Prowl: Get Any Growl Notifications Via Push On Your iPhone
Remember when you had to click on an application to make it active, and hit refresh in order to find out if anything new had happened? It’s been a long while now, since most desktop programs can run in the background and notify you when something requires your attention. The iPhone approximates that same functionality via the newly introduced push notification features, though apps aren’t actually running in the background, so special support is required from app developers to enable it.
As far as I’m concerned, push has already been a game-changer. My iPhone is now my dedicated IM client, lets me monitor any and all Blue Jays games no matter where I am, and keeps me on-task with my to-do list. But that’s not all. Thanks to a new app called Prowl ($2.99, iTunes link), my iPhone can keep me abreast of pretty much anything, via my Mac and a useful app many will already be familiar with, Growl.
Growl, in case you aren’t aware, is an open notification platform for OS X that supports a wide variety of applications. Basically, it alerts you via an on-screen pop-up and/or sound when one of its supported applications receives a message, finishes a task, and so on. So, for example, using a Mail plugin, I receive a Growl notification whenever I get an email, or when I’m mentioned or receive a DM on Twitter via Tweetie’s built-in Growl support. It’s a very handy tool to have, especially if you keep your dock hidden, as I do, or if you’re working with many different applications on multiple screens.
Now you can receive Growl notifications on your iPhone, too, in the form of push notifications, thanks to Prowl. I can’t even begin to explain how useful this could potentially be, depending on your usage. Already, I have it set up to notify me of new mail (which works better than Apple’s wn push mail, in my opinion, because it allows me to see the sender and some content of the received message), let me know when I receive new @ replies and DMs via Twitter (which I can then check out in Tweetie), and alert me whenever Transmission finishes downloading or seeding a torrent file.
Not only can Prowl alert you of whatever Growl can, but it can also receive custom alerts sent from a web interface. When you set up Prowl, you sign up for an account that’s necessary for syncing Growl on your computer with Prowl on your iPhone. Using that same login, you can go to the Prowl web site and send yourself messages. Any applicable content in that message will be automatically hot-linked, like emails and phone numbers. Very handy for sending a contact number to yourself for future reference.
Prowl is potentially the most effective application of push I’ve yet seen on the iPhone platform, especially if you’re already using Growl (which you should be). The best part is that it’s limited only by Growl itself, which is infinitely expandable, so long as developers keep supporting it. Probably the best $3 I’ve ever spent in the App Store.
Simon on July 6th, 2009 at 11:27 am
So Prowl requires a mac running somewhere? That’s a shame since I use a stationary pc most of the time and my macbook far less often.
Alex on July 6th, 2009 at 12:22 pm
Well duh. Growl is a Mac only app. So you need a Mac to use it.
You act like this is surprising?
Simon on July 6th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
Of course not. But I was hoping Prowl could use a standalone server instead of using a computer.
Ian Eiloart on October 2nd, 2009 at 2:48 am
From Prowl’s description in the app store: “Notifications from your Mac or Windows computer….”
Matt Legend Gemmell on July 6th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Actually, there’s a version of Growl for Windows too: http://www.growlforwindows.com/
Not sure it’s compatible with Prowl yet, but it’s at least feasible.
evan on July 6th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
it looks like you could interface directly with their website rather than use growl at all.
Neil Sweeney on July 6th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
Just downloaded and tested it. It’s rather cool!
Great for when I’m working at home and not sat at the iMac or laptop and a message comes through rather than having to check the screen every 5 minutes.
scifi451 on July 6th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
What IM application do you use that has push support? I am curious what the best IM application is, I am hesitant to buy any of the $10 chat apps, first off just dont think chat is worth paying that much and if it the app sucks, $10 is a lot to waste.
Simon on July 6th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
I bought Beejive long ago since I was pretty sure they would add push (which they did) and I really like it. I can only compare it to the free version of Palringo, but Beejive’s definately worth its price.
Alexander Kellett on July 6th, 2009 at 2:19 pm
to save you the trouble…
i’ve used beejive for the last year.
its horribly unreliable.
don’t bother.
get im+ with push.
it actually works, and has skype too.
Alex (who is quite pissed off with beejive because he paid the $14 starting price and it NEVER worked reliably enough for him to be comfortable using it for anything of any importance)
scifi451 on July 6th, 2009 at 2:20 pm
Alex thanks for the information! Also just looked today and IM+ is on sale right now for $4.99
ebbinator on July 6th, 2009 at 1:49 pm
So, if your mac has growl notifications set, but the computer is currently off (lets say its at home, and I go out to run errands), will those not be pushed, or will it be kept on a network somewhere and pushed anyway?
Richard Johansson on July 6th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
Since it requiers a client download for the Mac, it will only work if the computer is online. And thats the big turndown for me, since I only use a laptop thats asleep when im out running…
Richard Johansson on July 6th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
scifi451: Beejive is a great IM client with push. Im very happy with it.
Luke Amdor on July 6th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
According to http://prowl.weks.net/faq.php , you can use the perl script to send out notifications instead of relying on growl notifications. Easy scripting of push notifications ftw.
sskennel on July 6th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
Prowl sounds fabulous – I can’t wait to try it.
Just d/led Beejive today and have been exercising it. Seems to work very well.
romaindardour on July 6th, 2009 at 3:30 pm
Just finished setting up a sweet centralized server monitoring system using Prowl, that works really well it seems :
ruby-growl used in a few monitoring scripts on our linux servers,
notifies our in-house OSX server,
that in turn pushes alerts to iPhone.
Works wonderfully. This is quite a breaktrhough.
Let’s hope Prowl proves stable and then we can dump all other forms of notifications :)
Ryan on July 6th, 2009 at 5:50 pm
I’ve noticed some issues with the service lately. Hoping they will get it sorted out.
Brian Dunnington on July 6th, 2009 at 7:12 pm
for the few people who were interested in running this without a Mac – Prowl is already integrated into Growl for Windows and will be available in the next beta release (set to be publicly available in the next couple of days).
http://www.growlforwindows.com/prowl1.png
Carlos on July 6th, 2009 at 8:13 pm
I’m also having problems with this. Bought the app but my device never appears on the website. And no, my phone is not jailbroken (hacktivated).
Anyone else got it working?
Sajid Khan on July 7th, 2009 at 6:50 am
Bought this yesterday – works beautifully. I’ve got a couple of shell command scripts which call growlnotify, and this app just makes the entire process even nicer.
Really hoping that the 1.1 update will bring more polish to the user interface.
@Carlos – have you tried doing a hard reset?
Carlos on July 7th, 2009 at 7:36 am
Yeah… tried almost everything. Reinstalling the app, rebooting, enabling/disabling notifications (per app and general), but nothing makes it work.
But what drive me nuts is that other apps have push working, like AIM, IM+ and Rolando 2.
Still trying to figure out…
Sajid Khan on July 7th, 2009 at 10:54 am
Have you installed the actual prowl preference pane – and then set the notification to prowl?
Sajid Khan on July 7th, 2009 at 10:55 am
@Carlos – Also, do the notifications from the website work?
Carlos on July 7th, 2009 at 2:15 pm
I’ve installed the preference pane, configured it to notify me, but the main problem is that my device won’t show on the “devices” tab. So, i can’t even send a notification from the website.
In the meantime, i’ve just installed Textfree lite, which has push and its working. I’ll wait for a possible update to fix this.
Tamara on July 7th, 2009 at 2:54 pm
It sounds like it’s not push that’s the problem, it’s a problem with the app registering the device on the prowl website. Therefore, pushes are not sent to the device at all. So whether or not other push apps work doesn’t have anything to do with the problem.
Wish I could help, but my Prowl set up fine.
Sajid Khan on July 7th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
I’d suggest emailing the developer. I sent some feature suggestions earlier this afternoon and got a nice email back. The contact details are on the website (Under the about tab).
Good luck!
Carlos on July 8th, 2009 at 9:34 am
Its working now! Had something to do with SBSettings / MobileSubstrate. Followed these instructions: http://limitededitioniphone.com/faq-how-to-get-prowl-push-notifications-working-on-jailbroken-iphone
And its perfect now.
Thank you all.
Andre on July 11th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
And your iphone was not jailbroken….mmm