Sixpoint: Anatomy of a Nanokeg

This is a very good page from Sixpoint, explaining the information on their cans, which they call nanokegs.  I always wondered what SRM was.  Also very cool web design.

Tappd That iPhone App

In my iPhone Beer Apps Suck article, I talked about the sad landscape of iOS beer apps.  It hasn’t gotten much
better.  One app I talked about was Untappd.  It’s improved a lot since that article, but is still pretty clunky to use.  It’s probably the best they can do using PhoneGap.  In the limited personal time I have, I’ve tried to learn Objective C so I could make the native iPhone apps I want that don’t exist.  Fortunately I no longer have to make one for Untappd; Greg Fiumara created Tappd That.

Tappd That is not a complete replacement for the Untappd app, but it was never meant to be.  It won’t show you what your friends and others are drinking, but it does, and very well, what I consider the essential (personal) functions of Untappd: check in beers, see your checkin history, and your entire list of unique beers.  It also shows your wish list and past venues you’ve checked into.  The lists are all saved locally on your iPhone, and searchable. This is huge for people like me who live in a place like NYC, where we’re often either underground or with a crappy signal. Not only does this mean that you can view your data without a signal, but it makes for even faster checkins, if it’s a beer you’ve already had.  This is a real time saver when checking into a beer at a bar, so you can do it as quickly and easily as possible. But even it’s a new-toTappd That beer, it’s still way faster and sleeker to check in than the Untappd app. When time is short, the Untappd app can be a frustration.

When you open the app, you’re presented with four options: Check In, Distinct Beer, Wish List, and Venues. To check in a beer in the “Check In” section, you tap on the little arrow for your beer.  There you have the standard options to rate the beer,  add a venue and check in via Foursquare, and send the checkin to Twitter and/or Facebook.  Tappd That takes your defaults for those options from your Untappd settings, which you can of course override if you don’t want to check into any of those services.  Tapping on a beer itself from the list will drop it down a little and show you your rating and the last time you checked it in. The “Distinct Beer” section has the same functionality for checking in, but tapping on a beer will show you your rating and the first time you checked it in.  That’s a very nice distinction due to the section it’s in.  This section will also show you the total count at the bottom.  The “Wish List” section is the same again, but tapping on a beer will show you your rating, which seems unnecessary since it’s on your wish list, and the date you added it. And lastly, the “Venues” section is very cool, though I rarely go in there.  Tapping on the arrow will show you the list of beers you’ve checked in at that venue.  Tapping on a beer itself from the root of the Venus section will show you the location of that venue and how many beers you’ve checked in there.

Greg has done a great job with Tappd That and it’s worth every bit of its $1.99.  I’ve been testing it for a while and he’s made some huge improvements in a relatively short time.  I’m confident that this app will continue to grow and improve. I still keep the Untappd app around for the social functions, but I find myself using Tappd That 90% of the time (maybe that means I’m antisocial).  Highly recommended.