PockeTwit v.75 Released!

PockeTwit v.75 is now available with several bugfixes and some exciting new features!

@marclandis has continued refining the today screen plugin. It now offers a list of groups with unread items similar to the standard "Messages" plugin for pocket outlook. And tapping an item in that list will bring PockeTwit to the foreground and display that group.

He also fixed an issue with QuickPost. The "Post Update" screen will now be displayed regardless of whether PockeTwit was already running or not.

There is now a "Saved Searches" feature. This will allow you to define a search and add it to your custom groups timelines. You can also specify if the saved search will be automatically checked with your friends and messages timelines, or only refresh when it's selected. For example, I've defined a saved search for "PockeTwit OR PocketTwit" and set it to autoupdate, so I know whenever anyone mentions the applications name out there. But I also defined a saved search for any posts near my house and told it NOT to autoupdate, since that would get a constant stream of chatter.

Note that PockeTwit's saved searches do not correspond with the user's saved searches on Twitter's site. Twitter added that feature too late into the development cycle of PockeTwit for me to have them match without adding a significant delay to the release. I do plan to have them synchronize in the future.

I've added support for the web service "140it.com" to help users shorten their posts to fit twitter's 140 character requirement. If your post is over 140 characters, PockeTwit will first ask if you'd like to use 140it. If you agree, it will use their service to shorten some common words. For example, it will replace the word "to" with the character "2" and use other common abbreviations. If that still doesn't get the text to less than 140 characters, it will ask if you'd like to use shorttext.com like it did in the past.

@roelvandenbrand has been trying to keep up with the flood of media services popping up around twitter and making sure PockeTwit supports as many as possible. He's added Img.Ly, Posterous, and TweetPhoto support. And thanks to TweetPhoto's support of development, it has been made the default media service for PockeTwit.

A new developer, @theMark_S ,has come forward and volunteered to write a desktop installer for PockeTwit. This will make it easier for some users to install the application through activesync rather than having to download the cab file directly to their device.

As I mentioned, there have also been several bugfixes. The most important one is a fix that allows a user in the cache to be updated. In the last release, if a user changed their avatar or screen name, PockeTwit could not update the cached information. Their avatar would appear as a question mark or their screenname would not be updated. I'm glad to say that bug has been fixed!

As always, thank you to all the PockeTwit supporters out there. This project has been a tremendous learning experience for me and I'm very glad that you find it useful.

Announcing an Agreement with TweetPhoto!

PockeTwit v.75 is very near done and I'd like to take a moment to announce an agreement with TweetPhoto before the release. It's not the only new feature in PockeTwit, it's probably not even the most important new feature. But it is very exciting to me (for obvious reasons).

When I started development of PockeTwit, I did it with absolutely no financial incentive in mind. I had a good job that paid what I needed. I was just glad to share my work and allow others to enjoy it.

But times and situations have changed and I can no longer afford to be so single-minded in my motives.
Thankfully, TweetPhoto has come up with a simple plan to support PockeTwit development that requires almost no effort from you. If you use PockeTwit to post images to TweetPhoto, any advertising revenue for the page hosting the photo will go to PockeTwit. It's that simple.

Of course you can still choose one of the many other media services supported by PockeTwit. And I won't bug you about that too much, I promise! But if you want a hassle-free way to show your support, this is it.

I plan to release a version of PockeTwit which supports TweetPhoto (and has a lot more!) very soon. Be on the lookout, then take lots of pictures!!