Discover Rambox: Manage All Your Apps in One
Maha Bali
According to their website, Rambox is a "Free, Open Source and Cross Platform messaging and emailing app that combines common web applications into one." Now, when I saw "app," I assumed it would work on my phone, but it was not on Google Play store, so when I went to their website, I discovered it was an app for Windows, Mac and Linux. It's different from many of the other social media management tools out there in that it is open source, so if you're using an app that does not currently integrate with it, you can create the code to add it (assuming you know how to do that, of course). I use Windows, and I got an error message when first trying to install it "unknown publisher," but I overrode it and went ahead (they should fix that, though?). The first thing that struck me when adding apps is that this is a "messaging" not a social media tool. For example, it does not integrate with Facebook, but it integrates with (Facebook) Messenger. It strangely connects to Tweetdeck, rather than Twitter. It also connects with Slack, Hangouts, Skype, and even WhatsApp. I managed to connect two different Slack teams. One of the main reasons I need an app like this one is that my social media takes up way too many tabs on my computer, and so it's useful to have them all in one place separate from my browser, so I can get notifications, without having them crowding my browser tabs. I basically set up two Slack teams, Tweetdeck (There was not Twitter option), and hangouts. My experience so far is that the notifications show up as little numbered bubbles for each app, as well as pop-ups on my screen. I'm comfortable with this. I get the pop-up type on my phone if I want to, but on my computer, I can turn on "do not disturb" in ONE place, which is useful when I'd rather be able to focus on work and check in when I want to. I know this option already exists on the Mac OS, but there isn't an overriding one for Windows, as far as I know. I've found the Slack interface helpful, but the Tweetdeck interface a bit awkward. For example, when I open a tweet, I can see 4 white boxes for stuff I can do with it, and I had to guess which option was "reply," which "Retweet" and which was "like". The scrolling is also pretty horrendous, but that might just be because I have dozens of columns on my Tweetdeck. There is supposed to be an option to have an overall login for the app and to then log in from anywhere and find all your apps set up, but this did not happen with me when I used it on another computer. Not sure if it is a glitch or I did something wrong. All in all, I am warming up to it. I think if I just get used to opening it daily (I've set it up to start upon system start up and appear on my tray and taskbar) and using it, I'll start having fewer browser tabs (this is already happening). Have you used Rambox or something similar? What was your experience? Tell us in the comments Flickr photo: "social-media-bandwagon" by juaniraola http://ift.tt/2jgIbgJ shared under a Creative Commons (BY-SA) license | 
