Tag: app reviews

App Review – Day One

App Essentials for Writing

Day One is the focus of today’s app spotlight. It isn’t the best for long form writing, or any kind of publishing, but it makes an excellent private journal. Day One is available for free on iOS and Android devices.

With Daily Prompts, the ability to post images, videos, and audio, Day One is an incredibly robust application. Personally, I use it for a pic-a-day and shorter journaling exercises. I write across dozens of genres, so I have a lot of apps for writing. This is where my private thoughts go.

Day One offers one of the best daily prompt services. I don’t really use writing prompts often, but Day One’s are a step above the usual. It will also integrate with the WordPress mobile app Jetpack. Jetpack will show prompts from Day One on the opening page. There are also tons of stats(see the image above) that track all kinds of stuff, and some excellent widgets for your Home Screen.

Day One is available for free, but if you can afford the $35/yearly, it’s worth it too.

I’ve been using it for 5 years now. I’ve paid for the premium for 2 of those years. Premium is certainly the way to go, but it’s not necessarily the best choice for everyone. The way I post my entries in it doesn’t really require the premium features. In the past I’ve paid just to support the dev team, because they are great, and constantly updating.

  • Jack Lhasa

iOS App Review: Writerly

App Essentials for Writing


Writerly Review

Writerly is a full writing class available on iOS. The amount of free content is large and insightful. The full paid version requires 3 purchases of $1.99 twice and $0.99 once. And it’s totally worth the low price. 

Writerly assumes you are new to writing, but there is something here for everyone. There are definitely some concepts that are new to me, and writing is kinda my whole life. Writerly is also great as a refresher. 

Creative writing can be beneficial in many ways. First off, it’s an emotional outlet. Writing can help you take control of your emotional situations. Writing fiction is enjoyable, and it provides a source of entertainment and learning for others(hopefully).  

Writing poetry can be very tough, or very smooth.  Sometimes in poetry, the beauty is in what was not said. Also, exercising your creativity within the constraints of many poetry disciplines means there is always room to grow. 

Writerly is like a full college textbook, focusing entirely on what you can do to learn to write, or leveling up your current writing techniques. 

A quick rundown of the features:

  • Available on iOS, iPadOS, and MacOS
  • great ways to build writing habits and overcome writers’ block
  • a full suite of generators for mood, characters, appearance, Journeys and more.
  • Timer & progress tracker for writing exercises
  • Widgets!
  • Fully adjustable fonts
  • Fully encrypted, truly private
  • regular updates
  • Paid options aren’t subscriptions, they are one time purchases.
  • Linear progress for beginners, mix-n-match options for experienced writers.

This app sold me on its upgrades while I was still going through the free content. I’m loathe to spend money on most things, because I generally don’t like have it, but this tool was worth it.

iOS App Review: Miji

Miji App Review

Miji is a database of AI images and the prompts used to create them. Includes prompts for s variety of AI art applications, and allows the editing of a prompt to save your changes.

The directory is far from expansive. It feels like something that could be updated with a simple RSS feed, to create a robust reference library. Also, the most common AI model that the prompts come for is MidJourney. Personally, I was bored with MidJourney after about a week’s use.

In my opinion, MidJourney and Dall-E are overused and they underperform. Similar to the OpenAI products GPT & Stable Diffusion, the models are very popular, but in reality, they are the low end of machine learning.

The prompts the app uses are extremely basic. This app might be good for someone new to AI image generation/editing, but experienced users are unlikely to find much of use.

The developers’ website was down at the time of this writing.

All-in-all, I don’t recommend this app. It might be worth looking through, but its usefulness will run thin quite quickly.

  • Jack Lhasa

App Reviews

I’ll be posting a lot of iOS app reviews soon. I’m always trying new apps. Even if what I currently use is perfect, I’m still looking for more. I’m going to take this constant curiosity and make it useful for other people. This will include some very popular apps, as well as some niche-perfect apps. Some will be paid, but most will offer a free plan as well.

NOTE: No apps by X or Meta will ever be covered in any way. I don’t support the exploitation of social media by technocrats and oligarchs. There will also be no applications from OpenAI. I see OpenAI as the worst choice out of thousands, and won’t waste my time with it.

Here’s a list of some apps I’ll be reviewing in the coming weeks:

  • Day One
  • Drafts
  • Obsidian
  • Scrivener
  • Camp Fire Creators
  • Jetpack
  • Logseq
  • Mythulu Creation Cards
  • Notebook.ai
  • Perplexity
  • Claude AI
  • Google Gemini
  • Microsoft CoPilot
  • Le Chat by Mistral AI
  • rubra – Bookmark Manager
  • Mynders
  • OneTap Note
  • WonderPen
  • Miji: AI Art Prompt Templates
  • Surreal
  • SpellAI
  • PixAI
  • StarryAI
  • Rainbow Wallet
  • Zerion
  • Xverse
  • Lobstr
  • Gallery Labs
  • Snapseed
  • Ente Photos
  • Opera Mobile
  • Wombat
  • Characterize
  • Lists for Writers
  • Dictionary.com
  • LIFEguide
  • Language Tool
  • Spike
  • WonderPen
  • Documents by Readdle
  • StoryCraft
  • Name Dice
  • Article Rewriter
  • Crate
  • Fabric
  • ++ More….

All of the above apps I either use regularly, or I’ve just come across and will be testing as I review. So, new blog article type: iOS App Reviews!

I will provide links for each of these apps when I do the actual review.

Jack Lhasa

((UPDATED on 04/0542025))