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This week, Bank of Montreal (BMO) has launched a mobile banking website where users can access their account, pay bills, find branches, and more.

BMO Mobile Banking

BMO customers will be happy to know that the new BMO mobile site makes banking much easier. While you can still log in from the main BMO site, the mobile site is much faster.

With the BMO mobile site, customers can check their balances across multiple accounts and also review transactions such as deposits, payments, and much more.

Users can also make account transfers such as moving funds and locate bank branches and ABM’s. Basically anything you can do at the regular BMO account site, you can do here.

You can check out the mobile site here: http://m.bmo.com/

We also received news that BMO is launching an iOS app in April. This should make BMO online banking even better! The BMO app, once released, will join other bank apps such TD, Scotiabank, RBC, and CIBC.

Update 2: We just received some updated information and screenshots of this upcoming app from BMO’ Senior Manager of Digital Strategy, Pritesh Ghandi:

• The planned launch is April – date TBD (not April 1st).
• There will be an iPhone app, and a Blackberry launcher app. Android launcher app will follow in a later release. And mobile banking will be accessible from any other web-enabled device.
• Similar to BMO Online Banking, customers can transfer money instantly between their bank accounts and MasterCards or Lines of Credit. We’ll also be adding features in the coming months, such as alerts from bank accounts and bill payments from mobile devices.

Update 1: Reader Olivier contacted BMO regarding the application (translated by Google)

If you visit bmo.com/mobile, you’ll see a link to download the iPhone app, but it’s not live yet.

Thanks to Olivier for the tip!

[Updated with Screenshots] BMO Mobile Banking Site Launched, iPhone App Coming April is a post from: iPhone in Canada Blog – Canada's #1 iPhone Resource

The notification system in iOS is useful, but it can get a little overwhelming sometimes. Since notifications on iOS demand your attention by blocking what you’re doing until you click either ‘Cancel’ or ‘View’, it can get annoying if you receive a notification every two minutes. Luckily, there is a way to disable notifications on a per-app basis.

In order to change which apps can send you notifications, open your device’s Settings app, then tap Notifications. In here, you’ll find a list of all the apps you have installed which are able to send notifications, as well as a switch to turn off all notifications at once. However, I don’t recommend killing all notifications, since you’ll probably want important ones, such as those from to-do list apps to remind you of deadlines, to stil show up.

To edit what notifications a certain app will send, tap its name in the list. You’ll see up to three switches — Sounds, Alerts and Badges — depending on what options the app supports. From here you can choose how you’d like the app’s notifications to behave. Alerts is the option you’ll want to switch off if you’d like to stop the blue message boxes appearing. Badges determines whether an app should show a number badge (in a red circle) on its home screen icon. And sounds, as the name implies, controls whether or not you’ll get an auditory notice when a new notification arrives.

In my opinion, for an application which isn’t important, the best thing to do is turn off alerts and sounds, and just leave badges on. That way, you’ll still be able to tell which apps need your attention by glancing at their icons, but they won’t pester you with alert messages.

I much prefer the iOS experience without having to tap on a blue message box every three minutes. Adding the option to turn them off was a good decision on Apple’s part, and one that it pays to know how to use.

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Section: Mac Software, Business / Office Suites, Reviews

Provides: Spreadsheet creation/editing for Mac OS X
Developer: Microsoft
Minimum System Requirements: Mac OS X v10.5.8 or higher, 1GB of RAM Recommended, 2.5GB hard drive space, 1280×800 or higher resolution monitor
Processor Compatibility: Intel Only
Price: $150 (home and student edition) or $280 (home and business edition) as part of the MS Office Suite
Availability: Now
Version Reviewed: 14.0.2

Excel has remained the most popular and feature-rich spreadsheet application since Microsoft Office reached critical mass in the business world. Excel, first appeared in 1985 as a Mac application and has been bundled as a part of Microsoft Office since the early ‘90s. While it may also make switching to a Mac easier, Office:Mac has made it easier for those working in mixed environments to continue using a Mac without losing any cross-platform compatibility.  Who hasn’t encouraged a Windows user with the promise that they could continue to use their beloved MS Office applications after they have switched? The trouble is that sometimes the Mac versions of Office feel like the unappreciated stepchild and lacked true compatibility. Office:Mac 2011 has made great strides to close this gap and this can be seen in the outstanding version of Excel.

Online “Cloud” Integration

Another major MS Office enhancement includes Microsoft’s cloud computing initiative.  With a free Windows Live ID, users can now save and load files from their online SkyDrive storage space.  SkyDrive offers a generous 25GB of free space on Microsoft’s servers.  This can be used to store any type of file, but when uploading Office documents to a SkyDrive account you will get additional functionality.  You can save files directly to your SkyDrive from within Office 2011 by choosing “Share” from the File menu and logging into your account. To open a file from SkyDrive, you will need to log in from a web browser ,and then you have the option to edit the file online (with a limited set of tools), download and open the file in MS Office or save it as a zipped file.

You can also create new files online or share SkyDrive folders by changing permissions from private to public or shared (with a limited group of your contacts).  By using SkyDrive for co-authoring, groups no longer have to keep track of multiple versions that have been passed around in emails.  In other hosting situations, only one user might be able to “check out” and open the file at a time. But with SkyDrive, not only can multiple users view but simultaneous editing is possible (areas inside the document are locked while being edited).  Individuals can choose to receive email notifications of changes, and with the click of a button you can initiate a video chat, instant messaging or email to stay in touch with those who are working on the same document.  This online co-authoring service is built into Office and provided at no additional cost.  Currently, you cannot track changes with online sharing.  This can also be enabled if you have your own SharePoint server rather than using Microsoft’s SkyDrive services.

I found this feature to be reasonably useful, except that in my testing I did encounter an error trying to reopen a file I had uploaded to my SkyDrive.  After saving the file, the next day I could not open the same file from within Excel or even choosing to open it “in Excel” from the live.com webpage.  I kept getting an error message “Excel cannot open this file” suggesting that the file may be corrupt (even though I could open it online and edit the file using the live.com Excel editor).  The only solution was to download and save the file and then I could open it.  So, I guess while this may be a great feature, it still does not have all the wrinkles worked out.

Interface
The Macintosh Business Unit at Microsoft has gone out of their way to make the 2011 version not only cross-platform compatible functionally, but visually as well. When MS Office 2007 was released, a controversial new interface design called the Ribbon (or “tabbed” toolbar) was introduced to make the applications easier to use.  Much to Mac users’ delight, the 2008 Mac version that followed did not adopt this new Ribbon interface that had many Windows users frustrated.  In 2010, the Windows version included a few design changes, such as replacing the Office button with the more universally accepted File menu and allowing users to customize the Ribbon.  While Mac users may still not see the Ribbon as a step in the right direction (why take away vertical document space when screen sizes are becoming wider?) it is necessary to integrate this to make both the Windows and Mac version more similar.  Eventually, the same training issues that Windows users faced moving from 2003 to 2007 is going to impact users trying to move between Windows and Mac versions of MS Office.  Whether or not you love or loathe the Ribbon interface, it has become standard for Microsoft Office applications.

Toolbars
The Ribbon replaces the floating Formatting Palette and toolbars that have been prominent in Excel for more than a decade.  A complaint with the older Floating Palette is that sometimes it would get moved just far enough off the edge of the screen that it was hard to drag back, something that will never happen with the Ribbon.  Just like you could close the Floating Palette, you can also turn off the Ribbon in the application’s preferences and your toolbar will look similar to Excel 2004/2008.  The standard and formatting toolbars can be independently shown/hidden using the View menu, but they are integrated into the window (no longer floating toolbars that could be dragged or moved).  Should you decide to keep the Ribbon turned on, you can always hide all but the tabs to conserve space. Then you can expand the Ribbon by clicking on any tab, click the expand/hide button at the right of the tabs or toggle the Ribbon in the View menu.  It would have been nice if Microsoft had kept the floating Formatting Palette and toolbars as an option for those who dislike the Ribbon.

Sparklines
A picture is worth a thousand words, and graphs have always been one of Excel’s strengths.  While it is possible to stack data sources together into one graph, this can become quite confusing to visually decipher.  Creating multiple graphs would solve the problem, but it would be awkward since each one consumes quite a bit of visual space. A feature called Sparklines allow you to easily display mini-graphs (sometimes called micro-charts) that can show dozens of data sets that appear in the same row as the data.  Sparklines were added to the Windows version of Excel 2010 (although they were available in third-party extensions for years).  Just highlight a row (or rows) of data and pull the Insert menu to Sparklines.  Options include adding color, markers and a choice of line or bar graphs.  This is a very cool addition to Excel that increases compatibility and adds functionality to the application.

Conditional Formatting
Beginning with Excel 2011, more than three rules can be added for conditional formatting, and the display options that first appeared in Windows Excel 2007 have been incorporated into the Mac version.  For instance, now you can use gradients or solid bars inside the cell (known as “databars”) to visually make the information stand out.  To make the gradients, Excel 2011 now allows selecting colors from the full 32-bit color palette instead of just 40 colors.  Icon sets and two or three color scales can also be used to emphasize the value of the amount displayed.  While the “classic” conditional formatting dialog window from previous versions has been retained, there are now more options that can be accessed through the button on the Ribbon or in a drop down menu on the traditional dialog window.

Tables
In previous Mac versions, you could pull the Insert menu to add a “list” that was basically a formatted table. A “wizard” interface would guide you through the steps with a limited set of styles that could be applied.  Excel 2011 adds a tab inside the Ribbon with options and a gallery of new table styles, making it much easier to find, select or change the design.  Again, the Ribbon puts all the tools within consistent and easy reach while the older interface used a floating toolbar that sometimes would get lost on the screen.

Sorting
Filtering is certainly easier with a dynamic “filter” button on the “standard” toolbar or under the Data tab on the Ribbon.  Once you select a range or row/column on the toolbar, clicking the filter icon will allow you to select drop downs at the top of each row.  What has changed is the ability to not only sort on the values, but also cell color, font color, cell icons and even conditional formatting options.

Compatibility
Kurt Schmucker, Senior Evangelist for Microsoft, shared in January’s Macworld Expo that the Macintosh Business Unit made compatibility between the Mac and Windows versions a high priority for Office:Mac 2011.  He demonstrated this by opening a worksheet on both 2010 and 2011 side by side so we could visually compare how it was rendered on each platform.  He shared that the Word team did the same thing with literally hundreds of documents.  They would make hundreds of printouts from both Mac and Windows and then overlapped the two and hold them up to a light.  Even the slightest differences were reported as a bug.  He referred to this as a detailed level of “visual fidelity” that was sought to ensure that users would have confidence that their work would be accurately represented regardless of which platform was used to open the MS Office document.

The team went to the Windows Excel team and requested a “Frankenstein” document that contained every possible compatibility issue.  He demonstrated opening this file up in Excel 2008 which showed a long list of errors.  Not only did the file open in Excel 2011 with no errors, but the visual representation was identical to that of Excel 2010.  For comparison, he opened the same document in Apple’s Numbers which generated a few warnings.  Numbers also failed to open the currently selected sheet, which could be confusing for some users. The formatting, of course, was not the same with Numbers, and it really becomes clear that if you want to have the exact look and feel, you are going to want to stick with Microsoft Excel.

Excel 2008 took away Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) but added Applescript support.  With Excel 2011 we get both VBA and Applescript support.  Ken pointed out that having VBA in both Mac and Windows versions allows the functionality of Office to be extended by programmers.  For example, he showed how Sparklines could be animated using VBA to show changes over time.  Excel 2008 lost the Equation Editor.  In 2011, the Equation Editor has been ported over and is the exact same version as the Windows version.  Get out the stopwatch and time the difference between opening a spreadsheet in 2008 and 2011 and you will see a dramatic difference in the optimization that has gone into this new version.

Purchasing
You can purchase Excel 2011 as a part of the MS Office:Mac suite. There is no upgrade path for users of older versions, but Microsoft has lowered the suite costs from previous versions.  Two versions are available, a Home and Student or the Home and Business (the difference is that the Business version includes Outlook).  Just like Apple’s family pack, there are both single or multiple/family install versions, as well as university and volume licensing.  You can purchase a downloadable copy, purchase the box in an Apple Store or download a fully-functional 30 day trial and later purchase the license code online.  At this time, Microsoft is not offering Office through Apple’s Mac App Store since it does not fit their licensing model.

Conclusion
There are many alternatives to Excel, including some that are free.  If you only need a simple spreadsheet, then you could use the free OpenOffice/NeoOffice or a free online version such as Google Apps or Microsoft’s own online version of Excel.  Apple has its own spreadsheet—Numbers—that comes bundled with the iWork office suite.  While most of these will be able to open and save Excel-formatted files, there is still no substitute for compatibility other than using Excel itself.  This will become important if worksheets are being shared amongst several users, especially if you use more complicated formatting or features such as tracking changes or embedded VBA scripts.  To get the best compatibility would require that both users have the latest versions (2010 for Window and 2011 for Mac). If you were to include Sparklines, these would not be visible if opened in an older version.

Excel is still the granddaddy of spreadsheets and retains that status with this 2011 version. The obvious dedication that the Macintosh Business Unit has put into this version to bring it up to parity with the Windows version makes it a real winner. It adds credibility to those of us who rely on using our Macs in the business marketplace, and allows us to share files with confidence.

See our full Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac review.

Full Story » | Written by Alan Cook for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Twitter CEO Dick Costolo tweeted Thursday that the company is losing the QuickBar it introduced in a recent update to the iPhone application. The Quick Bar originally sat on top of your tweet stream within the app, and scrolled as you did, unshakeably resting at the top of the screen. A later update eventually changed the Quick Bar’s behavior, making it just stick at the top of your stream without scrolling, but even that apparently wasn’t enough to appease disgruntled users.

The update that removes the Quick Bar from the iPhone app is live right now in the App Store. In an official blog post on the matter, Twitter Creative Director Doug Bowman noted that the plan for future use of the Quick Bar included in-app notifications of new mentions, direct messages and other activity, but that after determining that the feature “doesn’t improve the user experience,” the decision was made to remove it rather than to continue tweaking it as it currently exists.

CEO Costolo originally seemed to be very much behind the idea of the Quick Bar, according to his tweets around the time of the feature’s launch, but recently Business Insider reports that in fact, he wasn’t a fan of the idea at all, and that it was actually a product of internal organizational structure confusion. Following the announcement of the Quick Bar’s removal, he seemed still to support the basic idea behind the feature, noting that “[T]he engagement data is through the roof but we ultimately agree trends are “too far away” and out of context in that position.”

Ultimately, this seems to come down to a question of user experience vs. a tentative early step towards profitability. It goes to show that even when you’re already a firmly established player, messing around with risky UX decisions can potentially carry brand-damaging ramifications.

Jeremy Bell of Toronto design firm Teehan+Lax shared some additional thoughts about why the Quick Bar failed from a UX standpoint. Specifically, according to Bell, the Quick Bar encountered resistance because it foregrounded one of Twitter’s weakest aspects — trending topics. While he felt that Twitter improved the situation a great deal by removing the scrolling aspect of the Quick Bar, the feature still ultimately suffered from the same flaws that affect trending topics in a much broader sense, and brought them front and center in the Twitter app user experience. Bell maintains that “trending and how it’s displayed in general is flawed, since it provides no understanding of the context of topics or why they might be important to [a user].”

It’s also worth noting that Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey confirmed Monday that he has returned to a more prominent role at the company as head of product development. Dorsey spoke Tuesday at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, where he said he sees “Twitter as a pure utility, like electricity or water.” Dorsey’s return, his statements regarding Twitter, and the removal of a feature that many saw as detracting from usability while serving profit all seem too well timed to be simply chalked up to coincidence.

Post photo courtesy of Flickr users Rosauro Ochoa

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This week, Bank of Montreal (BMO) has launched a mobile banking website where users can access their account, pay bills, find branches, and more.

BMO Mobile Banking

BMO customers will be happy to know that the new BMO mobile site makes banking much easier. While you can still log in from the main BMO site, the mobile site is much faster.

With the BMO mobile site, customers can check their balances across multiple accounts and also review transactions such as deposits, payments, and much more.

Users can also make account transfers such as moving funds and locate bank branches and ABM’s. Basically anything you can do at the regular BMO account site, you can do here.

You can check out the mobile site here: http://m.bmo.com/

We also received news that BMO is launching an iOS app in April. This should make BMO online banking even better! The BMO app, once released, will join other bank apps such TD, Scotiabank, RBC, and CIBC.

Update 1: Reader Olivier contacted BMO regarding the application (translated by Google)

If you visit bmo.com/mobile, you’ll see a link to download the iPhone app, but it’s not live yet.

Thanks to Olivier for the tip!

[Update] BMO Mobile Banking Site Launched, iPhone App Coming April 1st is a post from: iPhone in Canada Blog – Canada's #1 iPhone Resource

There was a tonne of noise made about the twitter app’s ‘QuickBar’ (which was quickly coined ‘dickbar’ on twitter). The Twitter team just announced the following on their blog:

Rather than continue to make changes to the QuickBar as it exists, we removed the bar from the update appearing in the App Store today. We believe there are still significant benefits to increasing awareness of what’s happening outside the home timeline. Evidence of the incredibly high usage metrics for the QuickBar support this. For now, we’re going back to the drawing board to explore the best possible experience for in-app notification and discovery.

The QuickBar fix ‘twizzler’ was introduced via Cydia, but it seems it won’t be necessary anymore. Are you happy about this?

[twitter blog via @TUAW]

Twitter Announces ‘QuickBar’ to Be Removed in App Update Today is a post from: iPhone in Canada Blog – Canada's #1 iPhone Resource

Thursday is opening day for the Major League Baseball season, and a new update for the MLB.com At Bat app has arrived just in time. The update brings a number of new features, including the ability to watch all out-of-market games live on your device free during the month of April.

Live game video streaming is usually only available if, in addition to purchasing the app, you also have MLB.TV subscription access (which you can also now access on your Apple TV, by the way). For April, Volvo is sponsoring a free trial of live streaming for all MLB.com app owners (iPad and iPhone versions). It’s sure to be a hit with those who’ve yet to decide whether or not they want to sign up for a full MLB.TV subscription, but it might also alienate some who decided to take the plunge early and pay full price ahead of this feature introduction.

The app also introduces a completely redesigned Gameday feature, which displays pitch-by-pitch live info on a virtual version of the actual at-bat live for users without live video access. The updated Gameday now features ballpark renderings from MLB 11: The Show, a PlayStation baseball simulation video game.

Finally, users of the apps will also be able to view key plays and occasional live clips, black-out games included, and watch past 2011 season games on-demand in the archive after they air. iPhone users will also be able to access new At the Ballpark features, including check-ins, maps of stadiums, special deals and social media features.

Android users won’t get the month-long free preview or access to archived games, but instead will get one free live out-of-market game every day for the duration of the season, and all the other new features mentioned above that are coming to the iPhone version.

I plan to spend April hooking up my iPad 2 to the TV using HD mirroring to watch baseball, something I haven’t done regularly since I was very young. This is definitely a smart move from an organization looking to attract new viewers, though I find it surprising that the iOS apps are still distinct, and not a single, universal version. We’ll see if it translates into higher subscription numbers once the trial is over.

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Viber is one of the most successful free VoIP iPhone apps, and their 2.01 update is now available in the App Store. Viber earlier released 2.0, but they pulled it due to technical issues. The new releases brings the much anticipated feature of text messaging and some refinements.

Here’s what’s new in 2.01:

1. Viber now has free text messaging!
Send and receive free text messages to and from all your Viber contacts. We’ve added a new tab called Messages. To send a text, simply select a contact from your list, and start texting for free.
New “Free Text Message” button added to Viber contact details.
Tap this button to send this user a free message.

Viber will also notify you about incoming messages so you won’t miss a word single text.

2. Favorites tab location changed
To view your ‘Favorites’ – go to the contacts tab, and tap the Favorites button at the top.

3. Improved calling mechanism
Now, you’ll always know the status of your outgoing calls.
Once a call is placed, a “Calling” state will indicate that Viber is now connecting to the other party.
Once a connection is established, a “Ringing” state will indicate that the other party’s Viber, is now actually ringing (note that a call can still be established even if you don’t see the “Ringing” state).

4. Placing regular calls through Viber
A “Don’t show again” option was added for to the “Place a regular carrier call” inform dialog.

5. Giving You More Control
A new option provides the ability to deactivate your Viber account, so that you can easily reactivate Viber with a new phone number.
Find this option under the ‘More’ menu.

I tried out the text messaging feature with a friend and it works great. However, it won’t replace WhatsApp for me but it’s a great alternative to talk to other friends as well. The app looks and feels much better. Can’t wait to try out some free calls!

Click here to download Viber for free.

Viber Back in App Store, 2.01 Update Brings Text Messaging is a post from: iPhone in Canada Blog – Canada's #1 iPhone Resource

If you were looking for an iPad 2 during the past few weeks and wanted instant gratification, eBay was a good place to look, so long as you didn’t mind inflated asking prices. It turns out at least 12,000 people were the impatient type (with big wallets, no less) as that’s how many iPad 2s were sold through the site during the tablet’s first two weeks of availability.

eBay detailed its iPad 2 sales info in the infographic below, complete with a breakdown of where sales were distributed geographically. The vast majority (65 percent) of iPad 2 purchases made through the site were U.S.-based, which is a little surprising since last year U.S. buyers accounted for only 35 percent of sales during the first two weeks following the original iPad’s launch. Heightened anticipation and demand, the lack of pre-orders and longer lines at U.S. retail locations may account for the increased number of domestic eBay buyers.

eBay buyers paid a significant premium over retail. On average, buyers paid nearly $200 more for the base 16 GB model, which was the most popular model with 30 percent of overall eBay sales. The second most popular seller, the 64 GB iPad 3G, carried an average additional cost of over $400 above Apple’s official asking price.

Some of the highest demand for the iPad 2 outside of the U.S. comes from Canada, Hong Kong, Russia, the UK and Hong Kong, many of which are countries where the iPad either just launched, or will be launching in April. Fears of delays and global stock shortages probably encouraged sales in those countries, despite imminent announced launch dates.

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This week, Bank of Montreal (BMO) has launched a mobile banking website where users can access their account, pay bills, find branches, and more.

BMO Mobile Banking

BMO customers will be happy to know that the new BMO mobile site makes banking much easier. While you can still log in from the main BMO site, the mobile site is much faster.

With the BMO mobile site, customers can check their balances across multiple accounts and also review transactions such as deposits, payments, and much more.

Users can also make account transfers such as moving funds and locate bank branches and ABM’s. Basically anything you can do at the regular BMO account site, you can do here.

You can check out the mobile site here: http://m.bmo.com/

We also received news that BMO is launching an iOS app in April. This should make BMO online banking even better! The BMO app, once released, will join other bank apps such TD, Scotiabank, RBC, and CIBC.

Thanks to John for the tip!

BMO Mobile Banking Site Launched, iPhone App Coming April is a post from: iPhone in Canada Blog – Canada's #1 iPhone Resource