Adobe Ideas is a brand new free iPhone and iPad app, one that’s intended as a general purpose creative notebook, integrating sketches, images and a pretty amazing color scheming tool that can use either photos taken from the iPhone’s camera or any images in your library as its source.

User Interface

I wanted to start off by saying that this app has one of the best UIs I’ve ever come across in an iPhone app. And, surprisingly, it manages to achieve this using an interface that doesn’t feel very “Apple.”

Flat buttons and sliding menus make everything about this app feel smooth as butter and oh-so-responsive. I found myself eager to create new ideas, organize them, and then delete them just for the pleasure of interacting with the app’s various menus and buttons. Other developers should take note; doing something original like Adobe’s done here can pay off hugely in terms of differentiating your application from thousands of copy-cats.

Usefulness

Enough crowing about how great the interface is. Just how usable is the app in actual real-world situations? Well, it’s honestly not really much more than an embellished drawing app, but it’s great at that. It has changeable brush sizes and opacity, a color picker, and the ability to add photo layers underneath your existing drawings, or to draw on top of existing photos. It doesn’t have some of the bells and whistles of some dedicated drawing apps, but you can export your work as PDF files via email, which is really all you should need on a mobile platform.

There’s also that color scheme generator, which graphic designers should go ga-ga for. It’s especially handy with the iPhone, since you can take a photo of literally anything you run across in your travels and the app will break it down to a five-color palette you can then use in print or web design. My only problem with this tool is that you can’t export the image, to be used with a color picker on your desktop, for example.

Bottom line: The Adobe Ideas app is free, it works for both iPhone and the iPad, and it’s a genuine pleasure to use. Grab it now if you do any kind of creative work.

Let us know what you think of Adobe Ideas in the comments.

Over the last few months I’ve continued to use it for that purpose, but always seem to have neglected to utilize some of the interesting things that it could do outside of my business and work endeavors. Features that, while appealing, I just never really got around to using. That’s about to change — and in a big way.

Instead of just being a “place for my stuff,” the newest release of Springpad now helps me do things with that stuff. It processes what I place there and then presents me with some contextual options that let me actually do something with that data.

For example, if I capture a CD that I think I might want to buy, it automatically recognizes what it is, links me to some shopping sites with price comparisons and gives me a list of tour dates for that artist. For movies it links to reviews, showtimes and a way to buy tickets.

This anticipation of why I added something in the first place makes it easier to take action whenever I happen to revisit that item, thus making the act of capturing and storing that information in Springpad much more useful to me.

Even the act of capturing the data has gotten easier. The new “Quick Add” bar not only does a web search so I can pull in structured data but it also live searches my friends’ shared data so I can easily find items that they have already captured, and possibly reviewed.

While Springpad is much more than just a bookmarking tool, I tend to use the “Spring It!” bookmarklet most often for data entry. It lets me grab and store items as I encounter them. The bookmarklet has been greatly improved as I can now more easily tag and identify items and add notes, all without needing to go in and tidy things up in the full interface.

An email dropbox has also been added, which is nice for entering story pitches, receipts, and other interesting items that come in via my Gmail. I use this feature often with Toodledo and my CRM app and have grown quite accustomed to it. Email items need a bit of cleaning up, however, and I haven’t figured out a way to tag or categorize them while entering them with the dropbox.

An iPhone app has also been released with options for capturing data by type, photo or even viah a bar-code scanner. I’ve resisted the urge to buy an iPhone up until now but the lure of easy, ubiquitous access to Springpad and some of my other favorite apps is making that more difficult to do recently.

All of these new features make it much easier for me to capture what I’m thinking, what I’m seeing, and what I’m finding and then put it in a place where I can easily process it, use it and store it. Not only does the capture process clear my mind from trying to remember the minutiae, but when I do need to use some information I can do so quickly and efficiently.

I’ve watched Springpad change quite a bit since I first looked at it, and with each release it becomes more useful. If I have one concern it is that the focus of the service on the apps and other tools that originally hooked me is somewhat diminished. For example, the apps folders have moved from the main page to a tab of their own. Everything still works the same and no functionality has been lost, but there is a sense that it is moving away from the product that I started using to becoming something else. I guess since that something else is also quite useful, perhaps it’s just a matter of me evolving right along with it.

Springpad is free and should work in any major browser. The iPhone app (also free) is now available in the App Store and other mobile versions are forthcoming.

I keep a lot of stuff in my Springpad — how could it help you?

If you want to direct lightning to strike a certain target, you erect a lightning rod. The lightning rod is frequently struck because of its particular construction, material and positioning. To become a lightning rod for inspiration, you have to pay attention to very similar things.

Record the Context

Writing down your ideas is a great way not to lose them, whether you’re doing so digitally or using more old-fashioned methods. But while many people write down what it is they thought of, few think to record what it was they were doing when they had such a great idea. The ground in which the fruitful plant grows, after all, is just as important as the plant itself.

While you’re writing down your genius idea, also jot down when, where, and, if possible, how the idea came to you. The idea is that over time, a pattern might emerge, one that could help you replicate the circumstances which produced inspiration in the first place. There are a couple of particularly good ways to go about this.

The Double-entry Notebook

A really good way to track not only what you’re thinking about, but how and when you’re thinking about it is using a double-entry notebook. It’s simple enough to create, just take an ordinary notebook and draw a line down the center of the page each time you start a new one. You could also pick up a stenographer’s notebook, which is pre-divided for you.

The idea is that you record your thoughts in the left-hand column, and then, right after that, record any contextual details about the conditions that generated the idea in the column on the right (or vice versa, the side doesn’t really make a difference). Include details like where you are, what you were thinking about before you came up with your idea, what was going on around you, etc.

Database/Spreadsheet

If you’re not so interested in the low-tech method, you could do pretty much the same thing using a database or spreadsheet program on your computer. Plain old Excel or Google Docs could do just fine, or a more advanced (and better organized) personal database app like Bento for the Mac might be more to your liking.

With something like Bento, you can create custom fields and enter all kinds of information, while keeping your format consistent. You could do the same thing with a custom form in Word, Acrobat or whatever other program you prefer to use. The important thing is that you have a way to capture data that you’re comfortable using, which should make you more likely to actually use it.

Processing the Data

Truth be told, a lot of what you learn using the process probably won’t be useful in the strictest sense. It’ll all be interesting, and you’ll probably learn a thing or two about yourself that will surprise you. But what you will gain from the experience is a number of shining points of overlap, things that you see recurring over and over again whenever you have your best ideas.

At least some of those things should be replicable, which means that you’ll be better able to provide a working situation in which motivation and inspiration will come easily and without much prodding. Basically, you’ll have reverse-engineered your inspiration process, and you’ll have an informed and complete view of how and why you work.

How do you get inspirational lighting to strike twice?

Image credit: flickr user KM Photography

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Idea Organizer is an app for the iPhone that I recently discovered that makes logging those ideas incredibly easy. There are other ways to do what it does, some via built-in tools offered by Apple itself, but no other solution brings all the features and functionality together in the same place.

Idea Organizer combines an audio recorder, a text notebook and an image capture tool to help make sure that you can not only keep track of any ideas that pop into your head, but also the ones you get from the world around you. You can create an idea using any type of media mentioned, and then add other types of content later to provide context.

The other reason I prefer this app to any other is that it keeps thing simple and has an intelligently designed user interface. The app opens directly to a screen that presents you with a button that gives you access to your most recent idea, and three big buttons that allow you create a new idea based on text input, photo or audio. Idea Organizer’s developers were clearly thinking about the fleeting nature of good ideas when they designed the app.

Finally, you can email any ideas to yourself at any time, for easier editing on an actual computer. You can also batch email all your ideas at once, which is a terrific convenience feature.

For $1.99, Idea Organizer (iTunes link) is great bargain for a very handy little app. Sure, you can approximate its function for free, but in many more steps and with a lot more hassle.

How do you make sure you don’t lose track of great ideas you have while out of the office?

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This certainly tallies with my experience since owning an iPhone, in that I’m far more likely to only tote my phone and not bring my laptop if all I need to do is keep an eye on emails and a few feeds. While at a conference, especially, I’d far rather not be lugging around a notebook when I can keep up to date via email, Twitter and RSS on my phone. Having to carry it around all day is one thing, but also the point of a conference, for me, is to get out and connect with people, something that’s much harder to do if I’m stuck behind my notebook screen, tapping away.

Unfortunately, I can’t use my iPhone as a general-purpose mobile device for doing “real” work: the screen is too small and the keyboard is inadequate for large amounts of typing. So I’m not ready to drop my notebook altogether just yet. But in situations where all I need to do is stay up to date, answer a few emails or maybe catch up on a little reading (via the excellent Instapaper app for the iPhone), say while on a train journey or at a conference, it’s great to be free of having to lug my notebook everywhere — something that I couldn’t have imagined just a couple of short years ago. Maybe in a few years smartphones will have gotten so good that I won’t need to bring a notebook with me at all.

Have you noticed that better smartphones mean that you don’t need to carry your notebook with you as much?

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So I decided to revisit a few of the applications I was impressed with in review, but hadn’t personally adopted, to see how they fare after a bit more cooking time. The first of these is Springpad, the online notebook organizer I last looked at back in November.

The things that most impressed me about Springpad originally are still there: that it’s a “whole life” organizer, the ready-made Springpads, and the Personal Organizer area, which aggregates and consolidates content from all of my individual Springpads to master lists.

But over time Springpad has added a couple of very nice usability tweaks. Most noticeable is a design refresh that moves the navigation to a slide away “drawer” that tucks itself out of the way when not in use.

In addition to the bit of freed-up space, hiding the navigation out of the way allows you to really focus on the tasks at hand. If you prefer to keep it visible, you can pin it open as well.

They have also added a very handy bookmarklet, the Springpad Clipper, that lets you grab highlighted content from any web page and easily transfer it in to the Springpad page of your choosing. This makes it great for capturing notes and photos as you are doing research, or even just to flag things to look at later.  I also like that it works in any browser and isn’t just Firefox-specific.

The quality of the ready-made Springpads has also improved, with the newer ones getting more interactive and detailed. The task-oriented Springpads are a good way to get up and running quickly, but if you prefer you can still create your own from scratch.

So, overall, while it lacks the ubiquity of a tool like Evernote for general information capturing, Springpad has matured quite a bit in a few short months and continues to be a fine option for an online organizer.

What do you think?  Could Springpad be the whole life organizer for you?

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Here are some of my favorite OneNote resources that I’ve flagged recently:

Microsoft Office Online tips us to a great demo of how to Take OneNote to class.

jkOnTheRun shares a great user contributed OneNote 2009 Day Planner. I’ve downloaded it and it’s very well done – Nice work David

7Breaths with a phenomenal GTD OneNote implementation (via Lifehacker)

OneNote Tips & Tricks on Outlining in OneNote

Don’t have OneNote but want to give it a try? Microsoft offers a free trial

And finally, I love our WWD readers.  One discovered DropBox through our review and then goes on to use it for great things, like to share his OneNote notebooks on multiple machines. I’m now doing this as well and it works brilliantly.

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While most apps of this type tend to be free form or even business focused, Springpad is a series of online notebooks designed to be a whole life organizational tool. Stay on top of not only your business or professional projects and items, but also track your personal life as well.

Much like other notebook or organizing applications, Springpad uses a familiar notebook and page metaphor. Each page can feature data in the form of notes, lists, maps, files, alarms, events, etc.

Every item can be tagged, flagged or annotated for even more filing flexibility. Items can also appear on multiple pages but remain connected to the original. Everything is drag and drop capable so it is easy to move items around on or between pages.

Where things get cool is when you visit your Personal Organizer section. This area aggregates the content from all of your springpads together into one place. For example, if I create a unique list of to-do items on each of my project pages, I can go to this master list and view them all pulled together for action.

Or say my wife has a shopping list for our general meal planning but then she also creates one on a party planning page. No problem, the organizer pulls the shopping lists together so she is prepared for her trip to the store.

The same goes for contacts, addresses, and other types of data. By letting Springpad know what these bits of data are, it can be organized and presented back to me in unique and useful ways, becoming much more than just notes on pages. Dates and events automatically appear on your agenda while addresses automatically connect to a Google Map.

Springpad is primarily aimed at those who are looking for a tool to help them get organized, but who also want a bit more help than they would get from most applications of this type. By providing templates and ready made lists and organizers, Springpad makes it easy to jump right in and get started.

There are a wide assortment of templates already available covering everything from your workouts to your job search. Springpads can also be tied together, for example the meal planner tracks recipes and ingredients and allows you to quickly create a shopping list.

Future partnerships with content providers will allow you to pull in branded templates, lists and content from these partner sites. The plan isn’t so much to have Springpad be ad supported but rather to allow you to easily import data from other sites and have it maintain branding and links back to the original content. You can already pull in restaurant reviews from Yelp and make reservations using OpenTable , and future similar integration is planned with other providers.

Springpad aims to be a database for your life. It is structured enough to be consistent and easy to use but the pages are flexible enough to handle most routine day to day projects and planning. You can have unlimited springpads so you can create one for all of the things that you are juggling.

This demo video does a good job of highlighting these and other key features:

Springpad is still in beta and there are some features like mobile access that are still forthcoming. Over the last couple of weeks I’ve seen frequent updates and enhancements and they seem eager for feedback and suggestions.

Registration is open now and accounts are free. They are currently featuring a Thanksgiving Menu Planner which should be a great way to test out the service and make sure you’re prepared for the upcoming holiday.

Could you use a Springpad to help you get organized?

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Jobs did announce a whole bunch of revisions to the MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro product lines, including one-piece aluminum shells, glass trackpads with multitouch, dual graphics chips, and bigger drives. Apple is reducing the entry-level price of the white plastic MacBook to $999 – but there’s a lot of psychological distance between that and the $800 price point that was getting kicked around in the blogs.

There were some significant price decreases in today’s announcements, but they generally amount to reflections of the normal, continuing advance of technology, and not a decision by Apple to play in new markets. For example, the $1300 model of the MacBook now has an instant-on backlit display and a fast graphics processor – which yesterday you would have had to pay $2000 to get in the MacBook Pro line. And at the high end of the line, there’s a $2500 machine with 4GB of RAM, dual graphics chips including one with 512MB, and a 320GB hard drive – more power than you could have gotten in any Apple laptop before this.

Despite the fantasies of low-price MacBooks, it seems pretty clear that Apple knows its core audience well. Some of the statistics that came out at the event include that Apple sells more notebooks in education than Dell does (with 39% of the market), and that Mac sales have outgrown those of the industry for 14 of the last 15 quarters.

Today’s announcements didn’t include anything that most web workers will see as game-changing. If you’re already an Apple fan, you likely saw some new models that you’d like to have. If you’re happy with a Windows box, nothing shown today is likely to make you switch.

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Of course, there are plenty of sub-$1000 laptops on the market already – you can buy Dell’s Inspiron line at prices from $499 up, and if you’re willing to compromise down to the “netbook” level of machine, with a 9-inch screen, you can find pricing under $400. But those cheaper machines are not, of course, Macs.

As a happy Mac owner already, the new price point isn’t much of a temptation to me – we’ve already got two MacBooks in the office, and being developers, we’re unlikely to go for a low-end notebook in any case. But I wonder whether it will contribute significantly to Apple’s ever-growing share of the laptop market.

If you’re not yet a MacBook user, what do you think? Could a new, cheaper Mac laptop tempt you to switch? Or are you firmly committed to some alternative, despite the pressure to join the cool kids?

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