There are plenty of clients available for all kinds of platforms out there beside the official Twitter clients. Now Talon for Twitter is one of the newest clients, trying to get attention within the Twitter community.
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| Talon for Android in the Play Store. |
Talon for Twitter
Talon for Twitter is one of the newest Twitter clients available, packed with lots of features, settings and a very clear, structured appearance.
Some of the features:
- Live streaming support
- Support for 2 accounts
- Timeline split up in different blocks (timeline, mentions, messages, links, pictures)
- Favorite users
- Different themes (light, dark, black and even custom themes)
- Night mode
- Auto-Refresh options
- Different notification settings
- Some kind of listener (called Talon Pull)
- Inline view for pictures
- Widgets (for desktop and lockscreen)
- In-app browser
- and many, many more ...
I will just highlight a few of this features a bit more detailed.
Timeline
The main screen shows the timeline where most things are happening. With the portraits of the authors shown on the left it's very easy to keep track on who is talking (or in this case writing). The newest messages are on top and the indicator on the bottom shows the current amount of unread posts.
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| Timeline main screen. |
Swiping to the next screen on the right shows the Mentions screen. This is where all mentions are collected so it's easier to keep track of and response to them.
Another swipe to the next screen on the right will show the Direct Messages. Easy to guess, direct messages are shown here. ;-)
To the left side of the main screen a screen with messages including pictures is shown. Once more in that direction will show a list with posts containing links.
Pressing and holding on a post for a moment will open up the quick options to reply or re-tweet.
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| Re-tweet or share by long press. |
Tweet details
Opening up the details for a tweet by short clicking on it will open a window like view with the message and it's embedded content.
Just like the timeline-screens, the presentation of a tweet is split in different screens that can be accessed by swiping right or left.
The tweet itself is shown in the main part of this details view. Embedded content like YouTube videos or webpages are shown to the left, discussion and conversation are shown to the right.
In the tweet details view you can also answer directly as the @-Tag is already been placed in the text field.
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| Tweet details. |
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| Webpage preview within the tweet details. |
Search
Of course you can execute searches as well as in every other Twitter client.
The search function also includes a history of your searches for faster access to them again.
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| Search history. |
Interactions
Swiping in from the right border of the screen will drag in a menu with interactions. Basically this contains all tweets mentioning you, direct messages and all the tweets of people that are assigned to be favorite users. This way its easy to follow the communications that are important to you and keep track on them. Also once your done with an interaction it will disappear or you can choose to set them all done at once. They still will be available as in this view there is a folder type object, called "All Interactions" that just holds all of them so nothing is lost.
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| Interactions. |
Main menu
Swiping in from the left (or pressing the top left Talon symbol) will open the main menu. This holds the different parts of your timeline and a bit more.
- Timeline
- Mentions
- Direct Messages
- Trending
- Lists
- Favorite Users
- Retweets
- Favorite Tweets
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| Main menu. |
Creating a tweet
Of course, a Twitter client without the option to create tweets wouldn't make much sense. In the top right corner, next to the spyglass is the symbol to create a tweet.
When creating a tweet there are also options to attach pictures or your location as well as to insert @-tags from people your in contact with directly form a list without the need to type in the correct tag.
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| Create a tweet with attach options. |
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| Choose a contact to add the @-tag directly form the list. |
Settings
In the top right corner you will also find the settings. The settings menu shows a very structured settings interface where you can adjust so many things that I will not list them here, just go there and explore it ;-)
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| Settings main menu. |
Night mode
One more really cool feature I want to showcase, the night mode.
Within the settings menu in the Theme Settings you can pick a Night Mode. For this you can set start and end time for the night mode as well as which theme should be shown during this time.
For myself I like to use a light theme at day time and a dark theme in the night. This way I have less issues with reflections in day time and not such a bright shining contrast at night time.
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| Light theme that I use at day time. |
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| Dark theme that I use at night time. |
Conclusion
There would be much more I could tell you about Talon for Twitter but it might become a bit long and boring to list all it's features. Best is to explore it yourself.
For me, Talon for Twitter is one of the best (if not the best) Twitter clients I have ever used. Long time I did not really use Twitter at all but with Talon I got the fun of Twitter back as well as a lot more use with the clear and structured layout. My behavior has changed so I consume a lot more news now with Talon for Twitter instead of the news apps and readers I was using before.
Just take a look to build your own opinion, I am sure you will not regret it.
By the way, besides my Google+ profile you can also find me on Twitter now more often again by the tag @jendit_de.
