Just Updated! iForgot Version 1.4.1 (Jan 21st, 2008)
Our popular remote control application for your Mac has been updated with a few Leopard fixes! iForgot allows you to control your Mac using chat messages to iChat or using emails from your iPhone®, cell phone, work email, web mail, BlackBerry®, Palm®, or other email- or chat-capable handheld device. iForgot gives you the ability to control your Mac from any device capable of chat or email! Send a message home to search for a document, launch a custom AppleScript or application of your choosing, or retrieve a picture taken with your computer's iSight or DV camera to keep an eye on things at home or on your desk. Try iForgot...the unlimited range remote for your Mac! Click on the banner to the right to download a free evaluation copy now.
What is iForgot?
iForgot is like a remote control for your Mac, but with unlimited range! Using any device with email or text messaging capability, iForgot will interpret commands and respond to your requests. iForgot is just what you need when you realize you forgot to do something on your computer. With the new iSight Snapshot feature, you can see what your Mac sees, no matter where you are! Send a command from a webmail account to take an iSight snapshot and in minutes, you can see a date-stamped image from your Mac's camera. Check out the iForgot blog for more information.
What do I need to use iForgot?
Simply, all you need is a device that can send email to your computer. If you have a cell phone with SMS or text messaging and can send a message to your home email address, you can use iForgot. Have a BlackBerry or other handheld device with email? You can use it with iForgot. If you have any doubt, just use your device to send a message to your home email address. If you can read a return email address, you can set up iForgot to control your Mac from your portable electronic device. Check this iForgot Help page for the email format for your cell phone.
What can it do?
Did you forget to launch iTunes or iPhoto to enable music or picture sharing? Send a simple iForgot command to launch either one. Forget that you need a document at work, but you left it on your home computer? Send an iForgot command to your home computer to send the file to your work email account. Did you just remember that document you saved at home that your friend might be interested in reading? Send an iForgot command to search your computer using Spotlight to find it and send it to your friend's email account. Need to fax a document from your computer? iForgot can do that for you, too.
iForgot is a Universal Mac OS X application that watches your email for commands from your remote email account. Configure iForgot to watch for commands from your cell phone, BlackBerry, handheld or work computer. iForgot interprets the commands and responds to your requests. Built-in security features ensure that iForgot only responds to emails from accounts you authorize, and to prevent forged emails, responses are forwarded only to accounts that you allow. Using the best technologies provided by Apple, iForgot is the perfect enhancement for your mobile life. You never know when you're going to need it...
iForgot is Universal
Built for today's Macs powered by Intel or PowerPC chips. iForgot takes advantage of some advanced features of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and will be ready to power you through the future, whether it's Mac OS X 10.5 or the much anticipated Apple iPhone. Get iForgot now to take advantage of the rumored features of the Apple iPhone.
How Does it Work?
Let's see some examples. You configured iForgot to accept mails from your cell phone by entering your cell phone's email address. Say that you're using Sprint PCS, and so you entered your 10 digit phone number, followed by "@messaging.sprintpcs.com". You also entered your default email address that you'll want to receive responses, which is your work email address, say for example "work@mac.com". You also set the security settings that allow you to use either your work email address or cell phone to send iForgot commands to your home computer.
Example 1 (A Rather Lazy Example)
You're on the patio using your laptop and you want to open a photo album that's on your computer upstairs, but you forgot to launch iPhoto. You grab your cell phone and text the following message to your home computer's email address:
ifgt ip
Your phone sends the command in an email to your home computer. iForgot reads the message and sees the "ifgt" entry, meaning this is an iForgot message. "ip" is the command to launch iPhoto and since this message came from your authorized cell phone, iForgot launches iPhoto for you. A few minutes after sending the message, the iPhoto albums from your home computer are available on your laptop, and you never had to leave your patio chair.
Example 2 (A Common Dorm Room Example)
You are in the dorms and are trying to convince your roommate that "Wet Sand" from the Red Hot Chili Peppers album Stadium Arcadium should be the next hot single. Unfortunately, you dashed out of your room without launching iTunes and don't feel like hiking up three flights of stairs, so you send this message to your Mac's email account:
Again, iForgot recognizes this as a valid command and launches iTunes. In a few minutes, your neighbor agrees that "Wet Sand" is sweet, but he doesn't listen to the radio anymore, and so doesn't really care what song they pick to play next.
Example 3 (Homework...unfortunately)
You started your assignment at home and got a pretty good start on it, but when you went to school on Monday, you forgot to download the document on your iPod, so you'll have to either start over, or waste the gas to drive all the way home. Luckily, you've got your cell phone and iForgot:
ifgt fi -f Homework Essay 2
iForgot sees that you want it to find ("fi") the file ("-f") with the words "Homework", "Essay", and "2" in the title. iForgot uses SpotLight to search your computer's hard drive and finds several files that might be what you're looking for. iForgot sends the following message back to your cell phone to ask which file you want:
iForgot: Query Results - text 'ifgt ###' to confirm.
311: Homework Essay 2.doc
312: Physics Essay (Homework #2).doc
313: An Essay on Excessive Homework (2-5-06).pdf
314: Homework #2 - Physics Lab Essay.pdf
Luckily, the first item in the list is what you're looking for. To prevent anyone from sending commands and getting documents from your computer, a short random number is generated for each item in the list. Since you want the first item in the list, you reply with the following command:
ifgt 311
iForgot receives your confirmation and completes the original request by sending the file to you.
Example 4 (Advanced Search and Email Forwarding)
You need a document on your home computer, but can't remember what the file is named, and you need to send it to your gmail account. You whip out your cell phone and send the following command to iForgot:
ifgt fi yourmail@gmail.com -c documented cases of ufo abductions
iForgot reads the message and uses SpotLight to find ("fi") the file that has the content ("-c") "documented cases of ufo abductions". Again, iForgot replies with the results of your query back to your cell phone to ask which document you really want:
iForgot: Query Results - text 'ifgt ###' to confirm.
561: What Happened That Night.doc
562: Twelve Cows Reported Missing.html
563: Amazing UFO Stories.pdf
564: Lights Spotted Above Phoenix.html
You reply with ifgt 563 to get "Amazing UFO Stories.pdf", and iForgot sends the document to your gmail account.
iForgot Release Notes
- Version 1.4
- Added the ability to process commands via iChat
- Added an iSight command, which will capture and send a snapshot using your home computer's built-in or a digital camera attached via FireWire.
- Minor revisions
- Revised the help files
- Version 1.3
- Added the ability to process commands using plain English so commands are easier to remember. User can now send longer plain-language commands when using computer-based email. Shortened texting-friendly commands still work for use from cell phones and handhelds
- Minor revisions
- Revised the help files
- Version 1.2
- Added the ability to command your computer to take remote iSight snapshots and send them to remote devices
- Improved formatting options for the Email Summary command
- Corrected a bug where certain email address formats were ignored, causing iForgot to ignore valid commands from external email addresses like gMail and Yahoo!
- Revised the help files
- Enhanced the logging ability for a few more iForgot actions
- Corrected other minor bugs
- Version 1.1
- Added an option to increase the number of items returned by a Spotlight search
- Added logging ability for all iForgot actions
- Improved Spotlight search performance when searching by file name
- Added an option to launch custom commands without confirmation
- Added an option to set the number returned from remote Spotlight searches from 5 to 20
- Version 1.0
- Initial release
