.
  • Apple Music. Call me crazy but I still like it. Beats 1 is great, though I wish they had a UK indie rock power hour. And I love having new streaming albums sitting side by side with the last 25 years of my music.