7 ms·
I'm recommending only free software here. 1. Adium for chat. It is just awesome.http://www.adiumx.com/ http://www.adiumx.com/ 2. Quicksilver. if you just want
by boundlessdreamz 17y ago
I'm recommending only free software here.
1. Adium for chat. It is just awesome.http://www.adiumx.com/ http://www.adiumx.com/
2. Quicksilver. if you just want an app launcher spotlight is already good at that. http://code.google.com/p/blacktree-alchemy/downloads/list http://code.google.com/p/blacktree-alchemy/downloads/list [edit: updated link to point to the recent versions]
3. Caffeine is small program which puts an icon on menu bar on which you can click to prevent your Mac from going to sleep,dimming the screen etc. Very useful when watching long flash movies. http://lightheadsw.com/caffeine/ http://lightheadsw.com/caffeine/
4. MPlayer This is a video player which plays almost anything you can offer. Also comes with excellent keyboard shortcuts support making it the best video player on any platform. Most people prefer VLC though http://www.mplayerhq.hu/ http://www.mplayerhq.hu/
5. Flip4Mac For those videos that MPlayer plays poorly, typically WMVs Flip4Mac provides a fee codec which integrates with your quicktime player. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/wmcomponents.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/wmcompo...
6. HandBrake For ripping your DVDs to MPEG4, there is no better tool. http://handbrake.fr/ http://handbrake.fr/
7. Tweetie. if you use twitter, tweetie is the best mac twitter client by far. http://www.atebits.com/tweetie-mac/ http://www.atebits.com/tweetie-mac/
8. Virtualbox This virtualization product from Sun Microsystems totally eliminates the need for parallels or Vmware if you plan to use the VM sparingly. http://www.virtualbox.org/ http://www.virtualbox.org/
9. Evernote http://evernote.com/ http://evernote.com/
10. Eigenclock. I find the OS X, menu calendar extremely limted. Eigenclock is a good replacement http://www.twistedtheorysoftware.com/eigenclock/ http://www.twistedtheorysoftware.com/eigenclock/
11. Onyx for system tweaking http://www.titanium.free.fr/pgs/english.html http://www.titanium.free.fr/pgs/english.html
12. Transmission - bittorrent client http://www.transmissionbt.com/ http://www.transmissionbt.com/
- KirinDave 17y agoWhy does anyone recommend Quickisilver? It's suffering from massive bitrot these days. Most users report frequent crashes, hangs, problems waking from sleep, and general slowness compared to Spotlight and LaunchBar? I really wish it wasn't the case, but Quicksilver seems to have had its run and no one is stepping up to the plate to preserve it. Most everything else you list is awesome though (although I think Evernote is far from essential and I'm not sure "free" is the right word for it ;)
- Oompa 17y agoI don't know about LaunchBar, but Spotlight doesn't offer the same things that Quicksilver does. Sure it does application launching, but Quicksilver does more, not to mention Quicksilver's recommendation algorithm is, in my opinion, better.
- jimm 17y agoI only use it because it lets me define app-starting hot keys Command-F1, F2, etc. Mac OS X doesn't, as far as I can tell. Is there any other freeware app that will let me do that?
- KirinDave 17y agoI've heard good things about Global Hotkey: http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/Freeware/GlobalHotkey.shtml http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/Freeware/GlobalHotkey.shtm...
- boundlessdreamz 17y agoIt is still under development though. http://code.google.com/p/blacktree-alchemy/downloads/list http://code.google.com/p/blacktree-alchemy/downloads/list The original author has been hired by google and is working on google quicksearch box http://qsb-mac.googlecode.com http://qsb-mac.googlecode.com
- swombat 17y agoQuickSilver is quicker than Spotlight. I don't want to have to wait a few seconds for Spotlight to find stuff... QuickSilver is usually instantaneous or very near it. Also, it doesn't depend on the spotlight indexing, so this means I can disable the spotlight indexing jobs which have a nasty habit of using up 100% of my CPU at random times while I'm doing something. Also, I haven't had any problems with crashes or anything like that... works great here.
- quizbiz 17y agoHow do you disable spotlight indexing?
- elai 17y agoI would use uTorrent for a bitorrent client now. I find it's just more effective as a BT client. NetNewsWire is a good RSS client. And I would use VMWare Fusion as a virutalization software vs. Parallels.
- njharman 17y ago> 1. Adium Doesn't do IRC. In fact I've been unable to find any osX chat client that does IRC and IM. Anyone found a solution?
- mcav 17y agoColloquy [http://colloquy.info/ http://colloquy.info/] works well for IRC. Doesn't do IM though.
- silencio 17y agoAs one of the colloquy devs, I must step in with the more useful nightlies link: http://colloquy.info/downloads/nightlies/ http://colloquy.info/downloads/nightlies/ :)
- zimbabwe 17y agoMibbit. If you need a desktop solution, then use Fluid to turn it into an SSB.
- ankhmoop 17y agoWe're forced to regularly ban Mibbit users on Freenode technical channels due to abuse masked by Mibbit's proxying, and for that reason I must say I'm not a fan.
- zimbabwe 17y agoThat's the double edge that comes from any ease of access. Mibbit makes IRC very simple and very easy, and so more people use it, and with people come trolls. That said, if you're looking to access IRC easily, that's the way to go.
- Zev 17y agoIt would be quite easy for axod to pass along user's IP to the server instead of masking it through Mibbit. Having the user's IP as their realname isn't a real fix..
- Skeuomorph 17y agoThis list is great. Here's some more "FREE" software (some would appreciate a donation/purchase but are not crippled): 1. This may be obvious but as of the latest version, you don't gain much from a corporate email program like Entourage. I use Apple Mail, with IMAP and Google Apps for Your Domain. One account has 3.8GB of email and another has 4.1GB, according to Google. It scales fine and stays in sync across devices. Plus Address Book links to Google Contacts, and iCal links to Google Calendar. 2. I prefer MagiCal (http://www.charcoaldesign.co.uk/magical http://www.charcoaldesign.co.uk/magical) rather than Eigenclock as it includes options to put "yyyy-mm-dd [day] hh:mm:ss" by the Spotlight icon, with [day] clickable for the calendar. 3. I like SpeakTime (http://www.mecanisme.net/software/speaktime/ http://www.mecanisme.net/software/speaktime/) for putting a row of glance-able analog clocks at the lower left of my screen (semi-transparent so they look like part of the background) to be aware of alternate time zones. 4. I use Skitch (http://www.skitch.com http://www.skitch.com) for screengrabs with annotations to share with colleagues/clients. 5. I use Serverskine (http://www.serverskine.com/ http://www.serverskine.com/) to keep track of server logins. 6. I use Foxmarks (http://www.foxmarks.com/ http://www.foxmarks.com/) to keep bookmarks in sync across all browsers and computers. I don't use QuickSilver, Spotlight gets the job done. I'd also recommend the following paid apps depending on your needs: 1. iWork '09 (Pages, Numbers, Keynote) for all office apps needs with MS Office 03-07 compatibility. It's worth the $79 for the polish and usability. The "free" alternative will cost more in the long run. 2. OmniGraffle Pro for diagramming with Visio (even Visio binary file) compatibility. 3. OmniPlan for MS Project compatibility. 4. Coda for text based web development. (Yes, TextMate is in my dock. But so is Coda.) 5. 1Password for credentials management across browsers and computers 6. Things for "GTD" methodology (or OmniFocus for more features)
- Oompa 17y agoI find GrabUp (http://grabup.com/ http://grabup.com/) better than Skitch, mainly because I never use the extra features that Skitch gives on top of just taking a screenshot and uploading it.
- simonista 17y agoIf all you're looking for is screen capture: Apple-Shift-3 captures the entire screen. Apple-Shift-4 lets you select an area to capture. Apple-Shift-4 then Space captures a window that you select. I don't personally use GrabUp or Skitch, so I can't comment on what they add.
- maximilian 17y agoTransmission - bittorrent client http://www.transmissionbt.com/ http://www.transmissionbt.com/ I used to use transmission, but then I started using uTorrent, which I find has better performance. http://www.utorrent.com http://www.utorrent.com
- jemmons 17y agoI gave up both for Xtorrent, but YMMV.
- mark_h 17y agoThere's a new effort to make a native OSX interface for mplayer incidentally; seems fairly active so far, and includes apple remote integration, etc: http://mplayerosx.sttz.ch/ http://mplayerosx.sttz.ch/
- rabidsnail 17y agoPerian - All of the codecs supported by vlc made available for use by quicktime (and any apps that use quicktime, like iMovie).