So, after yesterday’s post about the move to shareware of Aurora (which, again, I don’t begrudge the dev that–it just doesn’t fit into my plans), I got an email from Jerry of Embraceware, the creators of another Mac alarm clock app called Awaken.
Jerry had a good deal for me: a free copy of Awaken.
That’s pretty amazing. I’m a small little blog, written by a web dork. My readership is pretty small. But Jerry is the smartest of marketers. What better way to get the word out about your product than to get it into someone’s hands who’ll try it, write about it, and probably evangelize for it (just based off the fact that it was such a great out of the blue offer).
So I installed Awaken last night, and I woke up to this morning to Bloc Party. It works as advertised, has a pretty nifty interface, and has one feature that Aurora doesn’t: it doesn’t require you to turn off your screen saver password or turn on auto-login. Both of those lower the security of your Mac (particularly if you’re using a laptop, like me), and it always bugged me about Aurora.
Now, with Awaken, even though my machine was locked, the alarm clock turned on and work me up, allowed me to snooze it or turn off the alarm, and then I could go about my daily business.
I like that. A lot.
It’s a pretty app too (especially in full screen mode when you wake up). Here’s a taste (from Embraceware’s flickr account):
Awaken rocks a good bit. I’m probably going to move to it as my alarm clock–it’ll be a whole lot less abrasive than my blaring alarm clock from 1988 (that my girlfriend despises). And then I’ll probably start using it as my sleep timer too, since it’d be pretty cool to toss a movie into iTunes and have it shut down my Mac when it’s done.
Jerry’s done pretty darn good marketing here. I would probably have not even considered Awaken before, but now I’m evangelizing it. I love the internet.
You can check out Jerry’s blog for more info on Awaken.
Good Morning Ryan. Wow – I wasn’t expecting a review – just wanted you to wake up on time. Thanks a bunch. Be sure to let us know if you require any help or have feature request suggestions. Cheers.
Jerry – I just really appreciated the offer and felt compelled to write up the review based on how the app has worked for me.
And it woke me up again nicely this morning!
Just to clarify one thing: You only need to enable Auto-login when you shut your Mac down over night – for the obvious reason that Aurora can’t launch as long as you’re not logged in. If you only put it to sleep, no additional action is neccessary and Aurora will play your alarm just fine.
Apart from that, Jerry is simply a very clever guy. He could do what I can’t – give free licenses to all of my customers who complain about the price. Here’s hoping that doesn’t come into fashion… ;-)
Cool Jonas. I didn’t realize that.
No harm intended on the Aurora vs. Awaken debate. I really like both apps and think you’ve both done a remarkable job. I wish both you and Jerry all the success in the world and really appreciate the attention you’ve given me. Your customers are very lucky for all of the attention they get.