Caffeine: Espresso for your Mac

OS X’s sleep function is something I couldn’t live without. The Mac’s aggressive form of power management has saved me hours upon hours of working time, where I otherwise would simply be without a functioning MacBook. This is because there is an absence of available power plugs where I roam, and I’m sure I’m not the only Mac user who’s in this situation.

Every day I go to school constantly leaving my MacBook’s lid open, yet idle, without much effect on it’s battery life. However, I keep finding myself not wanting my Mac to go to sleep, and it’s usually when I’m watching a video in QuickTime. To enjoy my video, I need to constantly wiggle the mouse to prevent my screensaver from showing up, or for the screen to automatically dim and then fall asleep.

While there are various ways to enable and disable the sleep function with the use of the Terminal and such, there is no simple way to constantly disable and re-enable it. That is, until Caffeine comes into the picture. Caffeine is an unobtrusive menu-bar item which functions just as advertised. Simply click the icon once, and an overlaid cross-section should appear, disabling sleep. The item can then easily be clicked again in order to re-enable it.

While it’s implementation is flawless, there is only one little grudge I have against this app, as there is still no option to prevent sleep when the lid is closed on your Mac laptop. For that purpose I recommend InsomniaX.

Caffeine is available as a free download from Lighthead Software.