We’ve written quite a lot about calendar apps here at ProfHacker; this post and this one from a few months later are just two examples. We’ve also run a post on getting good weather information on the go.
I’ve often thought it would be great to have an app that gathers into one place all (or at least most) of the information I need at the start of each day—and what I’ve had in mind is something like the Daily Briefing app for Samsung Android phones.
This past week, I found an app that takes care of most of those Daily Briefing functions for me: Cue. When I open it up, it gives me a quick overview of my day, providing a weather forecast and current temperature, sunrise and sunset times, and any events that it finds in my linked calendars. If anyone’s mentioned by name in an event, it will search through my linked accounts (e.g., GMail, Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn), and will provide me with additional information about that person and any recent communication we may have had. It will also remind me each day of any birthdays, which is handy because I have a tendency to forget.
The accounts I use most frequently, and whose information I’d want in my timeline (e.g., Google Calendar, GMail, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Dropbox, Google Contacts), are free to link to Cue. Others (such as Evernote, Basecamp, or Campfire) require an upgrade to Cue’s premium service, which is $4.99/month or $49.99/year).
As good as it is (and I’ve been using it for about a week and really liking it thus far), there are a few things to be aware of. First, as the folks over at LifeHacker point out in their review, Cue works only with cloud services. Second, it’s only available for iOS (a web version is in the works). Finally, in order to do its job, Cue needs access to a lot of information, which means it needs access to your accounts. It’s worth reading their privacy policy before deciding whether this is an app you want to use.
Do you like being able to see your entire day with the kind of format and function Cue provides? If you’ve tried Cue or a similar app, let us know what you think in the comments.
[Creative Commons licensed Flickr photo by the author.]