The TweetDeck App is the best Twitter client on the iPhone! That is saying something seeing there are a gazillion (more than a billion) to choose from! Twitterific is also a very popular twitter client, but you have to pay to use the desktop version (the one that you use on your computer) or deal with pesky adds! Neither of which I am big on! Furthermore, Tweetdeck allows you to sync your settings from the desktop version of Tweetdeck to the iPhone version! That is just one of the features that Tweetdeck boasts lets check the rest of them out!

As you open Tweetdeck there is a column labeled All Friends: IURabah (it will have whatever username is active here). This is a common theme for the app as you can add as many columns as you like (I am sure there is a limit I just havent hit it yet, I have 8 columns). The way the app works is that it features columns that you can add or remove very easily. Each column contains the tweets related to the filter you set. For example, the column All Friends: IURabah (thats my twitter name if you want to follow me) will show all the tweets from all of my friends (A Friend is the same as following someone).

*Notice the updates tab this will show you the tweets you have missed, including DM’s, and mentions

All Friends Column Screen

To navigate from column to column is incredibly easy! All you do is click the Columns button in the middle of the screen at the bottom. This will zoom out of the current column you selected and allow you to flick back and forth between columns (just like flicking thru pictures) with the corresponding title at the top! Whats nice is each column shows a preview of the tweets it contains!

Zoomed Out Screen when switching columns

Now you know how to navigate the columns, let learn how to add and remove them! As you can see from the screen-shot above there is a “+ ” sign in the middle of the screen at the bottom with Add Column under it. Press this button and up pops a screen asking you which column type: Twitter or Facebook. If you choose Twitter a screen will then ask you to choose which user (tweetdeck supports multiple twitter accounts, so does twitterfic). Under that is a choice of column type, the choices include:

All Friends – shows tweets from all your friends

Mentions - shows tweets that contain @yourusername, i.e. someone tweets “@IURabah Bob Knight is god!”

Direct Messages – Shows all the DM’s you receive in this column, when you send some body a direct message is only visible to that user, this is particularly nice when communicating sensitive info, such as phone numbers or email addresses

Favorites – Shows all tweets that have been favorited under the active twitter account (remember you can switch accounts right above )

Twitter Trends – Creates a search column from a Twitter Trend. Click the button View Trends to choose which trend you would like to view.

Tweets Nearby – Creates a column that shows all the tweets within a 1 – 20 mile radius set by the slider. You can even attach an optional query to this. For example, set the radius to 20 mi and add “sushi” to the query. This column will then show you every tweet in a 20 mile radius of you that contains the word sushi.

Sent DM’s - This column shows all the DM’s you have sent to other users from the selected acct (remember this is easily changed by choosing a different twitter account from above)

Twitter Lists – This allows you to create a column based on your Twitter lists, they are basically groups for Twitter. This is a more advanced feature so if you aren’t interested I won’t bore you, but if you are here is a great article explaining them and two websites where you can obtain pre-made lists: How to Use Twitter Lists Two great website to find Twitter Lists: Listorious and TweetMeme

User Group – This is sort of an on the go Twitter List. You can add specific people to your User Group, Name that group and that column will contain tweets from only the people you selected. You can also download the user groups from the Tweetdeck server if you have an account with them (which I suggest you do and I ll show you how to later on in the post)

Twitter Search – This column will house all the tweets related to the search terms you provide. For example, if I used the search terms “Peyton Manning” the tweets in this column will be tweets that contain “Peyton Manning” in them! Again you are also able to download your previous searches from the server by pressing the Get from Server button.

Add Column Screen for Twitter

* You can change which twitter account and which column to add by pressing the arrows or the actual button itself…i.e. User Group

The next choice you have if you didn’t choose Twitter, was Facebook. The only two choices you have for the Facebook type column are Full News feed and Group. The full news feed provides just that, a full newsfeed of all your facebook friends in the column (very similar to the Facebook news feed). The Group choice allows you to narrow that news feed to select users that you designate. You can also name this group or download a previously setup group from TweetDeck’s server by pressing Get From Server.

So what if I add a column and realize I don’t like it and want to remove it? No worries! At anytime in the zoomed out screen just click the little Cog icon in the top right corner of the column and up pops the settings screen for this column! From here you can do a number of things: Delete Column, Change Refresh Rate (20 seconds – 2000 seconds), Change the column location (press the page order button to move the location of the column with the arrow, the current location is given by the dot indicator), if the column is a group or list the options to  Edit Group Name and Edit Group Members will also show up on this screen.

Column Settings Screen for a Group Column I made named “Minimalists”

Now that you know how to comb thru everyone else’s tweets, it is time to show you how to submit your own tweets! First, you need a Twitter account! Don’t fight it people its here to stay get one have fun with it ! Go here to sign up ! I would also encourage getting a TweetDeck account and downloading their desktop version its awesome and FREE!

Get Tweet Deck Account here Download Desktop Version here

*The TweetDeck Account is great because you can setup everything on your desktop then just sync your columns and you won’t have asymmetric settings anymore!

Now that you have your accounts all setup, press on the Settings tab, the cog icon on the bottom (you must be in the zoomed out view). Press Manage Accounts and Add Twitter Account input your Twitter credentials and you are ready to Tweet!

From this screen you can also add more Twitter Accounts by repeating the above steps (I have a personal one and one for Way2hype: IURabah and Way2Hypecom. Follow Me!). Also, if you choose to add Facebook columns this is where you need to enter your credentials! From this screen you can also add your TweetDeck credentials, bit.ly credentials and if you scroll down to the bottom of the TweetDeck Account & Settings Screen you can designate which account is your default if you have multiple accounts.

*bit.ly is a website that allows you to track the links you post

A few more things, if you press the Settings button you will be able to choose between two themes: Dark and Light. The Dark Theme is displayed in the Zoomed Out Screen when switching columns Screen Shot above and the Light Theme is displayed in the All Friends Column Screen Shot.

*You can also choose the Picture Service used to tweet your photos, the default is twitpic, which I like, but if you use yfrog or tweetphoto this is where you switch

Change Theme Confirmation Screen

The two other sections in the Settings Screen are General and Geotagging. The General settings includes the following options with an on/off switch: turning sound, pop-up alerts, show real names, shake refresh, disable Photo Scale, Column Arrows (when in column view there are arrows at the bottom corners of the screen to use for navigation if you don’t want to flick thru the screens), Load All Tweets on Startup. The Geotagging settings are as follows: Geotagging Enabled, GPS Location Accuracy to 100 meters (there is a slider that allows for Best GPS Location Accuracy and goes all the way to 3 Km accuracy, if you don’t want people to know exactly where you are tweeting from).

Ok Finally I am going to show you how to tweet for real! There are two screens that you can tweet from the zoomed out column screen and the column screen. There is a subtle yellow pen and paper icon in the top right hand corner. Press this and you are brought the tweet creation screen. From here you able to choose what account the tweet is published from by pressing on the buttons of the corresponding accounts to the right of From (you can publish from multiple accounts just press the acct name and make sure it is highlight blue, just press again to not publish to that account and the acct name will turn gray).

Tweet Creation Screen – only publishing from IURabah

From here you are also able to to send tweets @ people very easily by pressing the person + icon. This populates a list of all the people you follow and can be sorted alphabetically or by popularity (the most recent person you sent an @ tweet will be on the top). If you press the  # button this will allow you to insert any hash tags you have used. A # is just like labeling a tweet making it easier for others interested in that content to find. For example, if I tweeted “Tom Crean brings a 6 banner to assembly!! #Indiana Basketball” anyone who searches for #Indiana Basketball will see this tweet. The # tag list can be sorted the exact same way as the @ list ( person + icon button).

*Checkout the article if you are still confused for it provides a much more in-depth explanation, Hash Tags -#

The last four buttons perform the following actions when pressed:

The arrows with the chain shorten the link inserted into your tweet helping you conserve those precious characters! A tweet may not exceed 140 characters! There is a helpful opaque counter on the right hand side of the screen midway up that will help you keep track!

The camera button allows you to insert photos and videos into your tweet! You have the option of tweeting previously taken photos/videos that are saved in your library or tweet new videos/photos by pressing on the Take Picture or Take Video buttons! Tweetdeck then uses your photo service (twitpic is the default) and inserts a link to your Photo or video!

*TweetDeck also lets you know there a photo attached to a tweet by the subtle “1 photo with this status” in the bottom left corner of the tweet

The bullseye button allows you to add a Google Maps link to your tweet so your followers know your location! This is obviously if you turned Geo-Tagging on in the settings.

Insert Location Screen from Tweet Creation Screen

* If Geo Tagging is turned on for that tweet you will see the bullseye have a yellow pin in the middle indicating Geo Tags will be sent with the tweet.

The last button, the keyboard with the arrow just toggles the screen from portrait to landscape orientations (portrait is default),  making it easier to enter those longer tweets!

Now all you do is press send and your 1st tweet with tweetdeck will be enshrined in the Library of Congress! Way to be a part of history!

The last two things I forgot to mention were the updates button located on the bottom right corner when in the zoomed out view and column view. When pressed this button will show you the exact number of updates(tweets), Direct Messages, and Mentions you have that are unread. Whats great too is that they are categorized by account! The last button, More (ironic it comes at the end of the post) allows for a Quick Follow. So if you know someone’s twitter name just type it in here and you are following them! Also it allows you to see people’s locations if you press the View on Map button (they must provide geo tags with in their for this to work).

Well thats it folks! If you made it thru this monster post you should be an expert on Twitter and TweetDeck. The desktop version is very similar and almost all the functionality in the iPhone app is present in the desktop version!

As you can see the TweetDeck app is jam packed with every feature you could think of and they are all easy and intuitive to use and that is why it is part of the Way2Hype iPhone Starter Kit! Everyone have fun and tweet away! Below are the download links to TweetDeck and Twitterific because I encourage you to try both!

Download Tweetdeck iPhone App

Download Twitterific iPhone App

Download Twitterific Pro iPhone App

What is your favorite iPhone Twitter Client?

What is your favorite Desktop Twitter Client?

Do you use Twitter?

Leave some love in the comments below if you want or you can just tweet to Way2hypecom!