SmileOnMyMac Blog

On the indispensability of TextExpander
(from Tales of Being TJ)

Scene: The Apple Store.

After waiting for a while to get help at the Genius Bar, our protagonist has finally been told that he needs to sign up for the queue via a form on one of the computers in the store.

Anyway, I went over to a 17″ Mac Book Pro and clicked on the aforementioned app. Up came a few prompts and then it asked me for my first and last name, and my cell phone number (optional).

I typed /first (tab) /last (tab) /cell (tab) and was amazed when I saw this appear on the screen:

/first /last /cell

Now that may look fine to you but I was expecting my first and last name and cell phone number to be inserted.

OOOooohhhhh….. wait, they don’t have TextExpander installed… and even if they did, they probably would not have my shortcuts installed. However, it was a good reminder of how accustomed I have become to having TextExpander around.

TextExpander is featured on MacBreak. Merlin Mann of 43 Folders is a big TextExpander fan, and he shows host Leo Laporte what makes TextExpander so powerful and, ultimately, so cool. Leo actually says “It is the single best productivity tool on the Mac, right after Quicksilver.”

Check out the segment. It’s a little under 9 minutes long, and you get a glimpse of the wacky uses that Merlin has for TextExpander amongst his 700+ snippets!

Now that TextExpander is a big star, will deign to hang out with PDFpen and the rest of the gang in the Productivity Suite?