Opinion: An Updater’s Chronicle
Today, I upgraded my operating system to Snow Leopard. I knew that it would be worth it in the end, but every time I do this I am petrified. Of all my files disappearing (this happened once to me); of the upgrade stopping partway through, leaving me with no operating system (this too has happened); of my programs not working after the upgrade because they haven’t been upgraded themselves. Luckily for me, however, none of these happened when I upgraded today. I write this not only as a story of my installation, but also as a reassurance to you that Snow Leopard will not become—despite its namesake—a sharp-toothed beast with untold powers of destruction. This cat is surprisingly tame.
Opinion: The Tao of the Desktop
People can do all sorts of different things to their desktops. Some are cluttered, some are sparse, there are pictures, designs, photos—pretty much anything you can think of is, at the moment, on someone’s computer background. For the sake of productivity, many people stress the fact that your desktop should be clean—not filled with files that aren’t used—but that probably doesn’t work for everyone. How can you discover your perfect desktop?
Opinion: Quicksilver Versus the Dock
I hardly ever use my mouse. Pretty much everything I do on my computer, from opening files to switching tracks in iTunes is activated by keyboard shortcuts. My number one app for doing so is the wonderful tool that goes by the name of Quicksilver. Through Quicksilver, you can open any application, folder, or file on your computer by just typing its name. Which means that anything is instantly available. So what use then is Apple’s built-in Dock? It would seem that Quicksilver would replace its only function—to have those programs and other items you most often use immediately at hand. But this is not the only thing the Dock can do, and indeed is nowhere near its best feature.
Preview: Google Quick Search Box for Mac
Many Mac users know about an app called Quicksilver. It’s a simple productivity application that can help you do things with a few quick keystrokes. Just last month Google released a beta of a new tool that’s quite similar; Google Quick Search Box.
Google Quick Search Box opens with a simple double tap of the command key. From here you can just type in what you want. Google QSB has some basic search features, including the ability to search your computer and certain websites (such as Google, Youtube, and Wikipedia). You can navigate results with the arrow keys on your keyboard. Sadly, web search results only showed up for Wikipedia and Youtube, and it only displays limited results. For the other options it just opens a link in your default browser.
Mail Act-On 2.0: Act On Your Mail with Just a Few Keystrokes
A few days ago, we reviewed MailTags, a great app for organizing and sorting Emails in Mail.app. We briefly mentioned Mail Act-On, the companion app to MailTags.
Jumpcut: Clipboard Buffering in your Menu Bar
Most likely, you’ve run into this problem in the last two hours. You’ve copied some text, pasted it into a document, copied some other text, pasted it, gone back to the first text block and copied it again. The problem with cutting/copying and pasting is its inability to multitask. Now I’m not one to clutter up your menu bar, but this free app is worth the real estate.
Jumpcut, a free minimalist clipboard buffering application, is a great way to keep track of your clipboard history. Once you start Jumpcut, it “listens” for your text clipboard entries and remembers them. These text clippings can be accessed through the menu:
Firefox 3: The Browser War Just Got a Lot Hotter
Firefox 3 released to much fanfare Tuesday with millions of downloads, earning the browser a place in the record books — literally. Firefox achieved the Guinness World Record for most downloads in a day. Excitement for the software launch bordered on the ridiculous, with thousands of people attending and hosting Firefox 3 launch parties. But behind all the hype, there really is a great deal of substance. Firefox 3 is fast, stable and packed with features.
TapDex: Instant Access to Address Book Contacts
Address Book has always been a great place to store contact information for all your friends, family acquaintances and coworkers, but it’s not necessarily the best way to easily access all that info. There are tons of solutions, from Quicksilver and Spotlight to the Dashboard widget. TapDex. is yet another way to get at all those phone numbers, email handles and mailing addresses stored in Address Book.
After installing the System Preference pane, the small TapDex application runs in the background, consuming very little system resources, and is ready to spring to action when the user invoke its hotkey (F1 by default). When initiated, the TapDex search window pops to the front, allowing you to type search criteria. Press enter and a list of matching contacts is displayed.
Cover Stream: Yet Another Awesome iTunes Controller
These days it seems like iTunes controllers are a dime a dozen, and for the most part, that would be right. However, not all iTunes controllers are created equal, a principle perfectly demonstrated by Cover Stream, an awesome app from the people over at SNARB.TK. This awesome app takes all of the best features from a bunch of other iTunes controller apps and rolls those features into a streamlined, functional application that will make browsing your music a pleasure.
Spruce Up Quicksilver With New Interfaces
The oft mentioned Quicksilver from the awesome folks at Blacktree Software is arguably one of my favorite apps on my entire Leopard MacBook Pro. The sheer simplicity, intuitiveness, and function of this remarkable app allows me to work more productively than ever; launching an app, controlling something, or finding something is just a keyboard shortcut away. However, some of the built-in appearances that ship with Quicksilver when you download can leave much to be desired, especially when running on the shiny new Leopard desktop. Here’s a bunch of new appearances to change that up.
