If you’re looking for a powerful Twitter iPhone/iPod Touch client, then you should look no further than Twittelator Pro.
Twittelator Pro Gradient theme
If you compare this app to others such as Twitterfon and Tweetie, you’ll probably notice that it isn’t as quick to load when you first start it up. But the tradeoff is a slew of features that you won’t get in the others.
Twittelator has the ability to update automatically in regular intervals that you set in the Settings from within the app. When the app refreshes, if the sound is on, you’ll hear a notification sound to alert you of new tweets. This notification sound will even work if the screen blanks out from being inactive. The auto-updating is pretty reliable and offers something that Tweetie doesn’t (you have to manually refresh).
When there are new tweets that arrive, a number badge will show up in the tab at the bottom. If there are a lot of new tweets, going to that section will mark the on-screen new tweets as read. The number badge won’t go away until you scroll down or up a bit and make sure that you read all tweets. Or if you can’t read them all, a simple quick flick up and down will get rid of the badge. The number badge is great for making sure you don’t miss a thing (or choose to, if you wish) and actually get caught up on all of your missed tweets. This is a necessary thing for any twitter app; unfortunate that even Tweetie doesn’t have this feature.
View a person’s profile simply by tapping their avatar. You’ll see following/followers, location, bio and can view their tweets. It also shows options for DM’ing them, @’ing them, unfollow/follow, and bookmarking them (bookmarks being located in the More section, read on to find out more). When you tap on the username of a person, a menu featuring the selected tweet will pop up and give you options of replying, DMing, RT’ing, emailing the tweet to someone else, copy tweet/link, or marking it as a favorite.
When writing a new tweet, there’s several features that you will see. There will be an icon that has a pin like ones in the Google Maps app. This will allow you to send out a tweet with your GPS location. I suppose this would be good for emergencies, or if you want to have an impromptu tweetup? This has very limited use, I think, but is a nifty little feature to have readily available.
Next is the camera button, which allows you to take a picture or use a library photo. This picture will then be compressed and you’ll get a link with your selected photo service (yfrog, pikchur, twitpic, or moby). Then you can then add some text to your tweet to go with the photo, then send it out to all your followers.
Twittelator also has the ability to copy a tweet or copy the link to a tweet. You’ll be able to do this by tapping the name of the person that you want to copy the tweet or link of tweet. Tap the option, then go to compose a new tweet. Click the icon with the highlighter like icon and then the entire tweet or link to tweet will be pasted into the text entry field.
The last icon is below the 140 character count, and this is where you can browse for ‘twitterkeys’ — little icons that are displayable regardless of what a person is using to view them (unlike emoji, which aren’t compatible on all OS’s or apps) and are browser friendly! A great feature missing from other apps that adds a little spice to your tweets and can be sure that everyone can see them.
The last feature that you’ll see when composing a new tweet is that ‘@friends’ button in the top right corner. Tap it, and you’ll be
New tweet screen with the scrolling menu of most used terms
presented with a list of your friends (people that you follow) that you can scroll through and add one at a time by hitting the + button to the side. It may not be practical if you have a rather large list of people you follow due to scrolling through a large list, but it may be of more use to people that follow less people. Though it seems to keep everyone that you have followed in the past as well. I notice scrolling through that the usernames of people I’ve unfollowed still remain in this list. So it’s something nice, but not exactly practical.
Another major feature of Twittelator is that you can view previews of tweets with pictures (from services like twitpic). It’s very nice to see small previews of photos because sometimes you’ll click to see a photo and maybe you won’t be amused or whatever it may be. With this feature, you can now see pictures that you would want to see instead of being forced to click it, wait for it to load, only to be disappointed.
To view the picture in full size, simply tap it and it will take you to the twitpic page, or whatever other photo hosting service, where you can zoom in/out with pinch gestures. You also get several options when viewing a twitpic page. You can open it in Safari, Email the link, Copy the link, open any link (manually input the URL), or go back/cancel. The way Twittelator Pro handles picture tweets is amazing and much better than other Twitter apps.
In the Settings section, you’ll find a plethora of things to tweak to your liking. How many tweets to load on launch, themes (three themes for now), various options for reading and writing tweets, even Retweet options. Choose from five different link shortening services and get some options for your GPS and Location settings. Photo uploading services? You’re covered with four different services! You can even have high resolution photos (on/off) and clear the image cache. Want more constant refreshes or slower refreshes to avoid hitting the rate limit? You can choose to have auto-refresh on and set the time interval to your liking. And if you don’t like the sound, you can turn that off too. Even settings for subgroups, warnings, Instapaper, and even a Safari bookmarklet.
The last tab is the ‘More’ section, and there are tons of additional stuff for the power-Twitterer here.
Yes, you can manage multiple accounts with Twittelator Pro.You can search for a topic that interests you, look at your own updates, view the DMs that you have sent to others and create various subgroups for better tweet organization. Grouping seems to have become quite popular amongst Twitter users, especially those that want to keep track of their friends in a more organized way. Trends is a necessity in all twitter apps, and Twittelator doesn’t disappoint. If you care at all about the public timeline, you can view that as well. Care about the falling stock market? You can add and keep track of stocks too. View recent tweets from friends, bookmarks (instructions provided in app), favorites, log of Twittelator’s activity, Misc (random tweets? Can’t quite figure it out myself), and Saved (instructions provided in app).
This is an extremely powerful Twitter app for the iPhone. It has enough power to match that of a full-on desktop client, at least I believe it does. If you want an app that has more to offer than just the basics or are just a power-user, then Twittelator Pro is for you. The only thing that prevents it from being perfect is the speed and some lag, but the pros outweigh these minor cons.
Available in the iTunes App Store for $4.99.
4.5/5