Yoink! Reviewed

Yoink is a tiny app with a big place in my work flow. As applications go Yoink doesn’t do much but it is now something I recommend to everyone who uses Lion and likes running apps in Full Screen mode. To use Yoink simply download it from the App Store for the low price of $2.99 and launch it. I can’t stress enough you should put this in your login items so it starts every time you startup your Mac.

When you grab a file from your desktop or from Mail in full screen mode or anyplace where you click and drag a file a gray box will appear on the portion of the screen you designate in Yoink’s preferences. Drag the file to the gray box and Yoink will hold it for you while you move to different desktops or to different full screen apps. Then just grab the file and drag it to the app you want to use the file on.

For example you are working in email full screen and someone sends you a file attachment in Mail. Drag the file attachment to Yoink and move to the screen you want to use the file attachment on. Say you are going to your main desktop and dropping a photo on Pixelmator to do some editing. Once on your desktop just grab the file from Yoink and drop it on the Pixelmator icon.

Yoink even had a quick look button so you can preview your document if you have more than one being held by Yoink. Once you clear your files out of Yoink it quietly disappears. You can even set how long you want the window to appear when you grab a file. I opted to stick with the default 5 seconds.

The only thing I would change about Yoink is you only get two choices where to put the Yoink dock. Center left or Center right. I would love to be able to put it at the top, middle, or bottom of the sides of the desktop. Yoink was updated after I had written this to include additional positions for the Yoink Window. Top and bottom of the screen is now available! Great job and this is an app I can truly no longer live without. Everything else about this app is a perfect addition to my workflow as I start using more and more apps in full screen modes, Yoink will be the one application I absolutely cannot live without.

Note: The text in blue was added after the initial review was released.