NewsGator Releases Social Sites App for Windows 8

NewsGator has moved its Social Sites to the new Windows 8 platform. The Denver-based company announced this week an app that will offer its Social Sites on devices using that new OS.

The app is also touch-enabled for those who want to use it on Windows 8 touch-based devices. It employs Lookout, a new drag-and-drop interface that was introduced by NewsGator in August as part of a major version 3.0 update of Social Sites for SharePoint 2013. Lookout allows users to pick and choose from the activity streams and other information emanating from SharePoint.

Multi-Column Dashboard

The company said Lookout is intended to solve the tendency of activity and other informational streams to overwhelm a user, causing important information to be overlooked. The interface allows a user to choose and configure which content to view from activity streams, people, communities, topics, subjects, notifications and other areas, including documents from SharePoint that match search terms.

Lookout presents the information as a multi-column dashboard view, and the columns can be dragged-and-dropped into a customized configuration. New or unread information is visually highlighted so users can quickly scan and locate the latest content.

Also displayed is “social intelligence” via recommendation engines, with descriptions why colleagues and communities are being recommended. And the app has the ability to include HD video, private messaging or email. As with the previous version of Social Sites, users can respond to notifications and conversations from activity streams via email.

Filtering Information

Brian Kellner, NewsGator’s executive vice president of development and product management, said in a statement that the company built Social Sites because “our customers told us they needed a better way to filter, refine, interact and consumer large amounts of information in the social streams.”

The intent of the new Windows 8 app, he said, is to “focus on a more human-centric approach,” since other tools on the marketplace “do not empower the end user.” He added that the app is making “social technology smarter and better-enabling the end user to surface relevant connections when and where they need it.”
 

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Quark Releases DesignPad for iPad

On Wednesday, Quark announced a preview release of its DesignPad app for grid-based design on an iPad.

The Denver-based company said that DesignPad, which is available for free, allows aspiring designers to try different layouts and designs via multi-touch gestures. The pre-defined layouts, which can be customized, include ones for ads, posters, newsletters and brochures.

DesignPad Offers New Approach to Design

The designs can be shared by Twitter or email, or moved to its big brother, QuarkXPress 9, for further design.

The company said that DesignPad, with its ability to quickly experiment with different layouts and create a wide range of final designs, was “an entirely new approach to design.”

Gavin Drake, Quark’s Vice President of Marketing, said in a statement that the company was “always looking at innovative ways to make graphic design accessible to the whole spectrum of creative professionals.”

With DesignPad, he said, “everyone can get real hands-on experience,” making the app a “valuable teaching aid,” in addition to being a tool for experienced professionals “to start a design on the go” and then easily share it for feedback.

In addition to pre-defined layouts, DesignPad’s features include slider controls for adjusting columns, rows, text and picture areas in layouts, a “randomize layouts” option, and text control for fonts, color and inset position.

Color, Opacity Control

There’s also color and opacity control on boxes and frames, text copy and paste functionality, the ability to choose from an online selection of free stock photos, and support for both U.S. and international document sizes with selectable units of measure.

Custom layouts can be saved for future re-use, a swip-and-pinch functionality enables the positioning, cropping and resizing of pictures, and there’s an option to add background images or floating text/image boxes.

For designers who want to work on the DesignPad piece in its higher-end relative, a QuarkXPress 9 version of the layout can be created for use in that app.

Founded in 1981 and named after a building block for all matter, Quark introduced its flagship QuarkXPress desktop publishing program in 1987. In 1992, it released Quark Publishing System to connect contributors in the publishing process, and 2001 saw the release of QuarkXPress Server, a high-performance publishing engine. One of its more recent products is Quark Dynamic Publishing Solution, which provides automated cross-media publishing.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com