With Ember having become abandonware (it's not even listed anymore on the Products menu on the Realmac site), I've been looking for alternative digital scrapbooks — not many pickings out there (I wonder why, no real demand? Do people largely rely on Pinterest?) — and I've been using trials of Pixave and Inboard. Pixave clearly seems to be taking on Pixa and Ember in terms of features, has a responsive developers, and quite a few bugs. Inboard has a fraction of the features of Pixave, costs twice as much, makes images easily accessible by storing them in its library a folder (not in a proprietary format like Pixave does), and is built by a very small development team (hence response time may vary).
I do like Inboard — I like its simplicity, its Pinterest-like layout, its performance (even with a few hundred images, scrolling is smooth and rendering is near immediate and I've seen a forum post where one users says he has thousands of images in the library and it still performs as it should). For whole page web snaps I've been using the ol' Paparazzi, but Inboard (and Pixave) handles full-page web snaps well and I like that these snaps are displayed in full length in the Inboard Library (rather than in a Finder folder), which makes for a nice browsing/(re)discovery experience.
Inboard has been designed with simplicity in mind (I don't think it will ever have close to the features that Ember had or Pixave currently has), but there certainly is room for improvement. For example, what would make it better (and help make workflows more efficient):
* Adding more options for screen grabs in the menu bar helper menu: Capture Area, Capture Window, Capture Fullscreen
* Putting the Tag group into its own tab (like Together does) so Folders and Tags are not on the same pane (which can get busy quickly)
* Adding Smart Folder and Live Folder options
* Making it so that one can drag one or more items from the Untagged folder (quasi Inbox) to an existing tag and that tag is then applied.
* Providing some basic annotation tools/features
* Letting users move the library to a (local) location of their choice
* Supporting multiple libraries (icing on the cake)
* MOST IMPORTANLY: Cloud sync (Davis, one of the developers, told me its their priority right now, but he couldn't provide an ETA yet).
Although not as ambitious in scope as Pixave, Inboard might get its place in my workflow, once the above—especially some form of cloud sync—are addressed. It’s a really great start for a simple digital scrapbook app that not only performs well but also lets users quickly work with their inspirational source captures. Four stars for what it does based on what it appears to be designed for (not for what it should be in my or other user's minds).
My only hesitation to buy: the price; having been burnt both by Pixa and Ember, I don't want to waste yet more money on an app that may become abandonware (I have no idea how committed the developer team of this app is, but I suspect their company - Regular SIA - may not be their only source of income and commitment). Still, my first impressions after working with this app for a little over a week are very favorable (I've been testing both Pixave and Inboard).