Author: Jonathan Seff

Editor’s note: The following review is part of Macworld’s GemFest 2014. Every day (except weekends) from July until September, the Macworld staff will use the Mac Gems blog to briefly cover a standout free, low-cost, or great-value program. You can view a list of this year’s apps, updated daily, on our handy GemFest chart, and you can visit the Mac Gems homepage for past Mac Gems reviews.

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I’ll be the first to admit that it’s difficult to get excited by a smartphone mount. It sticks to something and holds your phone—whoopie. But I’ve been using iMagnet’s $25 iMagnet Mount for Smartphone for a while, and I’m impressed.

Instead of a standard rubbery suction cup, the iMagnet mount uses a sticky, silicone-gel cup that stays on remarkably well and, in my testing, attaches to more surface types than regular suction cups. The mount doesn’t leave a mark when you remove it, and you can wash the gel surface if it gets dirty to restore its Dyson-like suction power. The mount worked equally well on the windshield and dashboard of my car, as well as on my kitchen counter and cabinets.

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One of the best things about Dropbox is how super easy the service makes it to share files with others—even if they don’t use Dropbox. Rick Waalders’ $2 Dragshare for Dropbox (Mac App Store link) makes the process even easier. Depending on how you work and how often you share files, Dragshare may be worth the small price tag.

Install Dragshare and it adds a systemwide menu-bar icon that looks like a drop of water. Link the software with your Dropbox account, and you then can share files by simply dragging them—either a single file or group of files—to that icon. When you do, Dragshare copies the data to its folder inside your Dropbox folder (Dropbox/Apps/Dragshare)—if you dragged multiple files, Dragshare first creates a zip archive—and then presents you with a popover sheet with three options.

From the sheet, you can choose to open the item on the Dropbox website in your browser, email a short Dropbox sharing link (with the subject “Share file: [file name]”) using your default mail client, or share the link on Facebook or Twitter. (You can opt, in the app’s preferences, to not see these sharing options each time.) You can bring up this same sharing sheet at any time by simply choosing an item from Dragshare’s menu—the apps lists recently shared files.

Unfortunately, you can’t currently drag a folder of files to Dragshare—in fact, attempting to do so severs the Dropbox connection and presents you with an error message. The developer says folder sharing will be fixed in the next update.

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