Who said that the iPod can only be used as a music player? Pod2Go is here to transform your iPod from a mere music player and file storage gadget to a (sort of) PDA. Pod2Go comes with 12 categories of information that you can sync on your iPod. The first one is RSS/RDF news. There, you can pick one of the 200+ preconfigured news sites’ newsfeeds or add your own, custom one.
On the Weather category, you can choose between two servers for US city support or for worldwide support. I easily found my Greek town using the second server, while the first server provides my local weather here in US.
On the third category, we got movies. You enter your zip code, you select a theater or more, and Pod2Go will sync for you all available movies that play on that theater and their times. Quite handy if you want to impress your girlfriend with your knowledge of local movies on Saturday night. 😉
Fourth category is stock support. You enter a stock symbol and you will get quite some information about it. Same goes for your daily horoscope on the fifth category. Now, I don’t really believe in horoscopes, but having your iPod telling you the “future”, is quite cool.
Next, we got Lyrics support. You can download the lyrics of any song found on your iTunes library, as long as the mp3 tag information is 100% correct. If not, the two lyrics servers will report that they can’t find the song you requested.
Next up we got “Text” support. This can be in the form of stickies, small notes, real document files or web pages. If you feel like reading Linux how-tos for example, you can!
Then, there’s Directions. You can include full directions from point A to Point B that’s either in North America or in 12 European countries. Athens, Greece is not one of them, unfortunately for me. Also, the form needs to be filled up completely, address, city, state and zip code. If you only have part of the address, or don’t have the zip code, the service won’t work.
On the next category we have Application syncing. Pod2Go would sync your Address Book, your iCal, Mail, Safari bookmarks and stickies. A useful option if you use all these Mac OS X applications.
A great feature of Pod2Go is backup support. You can point Pod2Go to a specific folder and the application will back it up on your iPod. Useful not only for backup, but also if your $HOME folder is not under /Users/ and if you move your home folder from home to work, or from one computer to another (there are some people who do just that with their iPods, you can change the default location of your $HOME using the NetInfoManager).
Next up are Podcasts. Too bad that this feature doesn’t really work very well. Sometimes the mp3 files are not synced in the iPod, and also I can’t seem to be able to play them on the app itself (there is a “play” button which is greyed out). Podcasts & videocasts seem to be the next big thing of blogging, so hopefully the app will fix any remaining issues.
The last feature is “Launcher”. Each time you sync your iPod you can tell Pod2Go to launch a specific application, or an Applescript to do a specific job on the device. I don’t see this feature used by many users though.
Pod2Go places a tray icon on OSX’s notification area too, so there’s no reason to have the app open at all times. You can do a “quick sync” for only one of the categories you might need, or all of them. The tray icon also gives you the option to eject the mounted iPod.
On the preference panel of Pod2Go you can tell the app to sync automatically when the iPod gets connected to your Mac, or on a pre-scheduled time. You can also tell it specifically what to sync on each one of the scheduled time (e.g. “on the 3 PM scheduled syncing, only do news sync”). Additionally, you can tell Pod2Go where to place all this information inside the iPod (normally under Extras/Notes/Pod2Go/).
This is possibly the best third party application ever created for the iPod. It gives the iPod some PDA qualities and makes it way more useful. The application is good looking, it has a good usability, it’s stable. If I had one feature request, it would be to format the synced text in a better way e.g. to use bold for the news subjects and normal text for the actual news text, so reading would be more pleasurable. Overall, this application definitely worth $12 and it’s a must-have if you have an iPod but no PDA.
Overall: 9/10
<sarcasm>
..is anyone taking bets on how long it takes for Apple to either:
a) Find some patent they’re infringing on to enable this or
b) Create their own app to do the same thing
I’ll give it 2 months
</sarcasm>
if i had an ipod i’d be definitely interested in this. i really like the remote $HOME mount hint. this would be great for a lab location or for possibly moving between work and home. too bad it takes a netinfo edit to implement.
@wakeupneo:
so shall everybody stop developing applications because this has happened a handful of times? hmm…microsoft anti-spyware…gnome implementing a default application…
The netinfo edit is trivial. Click on “users”, your usrername, and edit the path of your $HOME to “/Volumes/myIPod/atom”. Do that on both your home and work Mac machine. Also, you could use the same $HOME trick using rsync instead of pod2go.
thanks, eugenia.
now i just need an ipod.
I’ve got an iPod. I press play on it when i leave home in the morning and i press pause when i arrive at the office. Same procedure when i head home.
Maybe i should investigate the possibilities of using it for something else aswell 🙂
I tried reading text files on a 4G iPod but the display is so damn slow that the text blurs extremely while you are scrolling. Not very pleasant.
Yes, that’s because it’s DSTN, not a TFT.
This is a nice added functionality for negligible money. The success of the iPod is also in a large part due to third party development of apps and devices. With podcasting the user becomes an active participant and creates a new culture which only tightens the bond with the manufacturer. A few good apps will serve to make the device an even better value proposition. This little thing is just the kind of tidy app that reduces the hassle of managing your files on the iPod.
wakeupneo has a point in that this kind of application can be gobbled up by the giants [as they frequently have been in the past]. OTOH, if I had some coding ability and I wrote a really neat app that Apple would want to incorporate, I’d be more than happy to sell them the source
.
I don’t think Apple will sue these guys. It is not necessary and it would be a really stupid thing to do. The reference is for the NDA suit they filed, where I think they have a point [if they don’t sue then it’s a signal that it’s ok to disregard the NDA, if they do sue, they’re pounding on the wide-eyed innocent student…], they won’t do that here. The app is the acceptance of a cultural phenomenon. Unless it was poorly implemented, which this does not seem to be, dixit Eugenia, Apple should applaud and encourage people with great ideas developing for the iPod.
There’s a lot more good things happening on the platform than bad the last few years, why not be happy people can actually enjoy some enabling technology.
I promise that when the cow is finally released from the barn in Redmond and there are some good things to say about it [which undoubtedly there will be], you will find me saying so. That doesn’t mean I’m going to buy it, but if it’s good, it’s good.
I’ve been using it since I got my iPod last fall – It’s turned my music player into a helpful PDA-like device.
The developer’s very responsive to feedback & suggestions, and the updates are frequent! The only thing that’s not 100% IMHO, is the Podcast syncing, but I recently came across a thread on MacOSXHints (http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20050211205758273&quer…), which allows you to use Pod2Go to trigger iPodderX, thus circumventing Pod2Go’s only shortcoming. And to be fair, Pod2Go’s podcast capabilities are steadily improving, and I’m confident that the aforementioned workaround will not be needed much longer.
There was a tip I read a few weeks ago about changing your home directory in netinfo manager. I think you setup two value’s for home, the iPod being first. When your ipod was not connected, OS X would revert back to your other home directory value (most likely the default location of your home folder on your HD). Anyone know the details of this? I can no longer find the information on this tip, and it would be usefull!
Found it! Nevermind!
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20050215110210846&quer…
they have a link to linux for ipod on their site,, but this is only for mac.. I use my ipod exclusively on linux (gtkpod rocks!!).. is there anything like this for us linux people?
There is a similar program for Windows users called iPodSync, though it does not sync as many web sources.
http://www.ipod-sync.com
This is what a pda is for.
Ipod=music
iPAQ=files folders email etc etc.
cellphone=make/recieve calls
tv=watch tv
remote control=comes with tv
I’ve used this for about a year now and it’s great. The idea that I just un-dock my iPod when leaving in the morning and it has the weather forecasts, movie times, news items, any notes i’d like to have with me. The thing I never liked about PDA’s was that I could never be bothered to enter info while i was out with it. This just gives me a place to look up information without having all those extra PDA features I (personally) don’t need. I already carry my iPod around for music – so this is just extra gravy. Very clever little app.
Here we go again. Everybody loves convergence devices so much these days- smartphones, pda/mp3 players, pda/archos-style videojukeboxes… All I have to say is bah! Convergence devices ALWAYS sacrifice both style and substance to achieve the unison of two separate devices. Even when they do achieve some measure of success, the resulting devices are always less useful than individual devices. I like my PDAs (all 6 of them) to be PDAs, my cellphone to be a cellphone, and my iPod to play music. Compared to convergence, I much prefer the idea of a PAN. At least you still have some functionality when one device gets accidentally submerged…
I am reminded of one of David MacNeill’s columns for Pen Computing magazine (greatest magazine ever, although T3 is nice too). Even Star Trek characters carry 3 devices…
Terrific program. It syncs and ejects when I wake up, all my news and weather for the busride in, some of the best software ever. I see Apple buying out this program, it’s that good.
Maybe you like carrying around 10 electronic devices that do one thing, but I don’t mind some overlap in features if it means that I can pick up one device and run out the door with it. Computers are making it easy with automatic sync so that you can have your personal data on all devices.
At any rate, this is a third party software enhancement. The iPod does not suffer neglect on it’s other features since Apple doesn’t even make this software. Mostly, this program makes clever use of the iPod’s existing Notes feature where you can drag text files into your iPod and read them on screen.
I’ve been using Pod2Go for a while now and I really like it. My iPod has always been an MP3 player first, but with the features this application provides as well as the emergence of podcasting, I am getting much more use out of my iPod than I originally thought I would.