Time Machine is part of the Finder (thinking a little outside the box), as it is basically an extension of the Finder’s functionality, so why not make it a little bit more part of the Finder – Drag the Time Machine icon, from the Applications folder onto the top pane of the Finder window, et voilà! – you can remove it from your dock, and still have a quick way back to the past

Firstly, CheckUp is great for taking a quick look at everything in your system. I mean everything. Not only does it tell you about the usual CPU usage, and how much memory you’re using; it tells you much more. It tells you how much RAM your Mac can take, what OS it supports, and lots of essential information about your machine (Serial Number etc.), as well as information about installed fonts, Drivers, Apps, Pref Panes and much, much more. This really is an all-around app; but this is just the first of three things that sets it apart.

The second thing is the design. This app is designed to impress, using beautiful graphs to show data, and colourful icons which make it nicer to use.

Don’t like it? Well go to their website, and their are other skins to choose from. This is a nice feature, as you can make it blend in with your usual desktop.
The third thing, and this is a biggie: Remote monitoring. If you install CheckUp on more than one Mac on your network, you can “check-up” on other macs remotely.Tthis is an awesome feature, and works flawlessly. You get full information about the Mac  but not to worry, it can be password protected if you choose. This is really the feature that sets it apart from the crowd, and with bulk discounting, this could be an excellent feature for IT administrators checking up on remote Mac’s.

For monitoring your Mac, CheckUp is one of the best. Some features allow it to be an Activity Monitor replacement, and the extras such as remote monitoring make it just that little bit better than the competition  if you need it. If you don’t, at $49 for a two-Mac license, the price is a little steep, in which case I’d have to recommend the excellent iStat (free, in any form). CheckUp is available from App4Mac, and costs $49. Bulk discounts are available.

So “Why?” I hear you ask — well it sounds like it’s all due to Apple’s compulsion for perfection: Marathon Monday Meetings.

After topping Fortune’s coveted “Fortune 500″ list, Fortune has run a series of articles on the company, including an extremely interesting read — a rare interview with Mr Jobs himself, where he revealed the following:

“So what we do every Monday is we review the whole business. We look at what we sold the week before. We look at every single product under development, products we’re having trouble with, products where the demand is larger than we can make. All the stuff in development, we review. And we do it every single week. I put out an agenda — 80% is the same as it was the last week, and we just walk down it every single week.

We don’t have a lot of process at Apple, but that’s one of the few things we do just to all stay on the same page.”

Not only does this show why Apple releases everything on a Tuesday – because the final decision as to whether the channels are there for supply, and whether the project is ready or not, is made on the Monday before – but also the compulsion that pushes Apples products to perfection. There is no other company that does this; some may have good reviewing procedures, but I seriously doubt that any corporations the size of Apple have the senior team, including the CEO, review every product, every week.

That’s not all that came out of the Fortune article, which is well worth a read; we also find that Jobs is not worried about an Apple without him — it seems he is moulding Tim Cook(COO) for the job. If you’re not in the top 100 people at Apple it’s unlikely you’ll ever work with Jobs himself; and that OS X is definitely at the centre of Apples strategy.

If nothing else the article delves a little deeper into how Apple’s drive for perfection works, and it is best explained by the man himself:

“Take the iPhone. We had a different enclosure design for this iPhone until way too close to the introduction to ever change it. And I came in one Monday morning, I said, ‘I just don’t love this. I can’t convince myself to fall in love with this. And this is the most important product we’ve ever done.’

“And we pushed the reset button. We went through all of the zillions of models we’d made and ideas we’d had. And we ended up creating what you see here as the iPhone, which is dramatically better. It was hell because we had to go to the team and say, ‘All this work you’ve [done] for the last year, we’re going to have to throw it away and start over, and we’re going to have to work twice as hard now because we don’t have enough time.’ And you know what everybody said? ‘Sign us up.’”

We love Apple for their compulsive attitude towards product design. Apple must be one awesome place to work, annoying at times, but well, who doesn’t like a project!

The full article is here, and we congratulate Apple for remaining Number One on the Fortune 500.

But 2008 has been an interesting year, and it all started with a comment at a small event, known as MacWorld from a Mr Steven P. Jobs (ever heard of him, I certainly haven’t):

“[Big List of New Stuff]…all this in the FIRST two weeks. And we’ve got 50 more weeks to go!” At the time, it stuck in my head. Is it just a passing comment, or does he really mean Apple have 50 more products (at least!) to bring out this year? To my amazement, he seems to have meant it. Look Back. Every week, without fail, there has been some kind of Apple update:

Jan 7 – Mac Pros
Jan 15th – Macworld – Duh! – Mainly iPhone software update, as well as Movie Rentals
Jan 22nd – Pink nano
Jan 29th – MBA Ships + New UK iPhone tariffs
Feb 5th – iPod Touch + iPhone upgrades
Feb 12th – Aperture + 10.5.2
Feb 19th – Xsan + iPod Shuffle

Admittedly, some of these are minor, however I think it shows Apple’s desire to be on top of the market and to lead the way in product innovation. But could this be the year in which Apple updates every Tuesday? Is that even possible?

This Tuesday should see the release of the long awaited ‘Mobile’ OS X SDK, and then we’re into March. That’s a full 8 weeks in which Apple has pulled something out of Infinite Loop and wowed us all. And don’t forget, the MacBook Pro is overdue for an update, and in recent times the MacBook has been updated within weeks of it’s big brother, so Apple is not short of new stuff that it can bring out. Looking further into the year we have iPhone 2.0 almost confirmed, and maybe even a sneak peek at 10.6 at WWDC.

Whatever happens, this is a big year for Apple. With the growth of iPod sales slowing, Apple must explore new markets to keep investors happy and the stock price high; we’ve already seen this year what a mediocre MacWorld can do… All this leaves me wondering: what is left for 2008? Will Apple stick to the current trend of an update a week? Keep your RSS feeds burning on Tuesdays to find out!

*Editor: if you make it to the end of this review you will find a nice discount just for MacApper readers.

First off, Aurora is sporting a brand new user interface which is all together more Leopardy. The two panel interface works much better than the old, smaller window, and allows you to set up the alarm on a single screen. This is a huge improvement, as it allows you to quickly double check all the details of the alarm before you go off to bed.

Next up, is a new window, entitled “Playback”, which shows an iPod-esque display of what’s playing in iTunes. It gives you the simple forward/back/play and volume buttons, but there is that all important sleep button there when you need that extra 5 minutes in bed. You can also use the Play/Pause button on your Apple Remote to snooze, so you don’t have to get out of your bed! The snooze duration can be easily changed in the preference window.

Aurora is the easiest Alarm clock you will ever set. Simply press the “+” button in the bottom left corner, then you set which days you want it to go off on, the time, then the volume (you can set it to fade in if you don’t want your awakening to be too rude), followed by the playlist/channel you want to wake up to. You can also set it to go off after a certain amount of time, if you so desire. No more pressing fiddly buttons on that alarm clock, then having to remember to reset it every night. With Aurora you should never be late again.

If you’re lucky enough to get a day off work, and you don’t need to get up, simply right-click on the alarm and press “Skip Next Occurrence”. Aurora won’t wake you the next day, but when you go back to work, no need to remember to reset the alarm, it will be done already.

You might be thinking by now that Aurora is a morning app – but it really handles both ends of the day. Are you the kind to fall asleep during a movie, and wake up to find your Mac still on in the morning? Well Aurora has another tool, just for that situation. You can specify for your Mac to fall asleep at the end of a DVD; a QT movie; after a certain number of iTunes tracks; after an amount of time, or a hour. This feature is great, and even better for those with Pre-Apple Remote macs, as you no longer have to get out of bed to put your Mac to bed.

Alright so you may still be asking; is it really worth my money? After all this used to be free. In short, Yes, it is. EyeTV integration sets it apart from the other alarm clock apps, and it’s sheer simplicity is hard to beat. The fact it’s not a one-trick-pony makes the deal that bit sweeter. Aurora is available now for ⚬15 (~$22) and you can grab it right now from their website.

One More Thing! Jonas Witt, the developer, has been kind enough to offer our loyal MacApper readers a 20% Discount for a limited time! So now you can get it while it’s hot for just ⚬12. Simply use the discount code MACAPPER to get your reduced wares.

So, without any further ado, here are they key features of EyeTV 3:

New Interface – EyeTV’s interface now includes CoverFlow. It works exactly the same as iTunes, so if you can use iTunes you can use EyeTV.

Renewed Full Screen Menu – The menu is back looking like it should. It now looks much more like Front Row, using a black colour scheme instead of blue. It is also much more akin to the new AppleTV (take 2), with a simple menu floating over the TV window; making it easier to channel surf. Also, during playback, there is now a timeline bar which lets you see how far into a program you are and allows you to manually move through a recording or even manually rewind Live TV.

Smart Guides/Playlists – These work exactly the same as Smart Playlists in iTunes and the Guides are particularly useful. Not only can you group programs together, but when a new episode comes onto the TV guide, it will add it to the guide, and you can set it to automatically record it (a la TiVo’s “Season Pass”). This leads me brilliantly onto the next point.

Series Linking, But Better – This is one of the most requested features for EyeTV. Not only can you series link using smart guides, but again taking from iTunes, you can set old episodes to delete as new ones are recorded (ie. you can just keep the 3 newest episodes). This is a great feature for those tight on disk space.

Wi-Fi Access – Although this was added with EyeTV 2.5, version 3 makes it better. It will now work with more devices and allows you to password protect your recordings.
Saved Channel Lists – Although a small-ish feature, this can save you lots of time if you travel. Simple save a channel list for each location you use your EyeTV in, then never have to re-scan again.

Shared Libraries – Again, a fairly niche feature, but for those of us lucky enough to have EyeTV on more than one Mac, a brilliant one!

EyeTV 2 was a great app. It did nearly everything. But EyeTV 3 goes above and beyond; doing more and adding that much requested feature: series linking. That $39 upgrade is well worth it if it saves you from missing episodes of your favorite show because you forgot to set it to record. Apple may have made the big headlines at Macworld with the Keynote, but Elgato is not too far behind.

EyeTV 3 is available now and pricing is as follows. If you bought on or after 1st December 2007 it is a completely free upgrade; however if you bought before this date, it is a $39 upgrade, which is reasonable (this includes ANY full version of EyeTV 2, whether it came with and Elgato product or a 3rd party one). The full licence is $79.95; or it comes free with any tuner, with prices ranging from $149.95 to $199.95. Stay tuned for a full review here at MacApper in the next week.

So, let’s start with posters. Posterino lets you drag photos into a premade frame; it’s simple to use, and is very quick to do if your photos are in an iPhoto Album, as you can drag the whole lot from the browser at the side of the window, and they will auto fill. If you don’t like the frames you can make your own easily, by simply adding frames, then saving it as a template. Because of this, it keeps everyone happy: the less creative people like myself who want something quick, easy and already done; as well as the artists who want to make a mat themselves.

Posterino allows you to export to many different places, including web services such as Flikr, or Apple’s Mail and iPhoto. If you export it to iPhoto, you can then use iPhoto’s built in Photo printing service (with Kodak) to get it printed, a nice feature to get your photos off you Mac. My favourite feature of Posterino is the Postcard function. You use it in the same way as the Poster composition I described above, but you make postcards. The difference with Posterino is that you don’t need to print them yourself. You can export them, and get them professionally printed and sent anywhere in the world. They cost ⚬2.99/$3.99 each, but for that you get postage and a professionally printed and personal card. Apple does a similar service, but you get the cards and then have to send them yourself; Posterino makes it easy to send a postcard directly to the recipient.

Posterino is just $24.95, and well worth it in my opinion; especially as it include 3 free postcards. But lets make that deal just a little sweeter, Christoph Priebe of Zykloid Software has told us of their special Macworld deal, where you can get 15% off. Just use the discount code POSTERINO365 during Macworld week, ending on January 18th. Grab it while you can over at their website.

The list is sorted alphabetically by category and currently has 57 freeware mac apps.

We hope to extend this list regularly and make it one of the best places to find out about great freeware for Mac. Having said that we definitely will have missed some of your favorites so please feel free to vote for Mac apps you feel should make the list in the comments.

Audio/Video

Audacity
Audacity is free, open source software for recording and editing sounds. While it is more recommended for advanced users, novices should be able to perform basic editing and recording as well. Useful for podcasters.
iUseThis

Backups

Carbon Copy Cloner
Carbon Copy Cloner is a very useful and robust tool for making exact copy backups of any disk, even across the network. The newest version features an advanced scheduler tool and backup tasks can now be scheduled on an hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly fashion. If you don’t like Time Machine give CCC a try.
Our Review | iUseThis

Mozy
Mozy is a free online backup service to keep your important files safe. On the free version, you get just 2GB of storage, so may only be any use as part of your backup solution; however for those important documents it’s well worth a look, as you can retrieve your documents from any computer, a definite plus.
Our Review | iUseThis

CD/DVD Authoring

HandBrake
Handbrake is the One-Stop-Shop for ripping DVD’s to your Mac, to use on your iPod, Apple TV, iPhone, or pretty much anything you can think of. A lovely bit of software that nearly everyone will probably need to use at one point or another.
Our Review | iUseThis

Burn
Burn allows you to… burn any kind of CD or DVD, data, music or video. You can even copy or burn ISO and DMG images.
iUseThis

Development

DiffMerge
This a very simple application to compare your files and folders, showing you differences and allowing you to merge them. Very handy for programmers or code monkeys.
iUseThis

Nvu
Nvu is a fully featured web authoring application (WYSIWYG) similiar to something like Dreamweaver that allows you to edit HTML/CSS with no technical expertise or knowledge of either. Well sort of. Nvu is not without its caveats but it is opensource and deserves a spot here.
iUseThis

Smultron
Smultron is a open sourced text/code editor written in Cocoa that is both easy to use and quite advanced for a freeware offering.
iUseThis

Education

SchoolHouse
GTD is the in-thing at the moment, however most GTD app’s aren’t that great for organising your school life. Schoolhouse, however is, and is perfectly suited to the job. Never miss an assignment again, and know exactly how you’re getting on in each of your subjects.
Our Review | iUseThis

FTP/SFTP Clients

CyberDuck
Cyberduck is a great, simple and very quick FTP/SFTP browser. It lets you do everything you need to, and even lets you edit text documents remotely, without the need to download them. It also takes full advantage of Apple’s Bonjour, and supports full drag and drop.
Our Review | iUseThis

Fugu
Fugu is an opensource SFTP client with a dual pane view distributed by the University of Michigan. Fugu has become fairly robust and supports most of the features you would expect of a solid SFTP app.
iUseThis

Games

* Be sure to also see our article on free games for Mac.

Quinn
Quinn is a nice simple Tetris game, but it has beautiful graphics, as well as some features you rarely see on freeware games, such as Bonjour play, allowing you to play across a network.
Our Review | iUseThis

Graphics

GimpShop
GimpShop is the absolutley free Photoshop clone, which gives you most of Photoshops features, but in an open source package. On the downside, it does run in the X11 environment, however it will do nearly everything Photoshop can do without the massive cost. Great if you only need to do the occasional bit of Photoshop work, and don’t want to shell out the whole amount.
iUseThis

ImageWell
ImageWell is a small, yet quite powerful image editing application that lets you quickly resize, crop, watermark, and edit your images, for use on the web and elsewhere. While the base image editing software is free there is an Extras package which costs $19.95. The freeware version is useful enough we thought it deserved a spot here.
Our Review | iUseThis

Instant Shot
Instant shot is the perfect tool for your screenshot workflow – you can shoot a whole screen, part of a screen, rapid fire and even assign shortcutkeys to create snapshots on the fly.
iUseThis

Resize ‘Em All
This is a brilliant app, and it does what you need it to and very quickly. Useful for resizing photos, especially when you have a whole batch. Although the new finder can perform the same function, this is much quicker, and easier to use, with CoreImage effects just making it all the better.
Our Review | iUseThis

Seashore
Seashore is an amazing image editor, based on the same framework of “GimpShop”. It is, in basic terms, a GIMP based editor, with an OS X Cocoa wrapper. It works like every other OS X app, and is great if you don’t have the time to learn the huge monster, that can be GimpShop.
Our Review | iUseThis

Internet/Web

Adium
Adium is the standard for the multi-network chat client on OS X. It does too many networks to count, and does them well. It is the app of choice for many MSN users, while some AIM users prefer it over iChat; and with Video chat slated to be available soon, it can only get better!
Our Review | iUseThis

aMSN
aMSN is the underdog. It’s not the best at doing MSN, and it does only do MSN, however it does video chat, unlike Adium! A nice app if you need to do video chats on what is one of the most popular networks throughout the UK and much of Europe.
iUseThis

Chicken Of The VNC
Chicken of the VNC is a great VNC to control a remote computer; and now that leopard has VNC built in, it means there is very little setup on the ‘host’ computer. VNC allows you to take control of a remote computer, using your mouse.
Our Review | iUseThis

Colloquy
For Many, IRC is a great way to be part of an online community. It’s used throughout the iPhone hacking teams, as well as on websites like MacHeist; it’s a nice way to talk over the net, or in our case here at MacApper, to organise the next big thing. Colloquy is a must for any IRC user.
Our Review | iUseThis

Flikr Uploadr
Flickr is the photo website, and so many people use it to share their images. But uploading through a website is never easy, so here you have it. Flickr Uploadr an extremely simple uploader that works with both Finder and iPhoto. Why do it any other way?
iUseThis

GarageBuy
You may have used GarageSale, which allows you to sell through eBay with ease. This free Garagebuy allows you to buy on eBay in much the same way, with more ease and in some cases better security than just using the regular site.
Our Review | iUseThis

Google Earth
This is an obvious one, everyone and their grandparents have heard of it, and who hasn’t had a look at their house from the overhead photos? Even better, it now has a flight simulator built in, so you can fly past your neighbourhood, and have a go at landing a plane for yourself!
iUseThis

Joost
Joost is one of the most talked about products of the year, and is one of the first products to bring IP TV to the masses. It’s still in Beta, but it’s getting better all the time! It’s very simple to use, and although the resolutions can often be fairly low, the image quality is high, and it’ll work nicely on your nice 24″ iMac!
iUseThis

Skype
Skype seems to have been adopted as the main standard for free VOIP calls across the internet, and is growing in popularity as an IM client. Of course, it’s free to download, and works great as a video chat client.
iUseThis

Thunderbird
If you don’t get along with Apple’
s mail.app then this is the email client you want. Brought to us by the great people at Mozilla THunderbird allows for advanced email work with IMAP, POP, spam filters, and a plethora of options you would only expect from commercial software.
Our Review | iUseThis

Vienna¨
RSS is THE way to get news, and Vienna is a great, free RSS/Atom news reader. It is simple to use, has a built in WebKit browser, and is completely searchable. Vienna is nearly as good as commercial alternatives, or in some cases better.
Our Review | iUseThis

iPod

Senuti
Senuti is the most effortless possible way to get all of the content off an iPod or similar device without even needing to open iTunes. If you have an iPod you need Senuti.
Our Review | iUseThis

Network Tools

KisMac
KisMAC is an opensource and free stumbler/scanner application for Mac OS X using monitor mode and passive scanning.
KisMAC supports several third party PCMCIA cards – Orinoco, PrismII, Cisco Aironet, Atheros and PrismGT. USB Prism2 is supported as well, and USB Ralink support is in development. All of the internal AirPort hardware is supported as well.
iUseThis

Nmap
You will need to install the Apple Developer Tools and compile from source but where would you be without the best port scanner ever built. Nmap is a must security tool for any network admin.

Office & Productivity

Bean
Bean is a simple Word Processor. It is built on the same engine as TextEdit, but adds some extra features related with printing and a word count. It is a simple word processor and not as powerful as MS Word, but it does the job that it’s meant for quite well.
Our Review | iUseThis

LyX
LyX is a different kind of word processor. Most word processors let you focus on content and style, giving you inconsistent documents most of the time. LyX allows you to create professional documents while focusing on structure first, and when you’re done, you can export your document as a PDF or web page. This tool is excellent for professional reports, scientific papers and so on.
iUseThis

NeoOffice¨
Office Apps are expensive, Office ’08 starts at $149.95, and although iWork is cheaper it is still $79.95. Enter NeoOffice, a fully featured Office suite, based on Open Office. This differs from Open Office as it is Mac native, and does not require X11 to be installed seperately. A great way to get started with office productivity for free.
Our Review | iUseThis

Skim
Looking for a better PDF reader than Preview? Skim is a PDF reader with a few powerful built-in editing tools such as adding an arrow/circle, or striking out unwanted text. With Skim, you can quickly sort through and edit your PDFs in a pinch.
Our Review | iUseThis

P2P File Sharing

Cabos
Cabos is Gnutella file sharing program based on LimeWire and Acquisition. Cabos provides simple sidebar user interface, firewall to firewall transfers, proxy transfers, Universal Plug and Play, iTunes + iPod integration, “What’s New?” searches, international searches, and more.
iUseThis

Transmission
Transmission is a fast, easy, and free multi-platform BitTorrent client with a focus on being lightweight yet feature-filled. If you are doing any Bit-Torrent downloading and find other clients to be a bit clunky, this is the app you want. Simple, elegant, and completely functional.
iUseThis

Utilities

AppFresh
If your are reading this list, you need this app. It tells you when you need to update, you can use ‘iUseThis’ from within the app and if your not on Leopard it has a killer feature; You can take a snapshot of all your appss and back it up to wherever you want. Of note, this is a ‘Preview’, however it comes highly recommended.
Our Review | iUseThis

AppleJack
AppleJack is a very easy to use tool to troubleshoot your Mac when no other startup disk is available to you. The script gives you an interactive menu-driven environment for basic disk check/repair, permissions repair, .plist validation, cache cleanup, and swap file removal. Sadly AJ no longer works under Leopard 10.5.x but we are still hoping this changes!
iUseThis

Disk Inventory X
Got a fairly low amount of disk space left on your Mac? That’s where Disk Inventory X comes in – it shows you a visual representation of what files are on your disk, a big block means a big file, and a small block, a small file. Really simple, and highly recommended when space is tight!
iUseThis

Linotype FontExplorer X
FontExplorer X is a robust and stable program for managing all your fonts, both system and user added, from the leader in font technology LinoType.
Our Review | iUseThis

Onyx
Onyx allows you to verify the Startup Disk and the structure of OS X’s System files, to run misc tasks of system maintenance, to configure some hidden parameters of the Finder, Dock, Dashboard, Exposé, Safari, and more.
Our Review | iUseThis

Quicksilver
Love by many, yet so few use it to it’s full potential! An amazing App launcher, and so much more, it’s a must for every Mac, and lightning quick to open your apps. integration with other apps help’s you search them, and even send quick e-mails without even opening Mail.
Our Review | iUseThis

Video

Flip4Mac WMV
Really a must for most users, Flip4Mac removes most of the need to use the ageing mac version of Windows Media Player, by allowing you to play most of your WMV files directly in QuickTime.
iUseThis

Jing
Jing is fairly new to the scene, but makes it much easier to get your screencasts out. We’ve both used it and blogged about it here at MacApper. A very useful tool for any blogger.
iUseThis

Miro
Miro (a.k.a Democracy) is another IPTV app, that does so much more. It will play your WMV, XVid and Quicktime files, it’s a BitTorrent client, and it can even save YouTube videos. All for free. A really nice app that will do something for everyone!
Our Review | iUseThis

Perian
Perian enables any OS X application that uses QuickTime to be able to play many other media types like DivX, XviD, mpeg4, AC3 audio, etc. A must download for anyone watching video on their Mac.
Our Review | iUseThis

Real Player
Real Player is a nice all round media player, but it’s unlikely to make you switch from iTunes/Quicktime or VLC; however you need this is you want to watch videos on some websites, such as bbc.co.uk.
Our Review | iUseThis

TubeTV¨
Who doesn’t love YouTube? Not only is it fun, and a bit of a laugh, but it’s a great way to find great videos; or even some real TV, courtesy of companies like the BBC. However, you need an internet connection to watch it. TubeTV searches YouTube, saves the videos, and converts then to play on other devices.
Our Review | iUseThis

VLC
VLC is another must for every Mac. If your usual media player refuses to play something, chances are VLC will play it. DVD’s, MPEG 1, 2 and 4, OGG Vorbis, DivX and much more, VLC will play it. This really is a must so just get it now.
Our Review | iUseThis

Web Browsers

Camino
Camino is the cocoa-encased, Mac version of Firefox, using the ‘Gecko’ rendering engine . Although Firefox for the mac is available, Camino is more Mac-Like, and works more like other Mac-Apps
iUseThis

Firefox
This is the second most popular browser in the world, we couldn’t omit it from a list like this. It’s fast, and supports all the plugins that the windows version does. It’s not the best browser on the Mac, however, for a switcher, it’s perfect as it works exactly the same way the windows version does.
iUseThis

Flock
Social Networker? Flock is the browser for you, it integrates with many of the social networks including FaceBook and Twitter, as well as some media sites like YouTube.
Our Review | iUseThis

Shiira
Shiira is a browser, based on the same ‘WebKit’ as Safari.It has some nice transition effects, and more usefully a page dock which alows you to browse through tabs. Shiira is a serious contender to replace your current browser.
Our Review | iUseThis

Widgets

iStat
iStat is a great thing that comes in nearly any format you want, whether it be an app, dashboard widget, or menu-bar item, they all tell you everything you ever wanted to know about what your Mac is doing at any precise moment. They’re fast, and very low on resource useage, so if you need to be in the know, these come highly recommended.
Our Review | iUseThis

So there you have it, our list of freeware for your Mac. We plan to expand this page as quickly as possible, however some great apps likely slipped through the net unnoticed. If you know of any great freeware apps that deserve to be on this list please leave a comment and let us know. Oh and one more thing:

“Free software is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of free as in free speech, not as in free beer. ” – gnu.org

We saw the introduction of new Mac Pros and Xserves on Tuesday, but with much of the Mac press covering that, it has been overlooked that you can now Pre-Order Office 2008 in any one of the three editions, detailed below.

Microsoft Office is one of the best selling Apps for OS X and love it or hate it, it’s going to be here to stay. However, this is the first time that it has had some real competition in the market space. Although still dominant in productivity apps, Apple’s own iWork is eating into the market, and Office ’08 sales should be a nice indicator as to whether people have switched, for good.

So, without further ado, here are the 3 editions that can now be Pre-Ordered:

Home and Student – This is your basic edition, surprisingly made for the home user. It includes Word, PowerPoint, Excel and Entourage; however is should be noted that this version of Entourage lacks exchange support. This is priced very competitively, at just $149.95 – although iWork is just $79.95. Nevertheless the extra features and compatibility on just about every system in the world might draw users to spend the extra $70.

Next up is the Main Edition which adds exchange support, Automator actions, as well as an Upgrade edition. This is probably the edition most people will go for, and it is certainly priced like Office always will be – $239.95 to upgrade, and $399.95 for a full version

The Special Media Edition is made so you can “experience peak productivity while streamlining your digital asset management”, whatever that means. Basically it is the top version, including everything from the other two versions, and adding Microsoft Expression Media. Said app allows you to easily manage all your digital media; upgrade for $299.95 or buy the full version for $499.95.

So there you have it. Office: The New, Universally Bound version available for all to Pre-Order. Are you planning on upgrading to Office ’08, or sticking with the ageing Office ’04… or by the sounds of our recent iWork post, are you planning on sticking with iWork ’08? Sound off in the comments and let us know!

We have seen some attempts at this before, but the implementation was usually slightly weak, and usability was poor. Signal is honestly quite different. You launch the app, and it tells you the exact address to type into your iPod Touch or iPhone. Presto you’re done.

Signal works by setting up a web app on your computer with a nearly identical user interface as the iPhone/iPod touch; and for a network app, it’s unusually responsive. Changing tracks is nearly instantaneous. A nice feature is the fact that it shows you Album art, making it that much easier to work out what is playing. You can pause music, or skip tracks; even rate songs all from one web browser window. It’s also incredibly easy to browser your library, as it uses the iTunes structure to organise your media; there is even a built-in search feature.

This app is especially useful if you own an AirPort Express, and use the AirTunes feature; it allows you to control your media from anywhere in your network, removing the normal confines of the Apple Remote (Read: Walls). Signal is a brilliant implementation of a problem many people want solved. Although just a web app; it works well, and especially if you have AirPort Express, is well worth the $24.95 price.

A fully functioning Demo is available here, and it’s well worth a try!

It is UK only for licensing reasons. However, aside from that, it is well implemented allowing you to search by day, specific categories, or browse through an A-Z. Conveniently, when you move your mouse over an episode, it tells you how long you have left to watch it. The actual videos themselves are of average quality and struggle to scale up even to my MacBook’s screen, however they are easily watchable and great if you’ve missed something. Another nice feature is Guidance Lock which is hidden away in the upper right hand corner. it allows you to set a password to keep your little ones away from post-watershed content.

Although this is only a flash implementation, it is very well done and is a good, short term solution, however I would still like to see the BBC bring out a full Mac-Compatible desktop player in the very near future. If you are in the UK, you can check it out here; however if you are outside the UK, yhe BBC is due to launch a subscription based international player during 2008 – this however, may be Windows only.

And seeing as they are really just toys, they are all basically free to download and use right now. So why don’t you grab an egg-nog and let’s get down to it.

MacLampsX – Freeware, “The Arctic Mac”.

So lets add some flashing Xmas lights to your desktop. These lights are highly customizable, you can change the order they go in, you can change how often they flash, and you can even replace them with your own set. Unusually, MacLampsX uses very little of that precious processing power, showing as only 0.5% on my MacBook, a very reasonable trade off for a bit of Christmas cheer! Version 2.0 is promised imminently, with the only announced feature being Multiple displays. A very worthwhile download to spruce up your desktop!

X-MasTree – Freeware, JSChilling.

You need to know how long it is until Christmas, and you can’t go through the season without a tree, so why not fix two problems at once, with X-MasTree. It is another customizable app, allowing you to have your tree in a variety of different colours, and well as a multitude of different coloured flashing or solid lights. It also has a little red box at the bottom which tells you how many days are left until a large gentleman in red comes down your chimney. A really nice app, however it does use a little more CPU power than MacLampsX, at about 2.5 – 3%.

Sn̦ РDonationware, Infinity-to-the-Power-of-Infinity.

If like me, and you live in the UK with the promise of a white Christmas every year, let it happen this year with Snö. This app gives you beautiful snow tumbling down your screen, either under or over your other apps. This is a processor hog though, but it really makes your screen look beautiful. it also comes with a screen saver so it can snow all day long!

And there you have it, a trinity of apps to make you feel a bit of Christmas spirit. We’d also like to take this opportunity to wish you our readers, Merry Christmas from the whole team here at MacApper. Have a good one!

What do you do to your Mac at Christmas? Have you got any favourite apps that come out but once a year?

iWork, Apple’s productivity suite, has managed to capture 16% of the Mac Office Productivity sales. This really is a fairly big achievement. Microsoft Office is a monster, everyone everywhere uses it and it is the standard for Office Productivity apps. So how have Apple managed to crack Microsoft’s dominance in this market?

Well, iWork ’08 gave Apple the ‘Holy Trinity’ of office apps (Word Processor, Spreadsheets and a Presentation’s App) meaning that for the first time iWork wouldn’t just compliment Office, but was actually able to replace it.

Price may also have a factor; at just $79, iWork’s at least half the cost of office, which stands at a staggering $150-$500, for a suite which does essentially the same job.

Another factor is that iWork has proved itself to be better at some things than Office. Keynote is a better app for presenting than PowerPoint. Period. It just works better on the Mac, and features such as instant alpha, as well as the ‘Apple’ design make it ahead of PowerPoint. Many reviews have pointed this out, with AppleInsider recently putting the two head to head, and coming to the conclusion that Microsoft should scrap PowerPoint and start again.

Numbers can also be better for the average user, as it is simpler to use, with drag and drop formulae for the most simple functions; as well as multiple tables of one page. Pages is also nice to use, as it is better than Word at Page layout and currently runs faster as it is a Universal Binary app (Did anyone think we’d still be talking about whether something is a universal binary nearly 2 years after the transition?).

So could it really be that iWork is better than Office? Simply put, no. But if you delve deeper then it becomes clear that although power users will need Office for some of it’s advanced features, the majority of users will be more than happy with iWork and never meet any of it’s limitations.

But, having said that, Office is now 4 years old, in which time iWork has been written from scratch and been through as many as 3 iterations (Both Pages and Keynote are at version 3, while Numbers is at version 1). The fact that Office still runs in Rosetta may have temporarily converted some users until Microsoft finally deliver Office 2008 in January. This may push users back into Office, meaning that iWork may return to the shadows.

So what will the future bring? Well who knows, Office may re-assert its dominance after it becomes a universal binary, or iWork may finally have moved into the spotlight, after many people, including myself, have used iWork and decided that it does everything they need it to, without the expense of Office. All will become clearer after Office 2008 is released in January, probably at the MacWorld Expo.

So what do you use? Are you sticking with what you know in Microsoft Office, or have you switched to iWork? Tell us in the comments!

Via Ars Technia; Statistics are from recent NPD Group research

Like Ronseal, it does exactly what it says on the tin. You get 24 effects, including some that were previewed at WWDC, but never made the final cut into 10.5.

It’s a compilation of some of the effects we’ve seen before, like the Hologram effect, however there are lots of different ones, such as my personal favorite: Cube. You can even star in your own personal iPod ad! These effects are all bundled into one simple download; thankfully it comes with a simple installer, so you don’t have to go looking around in the system files, or editing .plist’s to install them.

I have to admit, although I thought these effects would be a gimmick, and I’d only use them once, I’ve actually found myself using them quite often, mainly due to the fact that it makes video conversations that little bit more interesting!

Another, less publicized feature in the new PhotoBooth and iChat is the fact you can be inside any QuickTime movie, or any photo you want. Simply drop it on the empty spaces and hey presto, you’re the star! And, of course, you can do some hopeless and shameless advertising like this:

MoreiChatEffects is available free from iSmiley. These are well worth a look, however it’s worth noting that they work best on Intel; PowerPC support is limited, and of course, this is Leopard only kids.

One of the great features in that list is Open Format Timeline, already found in Final Cut Studio. This allows you to drag in different format clips, and they’ll seamlessly blend together. Not only can this bring together HD and DV footage, but NTSC and PAL as well. (Don’t you just love AV acronyms!)

Also new is a whole set of compositing and effects features. There are now over 200 transitions and filters, with FxPlug compatibility. This is the same architecture as Final Cut Studio, so effects can be moved.  Keyframe automation is also big. This allows you to mark the ‘Key Frames’ in your video, and therefore link other things to it, such as the audio track and transitions. LiveType 2.1 is also included, which makes it easy and quick to make animated titles and credits. 50 animated textures, royalty free, are included; all of them broadcast quality. 

This is a long awaited update, with the Final Cut Express HD 3.x track having served a long period. Most notably the update brings many features of Final Cut Studio into the significantly cheaper Final Cut Express. Oh yeah, Final Cut Express has also recieved a price chop, now costing just $199 (down from $299), or $99 to upgrade from versions 1 – 3.5. So it looks like FCE at $199 may be well worth it especially if you don’t like the new iMovie, and feel Final Cut Studio is bit overkill for you’re needs.

Final Cut Express 4 is available now from Apple where you can check out some QuickTime ‘Tours’ to tell you more about all the new features. Would love to hear some opinions from the video scrubbers out there.

Other than compatibility with the new OS, Undercover has received a few updates to make it more likely that you’ll get your Mac back. These include a part of the recovery program, that if your Mac is not connected to the Internet for 2 months or more, it will initiate ‘Plan B’ which involves the staging of a hardware failure.

They have also upgraded the way it runs, so it now takes up even less of your oh-so-precious resources. Memory footprint is down about 75% in most cases and CPU and internet use have also been reduced dramatically.

Better yet, Undercover 2.0 is a free upgrade for all 1.x customers! Meaning you can now lock down your Mac even more against the thieves whether you upgraded to Leopard or not. Undercover 2.0 is available to buy from Orbicule at $49, or there is a free upgrade for existing users, with instructions on how to upgrade here.

Also Orbicule are generous to the students of the world, giving it to you for just $39, and if you are in charge of a School/District network of Mac’s this may well be worth a serious look, as it is just $8 per Mac when you buy 100+ copies.

The first thing you notice with Photon, is that it’s fast. It can quickly scan a card, and puts full resolution previews into the application. Photon supports JPEG, PNG, and a wide variety of RAW image formats. Each import is put into a ‘Stack’, where you can view the photos Metadata as well as a histogram.

One of the best features of the app is how you view the photos. As a default setting, you see the whole image, fitted to the size of the window. Then, if you want to have a look around the photo, you simply click, it zooms in, and as you move your mouse around, you move the image. It’s a really good implementation of a simple feature, however it would be nice to see a setting that controls how far it zooms in when you click.

Earlier in the review, I mentioned ‘Stacks’. These make it very simple to sort photos before you put them into iPhoto. You simply drag a photo from one stack to another to move it, or you can create a new stack by dropping it onto some empty space. After you’ve finished sorting your photos, you can export the stack, and then import it into your preferred photo editor. If you need to quickly change the format of a stack of photos, you can do so in PNG, JPEG, TIFF and all of the usual export options.

The vast majority of the apps features have hot-keys attached to them, meaning if you’re a big fan of using your keyboard for everything, this could be for you. You can even add hot-keys to your stacks, so you can switch between them easily. I found Photon to be a really solid new app. It is quick, and the UI design is simplistic, making it easy to use. It would be nice to see some simple editing tools, such as cropping or an export button to Aperture/Lightroom, added, but I don’t think that is the focus of Photon.

Here is a feature list for Photon 1.0 from their website:

• Version 1.0 sports Leopard compatibility
• Full resolution image previews
• Support for RAW formats from many camera manufacturers
• Batch convert images to JPEG, PNG, PSD and many other formats
• Customizable keyboard shortcuts
• Automatically detects card readers and memory cards
• Supports multi-processor systems
• Full drag and drop support

Photon is available right now from photon-app.com. It normally retails at $69, however there is an introductory price of $49 if you order now.

So what’s new? Well, quite a lot really. There are some special features; however, they are installed alongside some tools to make it an extremely easy server to setup.

Apple is calling it ‘The World’s Easiest Server‘ and claiming that no IT department is required. This could be a huge selling point, as most day to day tasks can be done from within one window: Server Preferences. Just like System Preferences in Desktop OS X, you can change users, setup and configure services available on the network, as well as see different information about what the server is doing.

Also new, is iCal Server. This is a new server that allows iCal events to be shared across a network. Although this will work best with iCal, it uses CalDAV, which is an open standard. This is a great feature for any business, as it allows information on “who is where at when” to be shared, allowing easier scheduling of meetings.

There are also some more niche services which come with Leopard Server; these are Wiki Server, and Podcast Producer. These tools will be very useful, especially with collaborative editing with the Wiki Server; however they are likely to have a smaller user base.

A big new feature is Spotlight Server. This makes it easy to find files anywhere on a network. While it may sound like a bit of a security risk, users can only see files which they have permission to see. This is a good new feature, however time will tell as to just how fast it can really perform.

Those are the main new features for OS X 10.5 Server Edition. It seems like a great upgrade, that could bring it into the mainstream; especially when price is considered. OS X Server costs $499 for 10 clients, and $999 for unlimited clients. This is actually a great deal, as Windows Server 2003 is $999 for just 5 clients.

The system requirements are the same as Leopard Desktop Edition, with an 867Mhz G4 or better required, plus 1GB of RAM. However, 20GB of Disk Space is required. Leopard Server is available now, from the online Apple store, or your local brick-and-mortar store. Check out all the features.

On Thursday, not wanting to be outdone by Apple, Microsoft rolled out a nice, small update to the built in search tool, Windows Desktop Search 3.0.1. This has, apparently, caused many a Windows network to grind to a halt, when the small piece of software installed itself and started to index the PCs.

This all happening despite the fact that it was not installed in the first place and that the administrators thought that they had shut off the auto-update of the feature to prevent this. According to The Register, this is the second time in a month Microsoft has done something of this nature.

A couple of months ago, it was reported that there was a nice easter egg in the new Finder, where connected Windows PC’s icons were monitors featuring a Blue Screen of Death. Many of the developers believed this was just Apple having a bit of fun in the Beta’s. However, it is being reported, that this egg has actually survived!

So there you have it, a bit of Post-OS-Upgrade fun between our favorite software giants. Have you found any other little easter eggs in Leopard? Tell us in the comments below!

If you keep up to date with all the Apple news, you’ll have seen all of Leopards key features (If not Apple has conveniently listed them here); but let’s look at it a different way. What will Leopard do for Mac apps?

Well to get us started, there is Core Animation, which is mainly for developers. It makes it much simpler to make animations, and to animate things within a window. These effects are shown with both Spaces and Time Machine (more on them later); but with 3rd Party Mac apps, we’re likely to see lots more ‘delicious generation’ apps (apps that are often largely based on style – and substance).

This could be good for us, as it will take developers less time to create beautiful apps, however, we will have to wait and see how much of Core Animation is actually used. One Leopard-only app, already announced, is Delicious Library 2. As the name suggests it is a ‘delicious’ app, of which version 2 is said to heavily use Core Animation. It has already won Best Leopard app at the 2007 Apple Design Awards.

Next Up, System Wide 64-bit. This isn’t a big one… yet. 64-bit support basically gives the system the ability to access more memory and more resources at the same time. This won’t make a lot of difference yet, as most things still use less than 4GB (The limit for 32-bit), but as apps and files grow, we’ll see how useful this becomes.

Quick Look, coupled with the new Finder could also be interesting. You’re likely to see a slew of updates with a new, high resolution icons come out just after leopard does; as well as 3rd Party file formats changing very slightly. If you look inside a Pages ’08 document (Right Click, Show Package Contents) you’ll see that Quick Look support is all ready there.

Unfortunately, Leopard is likely to see the end of some apps, due to built-in support. Apps such as Virtue Desktops, Overflow and Super Duper could see the end of their development due to Spaces, Stacks and Time Machine respectively. However the majority are likely to continue to be developed, as in most of the cases, they offer something slightly different, but the people behind Virtue Desktops have all ready announced the end of the product’s life.

It’s also more likely that we will see more widgets, due to the fact that DashCode will be included. DashCode is a simple development environment where you can develop a simple widget without knowing any coding, or where you can create complicated widgets with coding knowledge. It makes life easier for a ‘Pro’ widget developer with instant debugging, and like Xcode, includes code snippets to make it quicker to develop widgets.

Due to an upgrade to Objective-C 2.0 we may also see shorter release cycles and better memory management. The shorter release cycles may come partly due to Xray, which helps analyse apps, and show where they are having problems, or where memory leaking problems are. Better memory management comes on behalf of Xcode 3 and ‘Garbage Collection’ which seeks out parts of the app which are not used, and removes their memory use, to allow other apps to use the memory. This is a very basic description, but it’s fairly well explained here in Wikipedia. Leopard also sports an updated version of OpenGL, the graphics engine in OS X.

On the surface Leopard is a solid update; not amazing, but it brings OS X together, unifies it, and adds a few long requested features. However, dig a little deeper, and in the world of Mac applications, Leopard is an excellent update, which is likely to bring us lots of nice new or updated apps.

You can pre-order Leopard now at your local Apple Store (USA, UK, International), so check back to MacApper for lots of Leopard App reviews as new software is released!

GarageBuy, from iwascoding, is an app where you can browse, place a bid, and buy from eBay; it’s international too, with support for many eBay shops around the world.

The interface is simple, and makes eBay a breeze to navigate. It saves your searches in the left hand column, along with your watched auctions. On the right, there are two panes, the top allows you to see all the items, each in their own separate box, as shown below. This makes it easy to see all the key details, such as ‘Feedback’ and ‘Time Left’ without having to dig into the page. This bottom pane contains two tabs, one displays the images of the product, while the other shows the original page from eBay with a full description.

The process with GarageBuy is much more slick than it is just using the eBay website. For one thing say goodbye to the refresh button. GarageBuy does it automatically, ensuring you always see the highest bidder’s price. Growl support is also built in, to tell you when the status of an auction changes, so you can be on top of what’s happening and get the product you want.

Buying an item is simple and secure. It uses the same security as eBay, and keeps you logged in to make it quicker to bid, and to allow it to keep your ‘Watched’ list up-to-date. When you want to buy something, a simple window pops up, asking how much you want to bid. If you want to BuyitNow, you can. A nice touch is the fact that you can have multiple accounts, which, if you have a family PC that has 3 or 4 different accounts can make the buying process easier for all.

Buying can also be made safer. You can maintain a blacklist of users so the app doesn’t show items listed by these people, allowing you to steer clear of them without even thinking about it. Another useful feature is the ability to generate iCal events so you can tell when the auction finishes, and be there when it’s time to bid. You can also hide auctions that you don’t want to see from a search, so you don’t keep going back to the same thing that you don’t want.

Overall, GarageBuy is an excellent app. It simplifies buying on eBay, just like GarageSale did for selling. It is eBay certified for compatibility, and if your the eBay type, then it’s definitely worth a look! GarageBuy is free from iwascoding, and is available here.

Apache is the most common web server used on OS X. It is the industry standard and is actually the most widely used web server software available. While the nuts and bolts of Apache are out of the scope of this article, I’ll show you how to quickly set up the server, as well as make it internet accessible with an easy to remember free domain name.

First, go to System Preferences and then click on Sharing. From here, you need to tick the ‘Personal Web Sharing’ check box. This starts up Apache.

The next step is to decide where to store the web files. Your best bet is to put files in /Library/WebServer/Documents. These files will show up in the top level of your web site. You can also put files in the Sites folder within your home folder.

Just for fun let’s drop to a command line by firing up terminal. Type:

httpd -v

You should see something like this:

Server version: Apache/1.3.33 (Darwin)
Server built: Aug 19 2006 07:55:18

So you can clearly see your version of Apache along with the date it was compiled and installed. Another important piece of information is to know where Apache stores its logs:

/var/log/httpd

If you have problems be sure to check the most recent error.log file for clues.

Apache has a plethora of useful configuration flags, which again is really outside of the scope of this quick guide. The Apache configuration file is at:

/etc/httpd/httpd.conf

The Apache configuration file is fully commented, but do yourself a favor and check out some literature on the configuration before messing around. O’Reilly has a decent guide for Mac users here.

Okay you’ve learned a tiny bit about Apache so lets copy a photo, movie, song or text file to the /Library/WebServer/Documents folder. Once you’ve done that, go to http://127.0.0.1/hello.mov (or whatever file you chose) in your browser. Did you see your file okay? Hooray! 127.0.0.1 is what’s called the “localhost” IP address. It will always redirect to your current computer without you having to know what your network IP is.

So now you can publish your site to this folder. For example, in iWeb, publish your site to a folder; then copy the contents of that folder to the appropriate web server folder, mentioned above. The key is that you must have the index.htm(l) file in that root directory. The same is applicable for all other publishing apps, or even basic html in a text editor.

So, if you’ve managed to get this far, you can go to http://127.0.0.1 (or http://127.0.0.1/~username) and you’ll see your page.

So now you can access your files anywhere on your local network. Simply visit your local IP address, which is shown on the Sharing Preference Pane when Personal Web Sharing is selected. You should see it in the white box, and you can simply click on it to test it, or bookmark it to make it easier to find.

So this is fine and dandy but if you can map your router so that incoming requests come to your Mac, then you can view your website from any internet connected computer in the world. Now that could be useful. This will usually work by logging into the configuration for your router, and using web forwarding to point port 80 to your Mac’s internal ip address. It’s different for all router brands but I bet if you do some Googling you’ll figure this step out.

Now simply go to your external IP (which you can find here) and you should see your web accessible Mac. Ensure that you are properly firewalled, because leaving ports open on the internet is a bad idea.

So what do you do if you are using an ISP that changes your IP dynamically or you want to have an easier to remember domain instead of an IP? There are some great dynamic DNS services out there, but the one I use is from no-ip.com. The service is free and they have a decent list of domains to choose from as well as provide a great simple to use client for Mac. Make an account at no-ip and under Hosts/Redirect > Manage you will need to create a Host name, and select a root domain to use. Be creative!

Now download and fire up the Mac client from no-ip. This is the program that tells no-ip what your IP is and keeps it updated. You will need to login with your no-ip username and password as well as set the client for an update interval. I use 1 hour for this but a better setting might 5 mins if your IP changes frequently.

If you are going to be operating like this a lot you also might want to enable Launch Deamon at System Startup under the Deamon tab so that np-ip launches at startup.

So that’s about it! Keep in mind there is lot more I could have said about Apache web server, its configuration, security and its other many facets but I will leave that for another article(s). For now, as long as the no-ip client, and Apache is running ok you should have a publicly accessible web server with an easy to remember domain name. This is a great way to quickly share files, do some web development, or simply be that much more l33ter than everyone else. Have fun!

*Editor: If you are looking for a full-on LAMP (Linix, Apache, MySQL, PHP) style development server check out our recent MAMP review.

When you delete a file from a memory card, it isn’t actually removed from the card until it is overwritten; all that happens is the card forgets where those bits of data are stored. CardRaider works by putting those bits back together to reform your lost pictures!

The App itself is extremely simple. There is the option to do a one-click scan and save, in which it scans your card, and saves everything to a selected folder. If you don’t want all the photos saved onto your Mac, you can let it scan, then pick which photos you want to be saved.

CardRaider can also export to directly iPhoto. This works with iPhoto ’08; however it creates a new ‘event’ for every photo. You can also choose to simply preview the photo. This is especially useful if a photo is only partly recoverable, to see how badly damaged the file is.

In my experience, it has recovered all my photos fully, with no data loss; however, my advice is to run CardRaider as soon as you notice a photo is missing, to minimise the risk of losing it.

CardRaider also does another job. It can permanently delete a file from the card, so that even apps like CardRaider can’t find it! This may be useful if there’s an embarrassing photo on your card *ahem ahem*, since as we now know, even when it’s deleted, it’s still there.

CardRaider supports JPEG and many Raw formats like CRW, NEF etc. For a full list. check out this chart on Ecamm’s website. I recommend giving the demo a run before you buy, so that you can be sure it supports the format you work with the most.

The demo limits you to downloading ‘Preview’ files, which are very low resolution. The app only costs $19.95, which is well worth it if you can save that perfect shot! It is available from Ecamm Network here.

That’s where Iris comes in. This app does everything that Photobooth does, but it comes with loads of great, extra features clamped on.

Firstly, there are the same features as PhotoBooth, but vastly improved. You can take pictures from your internal or external iSight, from a selection of 26 different filters. Some of the filters are really good for making funky photos. My personal favorite is Kaleidoscope. Others include OpTile, Dots, Crystals and EdgeWork; some are more impressive than others, but they’re all a bit of fun!

Now onto the interesting bits. Firstly: Movie Capture. This one is kind of self explanatory; you can save in about every format that QuickTime supports, including MPEG-4 and H.264 up to the resolution of your iSight, which is 640×480. You can also tell it to record for a specific number of hours, seconds or minutes, making it a nice, small app to quickly capture a short video on your iSight. Notably missing are filter effects for video; this is unfortunate, but these may be added in later releases as this is a beta product.

The next feature it has over PhotoBooth is TimeLapse recording. It has the same video options as above, but lets you take a reduced number of frames per second, which is then sped up, e.g. you record one frame per second, but then play them at 15 frames per second. This makes a really cool effect, and is generally just another nice feature to play with!

Next up, Security. This one’s nice. It makes your iSight a motion detector going off when someone or something moves within your iSight frame. The sensitivity can be tailored, so an alert is only set off with a certain amount of movement. It can also be locked so that when activated, the settings can’t be changed and the app can’t be quit.

When something triggers the app, it can play a sound (or message!), record a movie (of a user specified length), a TimeLapse movie, or just take mug shot of the person using your Mac! These mug-shots can then be e-mailed. This is a great feature, that is used by certain other apps, however it’s nice to have in in a lovely ‘all-in-one’ app!

Impressively, it also has a ‘Webcam’ feature. This essentially publishes your iSight to your Mac’s built in web server (yes, every mac has a web server built in). It can also be viewed outside your local network, if you’ve set up your Mac and router correctly (details in an article soon!). Again, Webcam has many of the same options as the other video portions of the App, however as a default it is set to have less frames per second, so you don’t use all your bandwidth.

Iris already has a fairly impressive feature set, but it has one more, fairly big, trick up its sleeve. It has a built-in Gallery, with the ability to view and send any of the recorded material you have made. It can mail it, send it to Flickr, or export it to your iPod, iPhone or Apple TV. This is an excellent touch, giving the app a more rounded feel, allowing you to make and publish content all in the same, simplistic app.

Iris does have a few problems, performance can be poor when in photos, with the filter selector on, and while I was testing it, it crashed once or twice. However, Iris is still in beta, and development is active, so most bugs should be ironed out in the coming months.

Iris is a great app. It’s fun and has some productive bits as well. The gallery is a great idea, as is the ‘Security’ feature. There are no major bugs that I could find and is well worth downloading to try it out.

Iris is available from MildMannered Industries and the software is currently in a free, public beta. Grab it quick because it will be $30 when it goes on sale in the near future.

SchoolHouse is simple to set up. You just right click in the left hand pane and add a term; under each term, you can add classes. In each class, you can not only keep track of your assignments but also professor information, grade weighting, time, location, etc. There is a slight problem with this, my school works on a 2-week cycle, meaning that classes are only the same every second week, which is not supported in the app.

SchoolHouse has an excellent interface. You can see all the information you want to know at a glance about your assignments (week, month, and list views are all available).

Adding a new assignment is easy; just click on the assignment button in the top left and you can add information about the assignment on the right side panel.

In this panel, there are 3 tabs: Details, Project and Files. Details is where you enter the details of the assignment, you can set a priority, which is a very useful feature, as well as due date, course, and comments. The Project and Files are the two tabs that hold the unique features of this app. In ‘Project’ you can add tasks for each assignment which you can tick off as you go along. You can also add a Partner, which is very useful, as it gives you a quick link to email them. The final pane, Files is a brilliant time saver. All you have to do is drag any file related to the project into the box pane and you have the option of either linking to the file or creating a duplicate for the app. Unfortunately, you can’t choose where it keeps the duplicate files; it automatically saves them to Application Support folder in your Library.

SchoolHouse not only lets you keep up to date with your assignments, it allows you to store notes. The notepad supports rich text, tables, and links. This makes a very easy way to have organized, and searchable notes!

Another unique feature is ClassCasts which are RSS feeds for your classes. RSS files can be stored in on any (S)FTP server as well as your .Mac, Amazon S3, or WebDav accounts. If you collaborate with other people a lot or are a professor this is a great feature.

SchoolHouse also has other unique features such as the ability to generate a graph showing how well you’ve done over the term. You can also make smart folders to organize your assignments.

Overall SchoolHouse is an excellent app despite a few minor flaws. It’s the best GTD app geared towards students, and is definitely worth a try. Best of all, SchoolHouse is donationware and is available for free from Logan Collins.

However, what if you don’t have time to read them while at your computer? That’s where iFeedPod comes in. It’s a small app which syncs your feeds to your iPod using the ‘Notes’ section. This allows you to read your RSS feeds whenever it’s most convenient for you. Sound good?

You simply add the RSS feed address (may i suggest the MacApper RSS feed) either by typing them in, or importing a .opml file. A .opml can be exported from many RSS readers and it simply gives a list of the addresses so you don’t have to type them all into iFeedPod if you already use a RSS reader. When you next have your iPod plugged in you simply press ‘sync’ and it moves all your feeds to your iPod as ‘Notes’.

iFeedPod simple app, however I think you should be able to limit the number of stories from each feed it grabs (i.e. latest 10 posts from ‘MacApper’). Otherwise this is a great app which is well worth downloading if you read a lot of RSS feeds. iFeedPod is donationware, and is available from Carnglas software here

iWork, consisting of Pages and Keynote, has been growing in popularity, however, iWork has never been thought of as a real competitor to Microsoft Office. This is mainly because iWork lacked a Spreadsheet App, but also because Pages has often been considered more of a desktop publishing app rather than a real word processor. With iWork ’08, all that will change – the long-awaited Numbers spreadsheet app has been introduced, as well as some big changes throughout the suite. This is a big one, so sit back, relax, and read on.

Pages

The first thing that hits you in the new Pages is there are a whole lot more templates. In total there are 145, split into sections under 2 subheadings, which brings me nicely onto the next change: Pages now has 2 modes, Page Layout and Word Processing. This makes Pages a 2-in-1 app – it does both desktop publishing and word processing strong enough to rival anything else out there.

Another new feature is “track changes”. This has been around for a while on other word processors, so it is a good, solid addition which I’m sure many people will use. We here at MacApper use it so we contributors can see what the Editors have changed in our drafts.

Now, because Pages is a desktop publishing app as well, it has some new graphics tools. The most noteworthy of these is “instant alpha,” which removes backgrounds from photos, leaving just the foreground. This is great, and it works most of the time. You simply select a range of colors in a photo, and “instant alpha” will remove all of the similar colors. The only times it has failed for me so far is in beach shots, as skin very easily disappears due to the similarity of colors.

My favorite new feature is the “contextual format bar.” This removes much of the need to use the “inspector” window, as it gives you the information you need at a glance. If you are typing or editing text, it shows fonts and font sizes. If you are doing something with an image, it will change to a bar in which you can select how the image is placed on the page and add reflections. This is a brilliant feature, which really shows its worth when you have limited screen space.

Text Boxes are also improved, as you can link them together. This is especially useful if you want to start a story on a front page and continue it elsewhere; you simply click on the blue square and drag to the follow-on text box. When you run out of space in the first, it carries on in the second. This is really handy if you are making a newsletter or other multi-page document.

Pages also has a bit of a trick up its sleeve, as was mentioned on TUAW. You can open Word 2007 documents with this app, better than you can with any Microsoft tool! Apple claims that all of the page formatting will remain after you’ve imported it. Neat, huh?

Tables are also improved, mainly due to the new Numbers app, which now allows you to add formulas to the tables within Pages. More on that in the Numbers review further down.

The main thing is that Pages is more rounded, and it does the simple things better. Word Processing is now better; it feels right; it has new tools such as proofreading (for grammatical errors); and you can highlight a word and look it up in the OS X dictionary.
From my brief use of Pages ’08 so far, I can really feel the improvements, it feels a bit snappier, and the new tools really make the app like two programs in one. At this junction I think it is miles ahead of Word:Mac, mainly due to the speed (I own an Intel Mac, and Rosetta can be painful). Time will only tell if it competes well against Word when it finally arrives in Universal Binary format in January ’08.

Numbers

Numbers is really brilliant. It is like no Spreadsheet app I have used before, and I'll explain why.

Making a formula is simple. You can have multiple tables on a single page, all of which can be completely independent of each other. Table references can be words, not confusing cell locations like A2:A16. Put simply, it is spreadsheets done without a university Ph.D. in math required.

For example, say you want to work out the sum of a set of numbers. You simply highlight them, then look to the bottom corner of the app. It tells you the sum, average, min, max and count. Then, simply drag to a cell, and it's done.

Apple’s greatest innovation was to make Tables (which have been in Keynote and Pages) fully functioning spreadsheets (hence the reason Tables have been improved in the rest of iLife). So, on any page you can place multiple spreadsheets, complimented with Charts (which are stunning), and all your iLife media (Yes, you can add music to a spreadsheet!). It works better like this, as each table can be sized to fit the data. For example, you may want some text directly below a set of numbers. In any other spreadsheet program the numbers would end up being in a huge, wide box that is way too big. Not so with Numbers. Because of the separate tables, each column can be sized correctly. This is shown in the “mortgage calculator” template.

Although it is simple, it does all the complicated functions you would expect. From financial tools to trigonometry, from text to statistics, it will do them all.

Excel import and export is as easy as you would expect, and integration with other OS X apps is also there – for example you can use Address Book contacts in your tables.

Templates are also here, they are easy to customize, and make things much quicker if you can fit your project into one of the templates. There is everything from team organization to vacation planning to more business related uses such as expense reports or invoices.

Numbers is a brilliant app. It allows you to move away from Office, and use iWork exclusively. It completes the bundle, and does what it says it will: Spreadsheets for the rest of us.

Keynote

Keynote has seen some of the changes that I spoke of in Pages, such as Instant Alpha and the Format Bar, but Keynote also received some nice changes of its own.

The most work shows in Animations. There are new Text Effects and new Transitions, which you will have seen already if you saw the MacWorld or WWDC07 Keynotes. Even better, there is now A-B pathway animation, which is actually really easy to use.

Voice-Over recording is also now available, as are Smart Builds, my favorite new feature.

Probably most famous already for introducing the iPhone as a single product at MacWorld, Smart Builds allow you to drag images onto a bar, and Keynote will animate them. What would previously have taken a whole slideshow to do, using transitions, can now be done on a single slide. Simply select which animation you want, drag the images on, and you’re done. It's brilliant, and a great way to show different pictures during one slide.

As with Pages, Keynote feels more polished, faster and more grown up. I have always preferred Keynote to PowerPoint, due to the Apple design (and presentations are all about looks, so it's important). This update, although smaller than the update Pages has received, makes it that much better again.

Overall, this is a brilliant update. The addition of Numbers makes all the difference, as there is now an Apple version of the 3 main productivity Apps. At $79 for the set, this package is a killer value, too. It remains to be seen how they compare once Microsoft reveal Office:Mac Ëœ08 in January, but I won’t hold my breath.

Is it worth $79? If you like how iWork ’06 works, with slightly more emphasis on design than MS Office, then definitely. Otherwise, check out the trial.

If you want to try iWork ’08, you can. Apple has a free 30 day demo available clocking in at a 469MB download available here. iWork retails for $79, and is available from the Apple Store right now.

We would love to hear what you think of the upgrade, so tell us about your favorite tidbits in the comments below!

It is a simple shooting game in which you are a tank. You can’t move the tank (for simplicity) however you can move the barrel up, down, left and right. You have a small arsenal of weapons available to you that include Rockets, Grenades and Barrel Makers. For impeding your opponent, you have Smoke Screens and Wall Makers available for you to use.

The aim is to destroy your opponents fort, which is comprised of a number of randomly selected buildings. Each building starts off with a score of 100, and every time you hit it, points come off. When the building goes to 0, the building is demolished. The first person to destroy all the opponents buildings wins.

Another plus point of the game is that the controls are very simple. Use the directional arrows to adjust your barrel, and space to fire. If Mountain Tanks sounds like something you would like to try, I recommend that while you’re playing you press ‘c’ to see all the little extra buttons that makes the game playable.

This games ‘Party Piece’ however is network gaming. Up to 6 people can play at the same time; the great thing is you only need 1 registered copy, which acts as the server for everyone to play. If you’ve not got multiple Macs, or you’re not on a network with them, then you can play any combination of up to 6 human or ‘computer’ players (e.g. 5 humans, 1 computer; or 1 computer, 1 person).

Overall, Mountain Tanks is a great, simple game; even if, like me, you’re not a big gamer. It’s a good bit of fun to fill a spare few minutes. This game was built to be simple, but I did find I had a few gripes with it. With an arsenal of only 3 weapons to use, game play gets stale after a few single matches. Playing with other Humans is usually more interesting than playing with the computers. Another gripe is the graphics. As a shareware app, it is not expected that the graphics be outstanding, but if the graphics could be improved, it would make the game all that much more fun.

Mountain Tanks is $18 and available from Battery Acid Games.

ImageTricks is built around Tiger’s Core Image functionality, a little utility for developers to do some cool stuff with images. It’s a bit complicated to get into, (especially since I’m not a developer) but if you want more info, head over to Apple’s website for a brief explanation.

Anyway, on with the app. Image Tricks allows you to apply Core Image filters to any image with ease. You simply drag a picture into the window and use the sidebar to apply a huge number of effects (48 in total, 54 in the pro version). You can adjust the colours, make it artsy (stylize it), distort the image, blur the picture, or simply crop it.

These effects do everything. Most of them are just for fun (aka making people’s faces look silly), however, some will find the colour management and focusing tools very useful. It is rather easy to use, while still appealing to a fairly wide audience. The image below was made using the Parallelogram Kaelidescope filter.

It won’t replace your image editor of choice; ImageTricks is mainly for playing with, having a laugh, or touching up a single photo when you’re in a hurry. You can also generate images using the ‘Generate’ tab at the top, which is great for making funky backgrounds. Don’t underestimate the power of geometric shapes, because I managed to create the pattern below.

ImageTricks also integrates with BeLight’s popular ‘Printfolio’ suite of desktop publishing software, which is a nice touch for those who use Printfolio. Once you’re done messing around with your images, ImageTricks can also re-size/rotate images and add rounded corners. The app provides options to export your creation in any one of the usual image formats (TIFF, JPEG, PDF, PNG and GIF).

Image Tricks is a really fun app, possibly the next best after Apple’s PhotoBooth. Even if you’ll only use it once or twice, it’s really worth it, mainly due to the fact that it’s freeware is rather fully featured. You can upgrade to a pro version, if you find you use it a lot.

Imagetricks is available from BeLight Software. The Pro version gives you some extra filters and generators for $14.95.

Firefox makes my life simpler by having Google’s ‘I’m Feeling Lucky’ search built into the address bar, so if I type ‘MacApper’ or ‘Apple UK’ it would take me to the respective websites without having to go through Google or typing ‘.com’ or ‘.co.uk’.

However, Camino lacked this functionality, which for me, was a deal breaker. However, after a bit of looking around, I found Pimp My Camino. It’s a great site with loads of plugins, add-ons and just about anything you can think of for Camino. Particularly interesting for me though, was MoreCamino 1.0 by Dave Feare.

This preference pane for Camino added the functionality that I needed. In fact, it even took it further by allowing me to use Google ‘I’m Feeling Lucky’ UK, where I live. With Pimp My Camino, you can take Camino to new levels. There are optimized builds for different platforms (Intel, PPC etc.), new themes, plug-ins and even a few tips.

Obviously, they don’t go as far as Firefox plugins can. However, there are still some good things that make Camino better. So if you’re fed up with the Fox, and getting lost in Safari, then Camino is well worth a try. Check out Pimp My Camino.