Alert Thingy 1.2

I’ve just now had time to upgrade Alert Thingy to the new version that was just released today - Alert Thingy 1.2, which I discovered thanks to Steven’s FriendFeed Watch blog. I’m really impressed with how fast they put out the new version - it seems the app was only released yesterday. I’m also pleased to see that version 1.2 has some of the features that I wanted.

The biggest change in version 1.2 is, of course, the built in Twitter support. Using the "Tweet" button, you can send out tweets via Alert Thingy. For people who follow everyone in FF that they follow in Twitter, this means they can forgo their Twitter client (like Twhirl) and just use Alert Thingy instead. However, I’m not one of those people, so I’m still using both apps. However, if Alert Thingy would allow me to view my full Twitter stream, I could definitely see myself moving to just the one app.

The other big change in this newest version is the skinning ability. Many people had complained about the dark coloring and light text. Now, there are 5 themes available to choose from, including a perky "FriendFeed Blue" (pictured).

Now I’m just patiently waiting for version 1.3, which hopefully will integrate Twitter (including replies and directs, please!). They would also have to integrate Twhirl’s other features like shortened URL support and TwitPic, too, to really compete with Twhirl. And finally, the ability to send comments back via Twitter would make Alert Thingy nearly perfect. I have a feeling we’ll see all these options in time, but I can hardly stand the wait.