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43Folders.com is Merlin Mann’s website about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.

Textpander: An end at last to email from 'Melrin'

Peter Maurer [Textpander]

It took me about 5 seconds to fall hopelessly in love with Textpander.

Like so many wonderful things in the world (*waves to Unix apps*) it does exactly one thing: it replaces text you type with other text (or images). So, how would you use this? God, how wouldn’t you? Here’s the bullets from the Textpander page:

  • Insert standard greetings, text fragments, and signatures — including formatted text and pictures.
  • Insert the current date and time in any format you prefer.
  • Use editor-independent code templates and have Textpander position the cursor just where it needs to be.
  • Type special characters without having to launch any special characters palette.
  • Have Textpander correct typos automatically.
  • Import text snippets from other typing utilities.

This is huge for me for two reasons. First I date everything with a stamp (like 2005-09-17 07:43:53), and second, I constantly mistype my own name (“Melrin”). I automated both of these timesucks in less than a minute in Textpander, and now I’m the happiest boy in the world.1

Did I mention it’s donationware? I’ll definitely be crossing the palm of one Peter Maurer (also the developer of the wonderful Butler, it would seem).

Get this. Use this. Pay Peter.

[via Lifehacker via Slacker Manager ]


Notes

  1. Update 2005-09-17 11:00:12: Check out how Justin uses Textpander to make footnotes.

James's picture

http://www.typeit4me.com I have been...

http://www.typeit4me.com I have been using Typeit4me for years. It's been very helpful. How does this compare to Typeit4me?

 
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