Apple iTunes App Review: Tweetie

Do you own an Apple iPhone or iPod Touch and love using Twitter on the go? There are a few Twitter applications out there for the iPhone/Touch but none are comparable to that of Tweetie.

Up until recently I have been using Twitterific on my Apple 3G iPhone and it has served me well as a Twitter client. Though there are some aspects of the application I did not like such as no area to see replies or direct messages only. It would also group all my replies and direct messages at the top of the time line. The inline browser was poor and liked to crash a lot. If I were to look at a particular person’s profile, I would end up having to view it in Safari thus closing Twitterific. Using my iPhone with a Twitter client was becoming more of a pain in the butt, until I saw Tweetie.

I think the first time I briefly saw Tweetie was on Arieanna’s iPhone over at WordCamp Whistler. Her and her husband swore by it but I had forgotten about it since.

While looking over the What’s Hot list recently on my iPhone’s App store, I noticed that Tweetie was one of the popular applications. I looked over it briefly and decided to pay the $2.99 for it. Something has to be better than Twitterific, I was right.

Tweetie

Tweetie is a great, fully featured Twitter client for your Apple iPhone or iPod Touch. Curious as to what Tweetie has to offer you as _the_ Twitter application? Check out the extensive feature list!

• Handle multiple twitter accounts.
• View your timeline, replies, direct messages and favorites.
• Browse your friends and followers.
• Post new tweets, retweet
• Reply directly to tweets and send direct messages.
• Follow and unfollow people.
• Mark tweets as favorites.
• Navigate reply chains.
• Inline web browser.
• Post links with automatic link shrinking via bit.ly.
• Upload pictures to twitpic.com.
• Update your twitter location.
• View twitter trends and perform custom searches.
• Save your favorite searches.
• Implements the full twitter API.
• Uses secure connection (https).
• Go to User shortcut
• Nearby search
• Themes and adjustable font size
• Bookmarklet support

Look at that! Wow! Multiple accounts can come in handy since I do have 3 Twitter accounts, ability  to view timeline, replies and direct messages in separately, inline photos from TwitPic, Trending and Searching just to name a few. The list goes on.

One big feature that Tweetie has (and I think is a must) is the ability to use a landscape keyboard. Faster typing, no more fat-finger-syndrome for me! I can type out better tweets now without my fingers accidentally hitting other keys. (Apple when are you giving us a supported landscape keyboard for everything?)

Twitter Timeline

Right off the bat I noticed a difference over Twitterific user interface. The user interface for Tweetie is simple, clean and easy to use. You can even make it look like chat conversations with the bubbles, similar to the look you get with SMS on the iPhone.

Twitter Replies

Twitter Direct Messages (DMs)

Yes you still get your replies and direct messages shown in the main timeline but you can switch to either mode easily to recall previous messages replied to you or directly sent to you.

Tweetie supports Landscape Keyboard

Sure the text area itself allows for 2 lines at a time, but you only get 140 characters, so I don’t think that is much of an issue. The landscape keyboard is great for typing out messages. Like I previously mentioned above, when is Apple going to make this a native feature for the iPhone?

I have been using Tweetie for about a couple days now and I highly recommend people spending the $2.99 on this great application for their iPhone or even iPod Touch. If you’re an avid user of Twitter you will definitely see benefits to using this as your Twitter client of choice.

Other features I like about Tweetie is that you can not only see your own profile, but those other people without having to leave the application. You can also follow and unfollow people too! Previously I had to load up Safari, go to Twitter’s website (non iPhone version) and follow new people that way if I was on the road. Tweetie makes it easy!

Tweetie also has added features within the application itself which people, I believe, will find really useful. Just check out the above screen shot. You can look at the popular trends happening in real time on Twitter. You can search through Twitter on your iPhone using Tweetie too! For those who are not scared about people knowing where you are, you can also find other Twitter users nearby. Great for that last minute coffee or beer meetup!

If you use Twitter a lot and have an Apple iPhone or iPod Touch, I highly recommend downloading (spend that $2.99) Tweetie today! You will definitely not regret it.