In the last five months I’ve found an armload of great OS X freeware:
Firefox is my default web browser, but I also use Camino and SeaMonkey.
For an office application suite, you can’t beat OpenOffice. Its OS X incarnation is NeoOffice.
OS X has a good set of system utilities, but there are still a few gaps here and there. For example, it’s not easy to know file and folder sizes at a glance — using ⌘-I in the Finder will only gives you one size measurement at a time. WhatSize measures your whole hard disk and lets you know, well, what size everything on it is. It’s a must when housecleaning time inevitably comes around.
Azureus is my BitTorrent client of choice for P2P downloading. And once you’ve downloaded all those files, for unpacking zipped and archived items, StuffIt Expander and UnRarX come in handy.
Now that I have a fast computer that can read DVDs and play videos, I’ve been experimenting with ripping my DVDs to AVI files using HandBrake, and playing them (and files in practically any other video format, too) with VLC.
If I need a Photoshop-style image editor, I use The GIMP or Seashore. But honestly, iPhoto is often all I need for cropping and resizing. I’m not crazy about iPhoto’s goofy file structure, and I don’t trust it to manage my images, but it sure has nifty tools.
I use ArcGIS at work, so of course I was curious as to what kinds of geographic information systems apps are out there for the home user. ArcExplorer Java Edition for Education doesn’t have the professional-grade capabilities of its full-service big cousin, but it reads shapefiles just fine, and that’s 95% of what most people want. And hey, it’s free, which is a hell of a lot cheaper than paying per-seat licensing for ArcGIS. And although Google Earth isn’t strictly a GIS app, I include it here because it’s still an amazing tool for looking at the world and I use it just as often.
Other than the Apple apps that come pre-installed in Tiger, the only OS X software app that I’ve actually paid money for is CrossOver Mac, a Windows emulator to let me run those few Windows apps for which there isn’t a good OS X counterpart, like specialized technical software, or certain games, or even Internet Explorer (!). Rival Windows virtualization apps like Parallels Desktop require you to buy (!) and install (!!) Windows onto your Mac, but Crossover Mac works without needing an actual copy of Windows. Instead, it emulates the Windows APIs and fools the Windows apps into thinking that they are running in a Windows environment. It’s very cool, it doesn’t make you vulnerable to Windows viruses, and at $60 it’s also a lot cheaper than having to buy a full copy of Windows.
I use CrossOver Mac to run a few hard-to-replace Windows apps: AutoStitch (an awesome image-stitching tool), ACDSee 2.42 (my favorite old image browser), Picasa (potentially my favorite new image browser, if Google ever develops an OS X version), and even some technical software from work like Visual Sample Plan. I love it.
I’m clueless as to what you’re talking about but I enjoy reading it because I know I’m learning something & 5-10 years from now I’ll understand it but by then it’ll be a dinosaur. LOL
Stumbled upon your blog while looking for Hawaii related stuff, but welcome aboard the Mac platform. It is difficult for some to make the leap – I try to convince them to get a Mac and most of my friends just look at me like I’m trying to sell them a used car. The last Macworld the guys poked fun at how Vista will look and feel like Mac’s current Tiger OS, that’s something to look forward to.
Kudos for finding all the free and shareware out there as well – there is a abundance of great programs out there. Have fun!
They say that converts are usually the biggest zealots. I think it’s true!
You forgot to mention WoW. Surely you have been assimilated?
Does this mean we get to iChatAV now?
WoW holds very little appeal for me. I spend my on-screen leisure time websurfing, not gaming.
I was fiddling with iChat the other evening and got it hooked up to Gmail’s integrated chat feature. I discovered that audio chatting just for the hell of it is almost exactly like calling somebody up on the telephone just for the hell of it. To be more specific, it was like using conference-call speakerphones in an uncontrolled office setting where people were drifting in and out of the room at random. Bleh.
Agree with you about the voice chat functions, however I find the video chat functions brilliant. I regularly meet with writing partners and family in video conferences using iChatAV. I have had very productive meetings using iChatAV (video) and Writely and other collaborative tools. Have yet to do a fourway iChatAV bridge game or trumps though…